The Minister of Education and Culture, Kostas Kadis, called on his EU counterparts to assist the support of studies to promote cultural heritage as a means of social and economic development, on the second day of works of the Education, Culture, Youth and Sport Council in Brussels. The Minister, in his intervention, stressed the need for specific funding for this purpose and stressed that this endeavor should lead to the creation of new jobs. He also pointed out that this is one of the key issues to be tackled at EU level.

The Minister of Education and Culture, Kostas Kadis, called on his counterparts to further support the development of synergies between the actors of education and culture at local and international level, noting that such synergies can bring young people closer to the issues of culture and cultural heritage, while contributing to cultivating respect for diversity and building open, tolerant and cohesive societies.

The role of Culture in building inclusive societies and the challenges faced by the Sport sector were, in fact, the two main issues of the Council`s second day.

The Minister of Education also spoke on the issue of combating the illegal trafficking of antiquities, making special reference to the “Nicosia Convention”, which specifically addresses the criminalization of the illicit trafficking of cultural goods. He also informed his counterparts that the Convention was signed in May 2017 and called on the Member States to adopt it.

Then, referring to the role of modern technologies in the preservation and promotion of cultural heritage, the Minister of Education pointed out that Cyprus recently formed a “National Committee for the Digitization of Cultural Heritage”  with the aim of coordinating all the relevant institutions for the protection and promotion of cultural heritage .

As far as the Sport Council is concerned, Kostas Kadis addressed his counterparts saying that in Cyprus significant steps have been taken towards the cooperation of public sports authorities and sports federations to develop the first Code of Good Governance of sports federations, on the basis of their respective European principles. K.Kadis also referred to the revision of the legislation on illegal betting, the implementation of European programs for the education and training of sports federation executives and the successful implementation of the European Sports Week.

The debate addressed the need for sound management of sport issues and tackling the manipulation of sporting outcomes, illegal sports betting and doping and was held with the participation of the President of the International Olympic Committee.