The Future without Racism

On March 21st, HCA Vanadzor organized a workshop entitled “The Future without Racism” devoted to the International Day for the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination. Participants included students of various public schools of Vanadzor and the volunteers of HCA Vanadzor.

We did not choose the title by accident! Crimes based on nationality, ethnicity, and religion continue to exist in the various parts of the world. The task of creating a society free from all forms of discrimination remains ahead. To this end raising public awareness on the all forms of racial discrimination and the consequences is vital, especially on the part of youth. This was the reason why we chose students and young people to participate in the seminar.

See the report (eng) (pdf 2.49 mb)

The seminar was opened by Armine Sadikyan, a specialist of peace-building and manager of regional projects implemented by HCA Vanadzor. She presented the goal of the seminar and explained that it was organized within UNITED European wide action week. The seminar was facilitated by Marianna Ghahramanyan, a volunteer of HCA Vanadzor. She started with an interactive game called “Shipwreck,” which aimed at revealing the approaches of the participants to the issue.

The youngsters were familiarized with an understanding of discrimination; they discussed the International Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination, its traditional and modern hidden manifestations; as well as the necessity of perceiving diversity and of not accepting differences as threats.

We also showed the students a film on the previous activities of HCA Vanadzor organized on the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. We encouraged the participants to initiate events with students in their schools. They were all given hand-outs and information leaflets presenting the definitions of terms from UNITED.