BY REGISTRATION ONLY: International Summit of Mayors and Local Government Leaders

Europe is currently facing the biggest refugee crisis since World War II. Local governments are at the frontlines of national crisis management. As the welfare state’s primary care providers, they play a crucial role in the reception and integration of refugees. This summit brings together mayors and local government leaders from across Europe and Norway to discuss their experiences and how they have met these challenges in their respective municipalities.

Speakers include the Mayor of Kristiansand, Jan Oddvar Skisland; Mayor of Mykolaiv, Oleksandr Syenkevych and Mayor of Przemyśl, Wojciech Antoni Bakun. Mr Syenkevych will speak about the challenges of running local government services in a frontline city during the war in Ukraine. Mr Bakun will discuss how his municipality handled the sudden arrival of hundreds of thousands of refugees crossing the border from Ukraine since the onset of the war last year. Another key speaker is Bernd Vöhringer, who is Vice President of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities and Co-rapporteur on the Summit of the Council of Europe and Lord Mayor of Sindelfingen. The summit is organised by Kristiansand Municipality in collaboration with KS, the Norwegian Association of Local and Regional Authorities.

There is a limited number of seats available for this event, and participation requires registration. For more information, please contact Øyvind Laderud - Oyvind.Laderud@kristiansand.kommune.no or Kimberley Pallenschat - Kimberley.Pallenschat@kristiansand.kommune.no.