16.04.2021

Around a third of EU citizens live and work in border regions. The boundaries have a direct and indirect effect on their daily life. People living in border regions often face particular challenges, be it in terms of job search, access to health care and other public services, or daily commuting and overcoming administrative problems. The most effective instrument for overcoming the separation effect of borders has been shown to be cross-border cooperation.

A Europe-wide conference on the future of Europe will open in Strasbourg on May 9th. The European Committee of the Regions wants to play an active role in this conference, so its members organize local debates in their regions. With this debate, the Euroregion Neisse would like to contribute to formulating a vision of how cross-border cooperation will work in the future and what role border regions should play in this.

The debate is public and we look forward to a broad discussion. People with important functions and many years of experience in cross-border cooperation will speak:

• Martin Půta , President of the Liberec Region, President of the Nisa Euroregion, member of the Committee of the Regions
• Bernd Lange , District Administrator of the district of Görlitz, President of the Euroregion Neisse, member of the Committee of the Regions
• Pavel Branda , Deputy Mayor of Rádlo, member of the Committee of the Regions, Vice-President of AEBR
• Thomas Zenker , Mayor of Zittau (to be confirmed)
• Iva Linderová, director of the District Chamber of Commerce in Jablonec nad Nisou
• Regina Gellrich , Head of the Saxon State Office for Early Neighbor Language Education
• Hedvika Zimmermannová , pastor of the Czechoslovak Hussite Church, representative of the city of Hrádek nad Nisou
• Hynek Böhm , Assistant Professor, Institute of Geography, Technical University of Liberec
• Blanka Konvalinová , emeritus director of the Regional Scientific Library in Liberec, chairwoman of the EUREX library
• Martín Guillermo Ramírez , General Secretary of AEBR (Association of European Border Regions)
• Slaven Klobucar , EGTC Monitoring Platform, European Committee of the Regions

Moderation: David Hamr, Czech Radio Liberec

Date: April 21, 2021, 2.30 p.m. to 4.30 p.m.

Take part in the debate too! The debate will take place online and you can participate at the following link:

https://euconf-eu.zoom.us/j/98598410661?pwd=aElKS1p0cnRQS0gxOGFlOVhGWWdDQT09

Discussion topics:

• What is the significance of cross-border cooperation for our region?
• What are the main obstacles to the development of cross-border cooperation (legal, administrative, linguistic, economic, human ...)? What's the best way to overcome it?
• What effects did / does the COVID-19 pandemic have on cross-border cooperation? How should action be taken in the future to prevent collaboration from being so impaired?
• What is the minimum level of cross-border cooperation that the EU and Member States must guarantee in similar crises?
• What should cross-border governance look like in the future? For example, should an integrated room planning system work? A common territorial development strategy?
• What should life in border regions look like? Access to public services? Education? Culture? Health care? Crisis management?
• Should a cross-border identity be developed? How can you reach them?

(This is an automatic translation by Google Translator.)