Two new countries have announced they won’t participate in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest 2023 in Nice, France. It is Serbia and Azerbaijan, which makes the list of participating countries even shorter now.
As the Junior Eurovision 2023 approaches, the list of participating countries gets longer, but so does the list of non-participating countries. Today, we learn that both Serbia and Azerbaijan withdraw from this year’s JESC in Nice, France. These two withdrawals follow Kazakhstan’s withdrawal back in June.
Economic reasons for Serbia
The Serbian broadcaster’s (RTS) editor-in-chief Olivera Kovacevic stated that the country withdrew from the contest for economic reasons, and may be only focusing on the regular Eurovision Song Contest in the future, as the country’s participation in the future Junior Eurovision editions hasn’t been confirmed yet.
This marks the first time since 2014 that Serbia won’t participate in Junior Eurovision.
No reason stated for Azerbaijan
As for Azerbaijan, the national broadcaster Ictimai confirmed the withdrawal, through a declaration sent by the head of delegation Vasif Mammadov. But Ictimai didn’t specify the reason why they chose not to take part in the Junior Eurovision in Nice.
Azerbaijan participated a total of 4 times in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest and didn’t take part in last year’s contest in Yerevan, Armenia.
The Junior Eurovision 2023
In three months, France will host for the second time in the history the Junior Eurovision Song Contest, after having hosted it in 2021 in Paris following Valentina’s victory.
But this time, the French capital won’t be the host city as Nice has been chosen to do so. The contest will take place on November 26 in Palais Nikaรฏa, following Lissandro’s victory with ‘Oh Maman’, and this year’s slogan is ‘Heroes’.
To this day, 15 countries have confirmed their participation in JESC 2023:
- Albania ๐ฆ๐ฑ
- Armenia ๐ฆ๐ฒ
- France ๐ซ๐ท
- Georgia ๐ฌ๐ช โ Anastasia Vasadze
- Germany ๐ฉ๐ช
- Ireland ๐ฎ๐ช
- Italy ๐ฎ๐น
- Malta ๐ฒ๐น
- Netherlands ๐ณ๐ฑ
- North Macedonia ๐ฒ๐ฐ โ Tamara Grujevska
- Poland ๐ต๐ฑ
- Portugal ๐ต๐น โ Jรบlia Machado
- Spain ๐ช๐ธ โ Sandra Valero
- United Kingdom ๐ฌ๐ง
- Ukraine ๐บ๐ฆ
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Source: Eurofestivales
