Riyadh, March 31, 2022, SPA -- Ministers of youth and sports at the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries held their 35th meeting online under the presidency of Vice Minister of Sports of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the chair country, Bader bin Abdulrahman Al-Kadi. The ministers extended their congratulation to their majesties and highnesses leaders of GCC countries on the occasion of the success of the 42nd summit of the Supreme Council (Riyadh, December 2021) and their keenness to develop the joint Gulf youth process in a bid to realize the goals of GCC, represented by enhancing cooperation, bonds and integration among GCC countries, instilling GCC gains, and their big concern in empowering the youth, out of their belief in the youth’s pivotal role in realizing the envisioned sustainable development and accrediting the special budget concerned with implementing the "Youth and decision makers program", which was proposed by the UAE. They also congratulated the UAE for the huge success witnessed by the Expo 2020 Dubai and its excellence in organizing the event, extending their gratitude to the Federal Youth Authority in the UAE and the Arab Youth Center in Abu Dhabi for their organizing of the first forum of the Gulf youth in November and December, 2021 at the youth pavilion in Expo 2020 Dubai in partnership with the Secretariat General of GCC, and extended their gratitude for the Youth Public Authority in Kuwait for its initiative to cover the establishment of the first phase of the e-system of governance of the strategic plan of the GCC Ministerial Committee for Youth and Sports. GCC ministers of youth and sports discussed several issues of mutual concern in the field of youth, mainly following up on the implementation of resolutions and plans of the Supreme Council related to the youth field, and items mentioned in the Riyadh Agreement and final statement issued by the 42nd session concerned with the youth to support and enhance the role of youth in the development of the relief, humanitarian and voluntary cooperation, stressing keenness to move forward on unifying laws and regulations that serve the GCC youth in a way that can realize their aspirations and hopes; provide an encouraging environment for creativity, innovation and excellence; intensify joint programs, activities and events; and exchanging successful and distinguished expertise and experiments concerned with enabling the youth and entrepreneurship. Also during the meeting, they accredited the e-system of governance of the strategic plan of the GCC Ministerial Committee for Youth and Sports, update operational plans for the technical committees affiliated with the ministerial committee between 2022 and 2026, approving June 6 of every year as a day for Gulf youth and the draft logo and executive mechanism for 2022, and approved the recommendation of the first forum of Gulf youth (Dubai, December 2021) and going on with holding it annually in one of GCC members, and welcoming the organization of the second edition of the forum in 2022 in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, stressing the need of engaging youth as advisors for the joint Gulf action and considering their opinion, proposals and future aspiration, and providing Gulf youth initiative with joint interest for the Gulf youth. The meeting also discussed the importance of enhancing international strategic partnerships and dialogues with other countries and regional and international organizations in the youth field, benefiting from distinguished expertise and experiments of these countries in the youth field, including Iraq, China and Georgia, in addition to approving the outcomes of the joint work groups in the youth field between GCC and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and the Kingdom of Morocco during meetings that were held earlier in 2022, the recommendations and outcomes of the technical committees in the youth field, the joint programs, activities and events that are scheduled to be held by the ministries of youth and the suggested mechanism for honored people in the field of youth work and distinguished creative youth in GCC countries for the years 2020, 2021, and 2022. -- SPA 20:00 LOCAL TIME 17:00 GMT 0026 www.spa.gov.sa/w1715396