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The Greek Committee for International Democratic Solidarity (EEDDA) is a Greek non-governmental , non-profit making, public welfare organisation , which was established in September 1981 aiming at solidarity with the people's movements of Asia, Africa and Latin America and all other peoples fighting for their national independence and sovereignty, for peace and social justice.
EEDDA's members are high level and secondary level trade-union organisations (workers, civil servants, bank employees), trade unions, women's associations, peace movements, personalities of social life and natural persons, who want to contribute actively to the realisation of its goals.
Within EEDDA we have departments dealing with either specific geographical regions or with specific issues. For instance:
- The Middle East, the Arabic world, the Mediterranean, Turkey and Cyprus
- Africa
- Latin America and the Caribbean
- Development and emergency projects in developing countries
- The fight against racism, the problems of refugees and migrants
EEDDA has a Governing Board of 23 members and a Secretariat of 11 members and works together with corresponding organisations with comparable goals in the countries, where it is active, coordinating the efforts in order to succeed its goals, but as well with a series of non-governmental organisations in Europe and North America. EEDDA is an associated member of the International Organisation of Solidarity with the Peoples of Asia and Africa (AAPSO) and with the Department of non-governmental Public Information of the UN. EEDDA is a member as well of the Association Committee of NGO's for Development with the Commission of the European Community, the International Coordination Committee of NGO's for Palestine under the auspices of the UN and the corresponding European Coordination Committee. Furthermore, EEDDA participates in the Network of NGO's of the UN Sub-committee for Racial Discrimination, the Network for the Fight against Poverty and Social Exclusion, the European Network for Information and Action on the Southern Part of Africa (ENIASA), and in the Euromediterranean Network for Human Rights (EMHRN). EEDDA participates as well in the Coordination Group of NGO's for Latin America and the Caribbean (Grupo Sur), the London Agreement (Acuerdo de Londres), the coordination body of European NGO's, which are active for human rights in Columbia, and in the European Campaign for a new Columbia of Peace and Social Justice.
EEDDA has 4 main fields of action:
To express by all means its political, economic, material and moral solidarity and assistance to the struggle of the peoples fighting against imperialism, fighting for their national independence, their national sovereignty, the respect of human rights, peace and social justice.
To try to face the underdevelopment problem of the developing countries through projects and by sending urgent help to meet their immediate needs
To inform and sensitize the Greek people as to the problems of the people in the developing countries and to mobilize them through trade unions and mass organisations
To support political refugees and foreign workers living in our country through action and struggle in their communities for the solution of their problems
To succeed in these goals EEDDA organises or participates in conferences, meetings, lectures, rallies, political and artistic performances, marches, actions, missions of volunteers not only in Greece, but as well abroad. Through its three monthly review called "International Solidarity", EEDDA in cooperation with all its departments tries to diffuse the best possible information on its work.
In the field of projects, EEDDA takes on development projects, sensitisation and development education projects as well as humanitarian projects, usually in the countries in which it already works for solidarity reasons.
The projects aim at relieving the weakest strata by giving them the possibility to cover their immediate and urgent needs on a permanent basis and to open the road for them to look for their own solutions. To achieve this goal projects are needed which are set up in such a way that the following conditions are fulfilled:
They should correspond to the level of economic, political and social development of the local population
They should combine the creation of an indispensable infrastructure with the education and the training of individuals
They should help to increase the participation of the population in questions regarding their society and in making their social structures more democratic
They should not exhaust their natural resources and not change their natural environment.
The main driving force behind the whole procedure of the projects is the local organisation, be it a NGO, a trade union, women's or youth association, etc. That is the organisation, which will take on the coordination and the guidance of the population's efforts and which will mobilise the forces and the means needed to realise the project. That is to say, to guarantee that all the above-mentioned conditions will be fulfilled.
EEDDA carries out on a regular basis campaigns to collect money for the financial support of several peoples faced with problems because of natural disasters or as a consequence of wars, dictatorships etc.
EEDDA is a consisting part of the social mass movement of our country and struggles at the same time to demonstrate the narrow relationship existing between the problems and the struggle of the peoples of the underdeveloped and the developed countries.
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