The Annual Chicago Sister Cities International Reception was held in Chicago (USA) last Thursday, 15th March, celebrating Citizen Diplomacy. Over 300 guests attended the event to recognise the diplomat citizen’s work dedicated to Chicago Sister Cities International.
The main speaker at the evening was the Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who spoke on “the importance of the work that citizen diplomats do for the city of Chicago and the impact in the world today”. He then introduced the Consul Generals and Chairs of their sister city anniversary committees with special mention to honour the anniversaries with 5 cities: Milan, Italy (45 years); Osaka, Japan (45 years); Birmingham, United Kingdom (25 years); Vilnius, Lithuania (25 years); and Lucerne, Switzerland (20 years). The leaders from each respective five cities also sent their messages across to the attendees in Chicago.
In his message, Councillor Ian Ward, leader of Birmingham City Council, highlighted programmes like the “Youth Ambassador Programme” and showed enthusiasm to attend and meet everyone the next Mayor’s Round Table on 6th June 2018 in Chicago. The video can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8llVKiQkHAQ&feature=youtu.be
