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AJEGBO>>> The major responsibility for democratic transitions and consolidations lies with forces
from within the national society and no amount of external assistance will create democracy.
This is a difficult and complicated subject and I hope that a resolution will be passed
that will uphold the basic values and principals of United Nations. I now declare this General
Assembly Conference Open.
THOMAS>>> Today's event is a culmination of work that Bucks has been involved with in
the last two years. We started off with the School Linking Network which brought schools
together from different contexts, rural, urban, multicultural, monocultural. We were invited
by Bradford who were leading on the School Linking Network to be involved in Modern United
Nations. We got a positive response from the five schools you see here today. Each school
selected ten students, eight of whom are country delegates, two of whom are international press.
So then did a training workshop with teachers, we did a training workshop with the students,
where they had support from journalists from County, and they also did training on using
the Virtual Learning Environment, and then they were sent off to go and do their work,
find out about the countries they represent, what their position would be on the topic
and today's the culmination of that.
FLYNN>>> Some of the students are absolutely fantastically knowledgeable about both the
countries, the countries that are here today in the conference, and certainly the students
are speaking incredibly well and using terminology that I certainly wouldn't have expected to
hear from Year Nine and Year Ten students. Things like Human Rights have come up, democracy,
this is what's happening today and very relavent subjects that generally speaking in this country
we don't even think about.
IMBRIANO>>> I'm so hugely impressed by the level of debate amongst all of the delegates
by the very clear forward thinking and deep thinking about the issues that have been raised,
the exchanges have been tremendous and hugely informative. This shows what tremendous talent
we have here in Buckinghamshire. That's not only the young people themselves but also
the staff who work with them, encourage them.
SMITH>>> I think it's been really good because like countries have expressed their own views
and it's been good to get insights into what it is about, and because I'm reporting from
the BBC's point of view, it's good to think about what they want to know.
KNIGHTS>>> It's been quite difficult because on certain points, personally I would have
completely disagreed with what they said and if it was down to me I would have gone in
the opposite direction but you've got to think about it from your countries point of view.
LIDINGTON>>> I think it is a really great initiative. I've been listening to Year Nines
from across Aylesbury Vale Schools debating issues of real international importance, the
role of the United Nations, how you strike the right balance, between the need for international
human rights to be respected, but also the independence and sovereignty of individual
countries. At what point is international intervention justified. I mean these are the
sorts of issues that I and my colleagues in Government and Governments across the world
are having to grapple with.
AJEGBO>>> It's an incredibly difficult topic, one that the United Nations has failed to
solve over many years and I think it's given the Young People an opportunity to think about
the real complexities of the world and how it's impossible to come to clear and sensible
solutions and I think as the day has gone on, they've got deeper and deeper into that
complexity and I think it's begun to give them a real understanding of the problems
of having a peaceful world.
LOVE>>> It's been really good fun chairing, it's been quite difficult for the first half
an hour to work out what level the students are at and how far you can push them but they've
really rose to the challenge. At the risk of jumping on the band wagon, about the youth
of today being okay, they've been really good, the position papers were very good and the
debate has been to a really high standard and they've been excellent, they've really
surprised me. By a show of placards, all those in favour, those against please.
POPE>>> We were the resolution that didn't get passed, but it was really good because
we had a really big part in writing it which was really good fun. It was really good to
learn about, because it's quite difficult to write a resolution with the right format.
BUTCHER>>> Cuba's communist so it's very difficult to the way that I've been raised in a capitalist
state so it was very interesting to try and come from the perspective that all men are
equal.
THOMPSON>>> It was really scary at first, when we first came in and they did the roll
call and everything, but you get more relaxed throughout the day, and as you enjoy it more
you find out so much. As I was saying to our faculty advisor we were treated like we were
adults and it felt good because we got to express our views and do independent research
that we've never done in class so it gives us a better view of actual working and doing
research that we're doing as an extra curricular but we want to do.
STUDENT ONE>>> When I first heard about it I was new to my school and I joined up and
I got it and after the first day I was thinking why did I do this. But all in all the preparations,
while they were challenging, they did make sense, and I really enjoyed today.
STUDENT TWO>>> This experience has been really rewarding and I'll certainly take it into
the future and the learning certainly outweighs the hard work.
STUDENT THREE>>> I think I've learnt a lot about Mauritania because I'd never even heard
of it!!
TEACHER ONE>>> We've had to remind ourselves, back here in the cheap seats that you are
year nines and tens. I don't know what that says about international politics, that maybe
international politicians behave like you do, or you're behaving like international
politicians, I don't know. But the levels of debate have been amazing, you've managed
to take some really difficult issues and really push them, and you've concentrated and you've
acheived so much and it renews my faith in young people.