Youngsters are to raise cash to send teenagers from a town in the former Soviet Union on the trip of a lifetime.

The YMCA in Consett is sending a group to Prague in August, to take part in the YMCA Europe Youth Festival.

The ten youngsters, aged 16 to 18, will join more than 8,000 young people from across Europe for the event.

Thanks to the generosity of youngsters at the Consett centre, five teenagers from Dubnov, Russia, will be joining them. This follows a visit to Consett by Russian youth leader, Misha Kuschkov, last month, in a bid to forge better links between youngsters in the North-East and Russia.

Colonel Kuschkov, 46, a former military intelligence officer with the Soviet Air Force, met youth centre bosses in the region to set up an exchange programme.

Staff at the Consett centre heard that the YMCA in Russia could not afford to send youngsters to the youth festival and decided to help.

Billy Robson, of Consett YMCA, said: "These kids in Russia really have got nothing. We felt that, as we are getting an exchange programme going between us, it would be a good thing to do. We will be raising money over the next few months to pay for their trip."

Bosses from Consett are planning a visit Dubnov in May, to lay the groundwork for the first exchange visit by youngsters next year.