EBRD holds essay competition

TIRANA, July 22 – The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development will announce the winners of its “Born in ’89” essay competition at a discussion event and award ceremony on Sept. 6 in an event held at 1800hrs, at the Bank’s Headquarters in London in the presence of the six successful contestants from Eastern Europe.
The EBRD, together with its partners, UniCredit and the Financial Times, launched the competition last year as the world was commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989. The aim was to discover how the young generation in the EBRD region had witnessed and coped with the political and social changes of the past 20 years.
To celebrate the achievements of the young writers from Eastern Europe the EBRD will also launch a special publication with the 24 best essays which have been selected by an international jury chaired by acclaimed Ukrainian novelist Andrei Kurkov.
There was strong interest in the competition and some 600 essays from throughout the EBRD region were submitted. The contributions reveal the aspirations and fears of a whole new generation that was born after the fall of the Iron Curtain two decades ago.