Bridging the gap between two countries through sports? Perfect!

Sport is an international activity that gathers hundreds of millions if not billions of people together. Each and every country in the world, notwithstanding the language difference, can actually interact through sports.

Every single discipline has rules that are standard for each and every country, and every discipline brings together countries from all continents to compete against each other in a healthy environment, bringing together people from all over the world.

Each and every country has to create relationships with other sovereign states to establish cooperation in every field of life, ranging from commerce, legal and judicial cooperation, education and scientific research and all things that are common to human kind.

There is an inherent need in each and every one of us to reach out towards others. We do this individually, as a family unit and especially as a country. We do this without losing our identity. On the contrary, we do this in order to promote our identity and learn from others.

Being Chairman of the Foreign and European Affairs Committee within the House of Representatives, I can understand the need for the diplomatic work that our embassies do in foreign countries and especially the outreach that foreign embassies do in our land.

Such co-operation has led to many projects, benefitting both states. Take in the field of education for example. Cooperation between individual states, and even at European Union, level has led to various youth exchanges and youth programmes that benefit young people of all ages from all countries. Through these exchanges and youth and educational programmes, our young learn and share their experiences with their fellow foreign friends to enhance and achieve a holistic human experience.

We could do the same for sports.

I dream of the day we would have a kind of Erasmus project for sports. Maybe this idea could be conceived locally for the 2017 presidency. I believe that one of the priorities of our presidency should be to create a programme similar in nature to Erasmus, by which athletes, young and old, professional and amateur, could have the experience of their life while developing their sporting talent.

I am trying to start something like this locally by trying to work closely with foreign ambassadors and high commission. We could create relationships between local clubs and associations with foreign clubs and associations which could turn into some kind of twinning agreements, pledging co-operation for the benefit of the athletes, members of the associations, or clubs.

It could also benefit foreign states to promote national sports. In Malta for instance we have an emerging softball and baseball oriented community, which does not find the support and popularity that other sports can achieve. I believe it would be a mutually beneficial idea if we can get help from the US embassy in Malta to promote the sports and help emerging clubs to develop further, and maybe go a step further and be able to introduce this sport even in schools.

Above all, through sports diplomacy we can reach other areas in which cooperation between countries can be achieved. Sports diplomacy will definitely help countries to share each other's culture and open up for further opportunities, including but not only, commercial opportunities.

A small country like ours will surely benefit from any help that can be obtained from other larger countries. Our sporting facilities are very limited when compared to those of other countries. Our clubs and associations, and especially all our athletes, will have better opportunities to improve at their sport if they can have help of any kind from other countries.

We need to develop specialized departments that can focus on diplomatic work through sports. The Kunsill Malti ghall-iSport does not cater for this kind of specialized diplomatic work through sports. But with the help of the expertise from our foreign affairs department, we can start working on the concept of mixing diplomatic affairs and sports for the benefit of local sports.

Such co-operation could be the start of enhanced co-operation between states to address issues in fields related to sports, like sports betting and match fixing. Such international co-operation can help states keep all kind of sporting activities clean from any illegal and criminal activity.

Sports is an international language recognized and accepted and understood by each and every state in the World, and therefore, it could be the key to open doors that are still shut, letting diplomacy through.