Internationalisation of Tahrir Square 

(MENAFN - Jordan Times) In the last week of July, the United Nations held its High Level Meeting on Youth as part of the closing of the International Year of Youth 2011 at the General Assembly.

Last year was definitely historic; it witnessed the massive mobilisation and leadership of youth in the Arab world. The secretary general of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon, mentioned Tunisian Mohamed Bouazizi as an example of a young man who triggered the removal of two long-ruling dictators in Tunisia and Egypt at the beginning of 2011.

Many ideas and words came to my mind as I was preparing for my intervention at the high-level meeting of the General Assembly: 2011, youth, international, Arab Spring, Tahrir Square, among others.

I was asking myself why we were in the massive and unique room of the United Nations General Assembly, what it meant to be there, with all the representations and experiences, and how we may come out with something concrete.

I recalled the days and nights we spent in Tahrir Square, in Cairo. The values that brought Egyptians together in one place - sharing space, thoughts, ideas, food, among many other things - were unique.

Young Egyptians of all walks of life, backgrounds, education, shapes and sizes got together in Tahrir Square for the first time united as one.

It was like a utopia, where human beings unite based on their humane values, forgetting their differences and working together for the common good.

It was the specificity of time and place that brought those men and women together. And it was the strong idealistic strength that shaped the revolt against dictatorship and caused the Egyptian head of regime to collapse in 18 days.

It also represented a point of reference for the Egyptian revolutionaries demands, and continues to shape the societal pressure on the transitional government.

It also gave a new identity to Egypt, one that the whole world was looking up to.

The rest of the Arab nations' young people were given a strong push to lead their own revolts and demand freedom and democracy. Although in some countries it was not as peaceful as in Tahrir Square, their fight is still powerful, consistent and committed to bring change to their societies.

Tahrir Square was not only a place of revolution and change, but also a place of consensus, solidarity and coexistence where Egyptians of all walks of life, cultures and religions shared everything, from laugh to sorrow and from bread to medicine.

They lived together and protected each other, to the extent that we came up with new names like: Tahrir Square republic and Tahrir moral system.

At the UN General Assembly, I felt that same sense of unity that I felt in Tahrir Square. We were a very diverse group of people and organisations sitting under one roof to discuss youth issues at a high-level meeting.

The gathering was unique, representative and powerful. It was like the collection of people in Tahrir Square, and I was wondering whether we could have a dialogue similar to that in Tahrir Square and make real breakthroughs in the reality of the youth.

We always said we needed the wisdom of the elders and the energy and enthusiasm of the youth. The same applies today to international organisations, governments and the civil society. The youth need wisdom, power, knowledge and experience and offer their enthusiasm.

This is the value of Tahrir Square, which I see as necessary to be internationalised.

The UN General Assembly High Level Meeting on Youth was a symbolic example of this.

Tahrir was just a physical space in the heart of one of the largest cities in Africa, the Middle East and the developing world until it changed the way young people voiced their needs differently and peacefully. This is what the world should learn from Tahrir.

Indeed, the young people of Tahrir played a major role in the world to the benefit of humanity at large.

The writer is a consultant and researcher on youth issues in Egypt. He was an active participant in the youth revolts during Egypt's Arab Spring. 2012 Global Experts (www.theglobalexperts.org), a project of the United Nations Alliance of Civilisations.