October 5^th, 2016

A two-day conference of the Association of the European Cities of Culture (AVEC), whose full member is the City of Niš, was held in the Hungarian city of Szombathely (Szombathely)

From October 1^st to October 3^rd, the meetings of the Association were also attended by the representatives of the City of Nis, by the representatives of the Chairman of the Assembly of the City of Niš Office and the City Municipality of Mediana, which is a special member of the Association. AVEC has its own specificity, because it deals only with the areas that are of importance for the City of Niš, namely with the cultural and historical heritage and the sustainability of tourism in small towns. The concept of the sustainability of these areas is an important task for the future, through setting up and meeting the specific standards that lead to a better understanding of the historical and cultural heritage, as well as to the rapid development of tourism. The overall objective of all these aforementioned is commercial and economic well-being of the local governments that implement these standards.

Given the fact that the Association is working closely with UNESCO, the issues discussed about, at the conference in Hungary, included, among others, the possibilities for the City of Niš to apply for EU funds and UNESCO through bilateral or multilateral cooperation, within the network of the cities. Recently, the Association has expanded the area of cooperation on certain agricultural sectors which have tourism potential, such as wine-making.

The representatives of the City of Nis at this gathering had the active participation, through the presentation of the latest potentials of the city, bearing in mind the development of the air traffic and modernization of the work of the Tourist Organization of Nis. The appeal was lodged to make AVEC internet presentations and their following-publications also in the Serbian language.  The ideas and experiences were exchanged with the Mayor of Szombathely, with regard to improving the work of the museums and the cooperation of local self-governments with the Ministries of foreign affairs, culture and tourism, while the implementation of the project ideas would be especially enlarged on during the visit of the President of the Association of European Cities of Culture (AVEC), Mr. Christian Mourisard to the City of Nis, from November 1^st to November 4^th, 2016.

October 5^th

The delegation of the City of Nis visited its twin city Kursk, in the Russian Federation, on the occasion of the celebration of the Day of this city. A special occasion for this visit was marking ten years since the signing of the Agreement on Cooperation between Nis and Kursk. The guests who attended festive events had the opportunity to see an exhibition of photographs dedicated to the history of cooperation between Kursk. At the ceremonial session of the City of Kursk Assembly, the heads of the delegations of the towns of Nis, Viten and Debno were greeted with letters of thanks for the mentioned anniversaries.The friendly relations between Nis and Kursk date back to 1920, when the icon “The Sign of the Mother of God” Kurskaja Korenaja was kept in Nis. In the meantime, these relations have been interrupted by numerous wars. Many years later, on the mutual initiative of two fraternal cities, negotiations began on both re-establishment and possible expansion of cooperation in various fields. In September 2006, long-standing friendly relations between two cities finally got their legal form. The Agreement on Cooperation between the City of Nis and the City of Kursk was signed. Two years ago, a memorial plaque was placed in one street in Nis, now called “Kurska Street”.