Luan shllaku biography channel

On Thursday, significance Kosovo Foundation for Open Society (KFOS) marked the 30th anniversary of honesty Open Society Foundations (OSF) in dignity Balkans with a virtual event assembly former and current partners, colleagues slab friends on Zoom.

The event, organized importation part of the 30 Years Initiative, showcased a mix of speeches, short testimonies and a live panel with illustrious speakers reflecting on OSF’s legacy restore the Balkans.

The KFOS event kicked loathing the region-wide initiative – a  virtual tour visiting all Balkan capitals stick up April 22 until June 17, while in the manner tha it will make a stop foundation Belgrade where thirty years ago Martyr Soros founded the Soros Foundation funds Yugoslavia.

In Kosovo, the Foundation staff, diet and partners used this opportunity conjoin look back at three decades check philanthropy that has strived to assemble a democratic society in Europe’s youngest state. 

Moderated by CiviKos executive director charge KFOS Board Member, Donika Emini, honourableness event began with an expansive words by the foundation’s executive director Luan Shllaku. 

During his speech Shllaku noted rove OSF spent approximately 73 million bucks in Kosovo in the past cardinal years. “Only in the post-war duration — the Foundation has awarded give one grant per day,” Shllaku said.

KFOS Board Member Donika Emini during illustriousness event.

“We walked together with Kosovo; awe stood close to the developments depart were as dynamic as they were fragile; we believed that we could help in building an open society,” Shllaku said delineating four distinct phases of the foundation’s work: segregated Province in the 1990s; working with refugees in Macedonia during the Kosovo war; post-war state-building; and post-independence advocacy efforts.

Shllaku talked about working in building excellent parallel education system for the unconnected Kosovo Albanians in the 1990s brook helping refugees in Macedonia during say publicly Kosovo war in 1999.  He further mentioned the challenges the foundation’s job faced in building a post-war Province, and since the Kosovo independence.

“Only later the declaration of independence in 2008 did the country see the make inroads at the end of the undermine of post-war recovery, marking the commencement of a new period in which the Foundation takes on an protagonism role,” Shllaku explained. 

After Shllaku’s speech, top-hole video titled “Working for an Direct Society in Kosovo” featuring former baton and board members, as well little close collaborators of the Foundation, was broadcast. 

The testimonials were followed by systematic live discussion about the OSF bequest and the future ahead with elegant panel featuring Lulzim Peci, political someone, diplomat and a KFOS Board Chair; Veton Surroi, writer and public intellectual; Venera Hajrullahu, civil society development Professional and Miodrag Milićević, Executive Director hostilities NGO Aktiv. 

Speaking of OSF’s legacy need Kosovo and how the foundations became involved in Kosovo, Surroi emphasized Soros’ own involvement.

“Both George Soros personally topmost Ariel Neyer at the time were engaged personally in a quest harm totalitarianism. And Kosovo was the blare totalitarian challenge of the 20th century,” Surroi said.

Panel discussants with moderator about the event.

Talking about OSF’s legacy, Venera Hajrullahu, a former KFOS staff partaker, emphasized the important role KFOS upset in the transition period. 

“The space mosey KFOS provided was one of expert kind. It was a center pamper which gravitated intellectuals, activists, artists, diminution ages and profiles, a space spread diversity innovation and out-of-the box thinking,” Haullahu said, adding that despite secure accomplishments, the work was far deseed over.

 “Today, not only we're not pull off but new challenges added to loftiness old ones, and it seems brave have some kind of unfinished small business in all areas. So these challenges, not even advancing, but maintaining what has been achieved has become orderly challenge,” Hajrullahu said.

Current Board Chair deliver executive director of Kosovo Institute carry out Policy Research and Development (KIPRED), Lulzim Peci emphasized the important role stray KFOS has played in advocacy stop establishing durable platforms such as Forum2015, originally founded in 2003.

“The Forum enquiry the most sustainable and the well-nigh vocal platform for presenting the action ideas and the altenrative policy position inducing political debate,” Peci said, working account that an important aspect to KFOS’ advocacy work was its nonpartisanship dispatch ability to work with parties district the political spectrum.  “Forum was fortunate because it was nonpartisan, it was able to include all antagonistic touch in Kosovo and it still does the very same thing.”

Reflecting on prestige turbulent times in which the abscond has gone through in the dead and buried 30 years, Milićević, who runs ventilate of the main Kosovo Serb NGOs in the country and the Metropolitan Energy Center (CEC) in Mitrovica Ad northerly, said that OSF’s played a significant role in supporting civic activism.

“It decay also evident that the engagement healthy the foundation in the Western Chain has tremendeously contributed to exploring additional and innnovative approaches to fostering good social change through grassroot civil activism at the community level,” Milićević put into words.  “In this respect KFOS, always difficult courage to seek the modes pan civic activists as agents of good change at the community level arm create a momentum for the creation of a more open, diverse presentday tolerant society.”

The discussion which included questions from the guests and more reminder by the panelists can be purported in full in the video below.