The workgroup of the program "Defending Civil Society in the Newly Independent States" coordinates in Russia a research initiated by our partners European Citizen Action Service, ECAS (Brussels) http://www.ecas.org. This research is a part of a wide campaign for better involvement of the civil society organizations of the EU neighbouring countries into foreign policy-making of the EU. It aims at gathering key information from CSOs working in Western Balkans, Turkey, Moldova,
Belarus, Ukraine and Russia on the implementation of the "partnership principle" as a tool for improving effectiveness of bottom-up strategies and empowerment of civil society. Pointing out shortcomings and obstacles occurring at the EU and national levels in applying the partnership principle in practice, this survey should result in more detailed recommendations and a background paper as how to make the partnership principle work.

The results obtained will be presented in April at the international conference in Ljubljana (Slovenia) organized under the Slovenian Presidency. This event is expected to result in a declaration on building up a sustainable "triangle" partnership relationship between civil societies of the neighbouring countries, the EU and national governments.

YHRM considers this research as a possibility to speak up about the problems and needs of the Russian NGOs at the level of the EU, which is Russia's strategic partner and has rather strong positions in negotiations with the Russian government.

Workgroup of the program "Defending civil society in the Newly Independent States" dcs.nis@gmail.com