Gaza, Publication and Information Unit:
The Palestinian Center for Democracy and Conflict Resolution, in cooperation with the European Union, opened a children's drawing exhibition in Gaza City, with the participation of a number of local organisations and the families of the children taking part in the exhibition, and with media attendance.
At the start of the exhibition, the director of the Conflict Resolution Center's Gaza branch, Iyad Abu Hjair, stressed that the exhibition's message today is to affirm that all people in the world are equal. He pointed out that the Conflict Resolution Center focuses on supporting the initiatives and projects that call for activating social participation and the roles and behaviour of men and women within society.
Abu Hjair went on to say: "We always talk about wars and their psychological effects and about the need to achieve national reconciliation in the Palestinian homeland, and today is an opportunity to speak with our children so as to plant a smile and support their creativity." He explained that the Centre's policy focuses on deepening the language of dialogue, values and principles for all members of society, the most important of them children as the generation of the future.
For her part, the media and information coordinator at the European Union explained that the European Union has organised this international children's drawing competition since 2007 and that last year 40,000 children around the world took part in it, among them 10 artworks from Palestine. She added: "We are holding this exhibition today to display the best 65 pictures from the competition organised in Brussels in Belgium, in whose final stage there were 3 artworks by children from Gaza."
During the opening ceremony, Conflict Resolution and the European Union presented valuable prizes to the three participants from Gaza in the Brussels children's drawing competition, Nasma Mortaja, Osama Shammout and Rosaline Katbeh, in addition to presenting a number of prizes to twenty-three children who took part in the exhibition from Gaza.
