147 countries to participate in youth conference in Sri Lanka

Nearly 150 countries have confirmed participation at the World Conference on Youth hosted by Sri Lanka early next month, an official said on Thursday that will concentrate on youth participation in the post-2015 global development agenda. The confirmed list of invitees include Senior Ministers and Senior Government Officials from over 40 countries, national youth delegates representing 147 States and over 300 youth delegates representing various civil society movements. Furthermore, the President of the United Nations General Assembly Dr. John William Ashe, UN Secretary General's Special Envoy on Youth Ahmad Alhendawi and several other heads of the United Nations Agencies have confirmed their participation at WCY 2014. World Conference on Youth (WCY) 2014 will take place 6-9 May 2014 in Colombo. The theme of WCY 2014 is "Mainstreaming Youth in the Post-2015 Development Agenda". "The conference is expected to bring together 1500 participants, half of them young people aged 18 to 29, and 350 of them will come from marginalized backgrounds, making the conference one of the most well represented youth events at global level," WCY spokesman Lalith Perera told reporters. Having higher participation than the last WCY in Mexico in 2010 organizers hope that the event will provide the platform for an agreement between youth organizations and government policymakers that will be used to give young people space in the post-2015 global development. The WCY is also closely linked to the Commonwealth of which Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapaksa is the chairman.