Organized gathering and sports & educational activities for children
Representatives of the Belgrade authorities and NIS visited the children’s camp called ‘Serbia is Calling You’ (‘Srbija te Zove’) and supported this gathering of children who live in the Serbian enclaves in Kosovo and Metohija, as well as abroad. At the camp, children are learning about the history of Serbia, its tradition and the mutual connections through playing sports and engaging in educational activities.
This year, the camp is being held from July 21 to 31 and is organized by the Sportstars Association, to improve sports and youth cooperation with sports associations from Kosovo and Metohija, the region and the diaspora.
Andreja Mladenović, Assistant Mayor of Belgrade and Jelena Popara, Director of the Internal Audit and Risk Management Function at NIS have visited the children at the camp and gave them gifts. The event was also attended by Saša Rokvić, director of the Patriarch Pavle student dorm in Belgrade and the representatives of the Sportstars Association.
Assistant Mayor of Belgrade, Andreja Mladenović, thanked the NIS Company for their support and investment in youth and sports: “I am glad that today, together with NIS, we can meet up with the children, find out how they like their stay in our capital and highlight the importance of cooperation with socially responsible companies such as NIS, with which the Belgrade authorities have had extremely good cooperation for several years now, and have implemented numerous projects together. I would especially like to highlight the Zajedinici Zajedno programme, through which we did many good deeds for children in Belgrade with the aim of improving the conditions for studying, playing sports and enjoying culture and art.”
Jelena Popara, Director of the Internal Audit and Risk Management Function at NIS, said that young people are the focus of the company’s socially responsible investments: “It is a great honour to be here and spend time with you and the children from Kosovo and Metohija and the diaspora. The time you have set aside to be with each other, play sports and learn a lot about history and Serbian culture is precious. NIS is strategically committed to supporting social responsibility projects. Since 2009, we have invested around 4.1 billion dinars in such projects and the biggest part of those funds went towards supporting young people. We will continue providing our support in cooperation with the local community, and in this case, through cooperating with the Belgrade authorities.”
Saša Rokvić, director of Patriarch Pavle student dorm in Belgrade, highlighted the importance of the company’s investments in such events and their realization: „It is a great honour for me to see that children from the entire region are accommodated at the Patriarch Pavle student dorm, which, in addition to being a host, also participated in organizing the camp this year. The students, who come from all over the region, are happy with their accommodation, and on this occasion, I would like to thank all the organizations, good people and companies that helped with organizing this camp, and above all NIS, which invested a lot of effort into making sure that the programme of Sportstars’ camp is realized as smoothly as possible.“
232 of the most talented children from Serbian enclaves in Kosovo and Metohija, the diaspora (the USA, Australia, Sweden, Italy, Germany and France), the Republic of Srpska, Montenegro and Albania, aged 12-15, are participating in Serbia is Calling You camp.
Children are playing basketball, handball, football, volleyball, tennis and are trained by renowned coaches including Milorad Kosanović, Bogdan Obradović, Željko Tanasković, Milan Gurović, Nenad Peruničić and other young coaches. The children in the camp have the Serbian language and history classes every day, as well as organized visits to various institutions and the main tourist attractions in Belgrade.
In the previous period, the camp was supported by the Government of the Republic of Serbia, the Office for Kosovo and Metohija, the Ministry of Youth and Sports, the Ministry of Labour, Employment, Veteran and Social Affairs and the Belgrade government.