The kick-off meeting of the project BeWoP – Beyond Walk of Peace: from Crossborder Historical Research and Cultural Heritage to European Trail and Stories took place on the 30 May 2024 at the Monument of Peace Cerje, bringing together all project partners. The lead partner is Fundacija Poti miru (The Walk of Peace Foundation), while the project partners are GECT GO, PromoTurismoFVG, ZRC SAZU, the èStoria Association and the Municipality of Miren-Kostanjevica. The project is worth almost € 1.3 million and is 80 % co-financed by the European Union under the Interreg VI-A Italy–Slovenia programme and 20 % by the project partners. The project started in April 2024 and is expected to last until October 2026. The kick-off meeting was followed by a presentation of the project to a wider audience.
The presentation was visited by various visitors and media. In addition to all the project partners, some representatives of the associated partners from Slovenia (Ministry of Culture, Ministry of Defence, Slovenian Tourist Board and the Museum of National Liberation Maribor), Italy (European Wildlife Management Association, Museo storico italiano della guerra, M9 Museo del ʼ900, Associazione Amici delle Alpi Carniche, Associazione Friuli Storia), Belgium (In Flanders Fields Museum) and Poland (Euroregion Karpacki and Jagiellonian University Krakow) were also present.
The participants were welcomed by Mauricij Humar, Mayor of the Municipality Miren-Kostanjevica, Rudi Medved, Undersecretary of State at the Slovenian Ministry of Defence, Uroš Brežan, Slovenian Member of Parliament, Dubravka Kalin, Director of the Directorate for Tourism at the Slovenian Ministry of Economy, Tourism and Sport, Neda Rusjan Bric, Artistic Advisor to GO! 2025, the Director General of PromoTurismoFVG, Antonio Bravo, the Councillor of the Municipality of Gorizia, Francesco del Sordi and Andreja Grom from the Interreg Italy–Slovenia Programme. In their speeches, the guests stressed the importance of peace as a fundamental value of the project and the opportunity that cultural tourism linked to the sites of the First World War offers for the development of the entire border area.
The speeches of the guests were followed by presentations of the project activities by Maša Klavora (Project Manager, the Walk of Peace Foundation) and the project managers of the individual partner institutions – Ezio Benedetti (GECT GO), Petra Svoljšak (ZRC SAZU), Nicola Revelant (PromoTurismoFVG), Tina Gerbec (Municipality Miren-Kostanjevica) and Adriano Ossola (Association èStoria).
The event ended with a pleasant gathering of the participants at the banquet.
You can read more about the project, its objectives and results here: https://www.ita-slo.eu/en/bewop
