Nobel Laureates in Dialogue: Connecting for Peace

VANCOUVER – They are renowned for their commitment to peace in the face of hate and violence. They are Nobel Peace Prize Laureates , recipients of what some deem to be the world’s highest honour.

The Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, Mairead Maguire, Betty Williams, Rigoberta Menchú Tum and Jody Williams will engage in dialogue on Sunday, September 27 at the Chan Centre beginning at 1 p.m. Mary Robinson, past president of Ireland, will moderate the discussion.


 

These champions of peace have survived great personal tragedy, dedicating their lives towards nonviolent approaches to conflict resolution. Each of their stories is an inspiration and testimony, and together they represent hope for positive change and a true chance for all of humanity.

Maguire, cofounder of the Northern Ireland based Peace People, along with Betty Williams and and Ciaran McKeown, found it impossible to remain passive in the face of brutal unrest after the death of her sister’s three children. They were run down and killed by an I.R.A. (Irish Republican Army) get-away car after a British soldier shot its driver.

Maguire is an active pacifist passionately committed to nonviolent social and political change. She believes “When we reject weapons and war, when we uphold human rights and international law, when we build non-killing, nonviolent societies and world, refusing to kill each other but seeking nonviolent solutions to our problems, then we will have come of age as the human family.”

Over the 30 years since Williams was named a Laureate, she has devoted her life to promoting a new way of thinking on how we deal with the injustices, cruelty and horror perpetrated on the world’s children.“ I had no concept of the depth of the children’s suffering until witnessing their pain. Yet in a world that we know can feed itself, upwards of 40,000 children daily die from conditions of malnutrition. Surely we must question why we are allowing this carnage to continue,” Mrs. Williams says.

Today, Williams is helping to build the City of Peace for Children in Basilicata, Italy. In doing so she is fulfilling a dream to help refugee children seeking shelter in safe-zone countries to be housed, nurtured and educated. The goal is to build a city and give children the hope to believe that there is a possibility to live a life and feel accepted by humanity.

“We have learned that change cannot come through war. War is not a feasible tool to use in fighting against the oppression we face. War has caused more problems. We cannot embrace that path.”

So wrote Menchú, the Guatemalan native of Mayan descent, who grew up poor, and who, early in her youth embraced a life committed to social reform. Many members of her family were tortured and killed by the oppressive military dictatorship controlling her homeland. Despite threats to her own life, Menchú became a leading advocate of indigenous rights and ethno-cultural reconciliation. Today she continues her work, recognizing the Nobel Peace Prize as “…an instrument with which to fight for peace, for justice, for the rights of those who suffer the abysmal economic, social, cultural and political inequalities, typical of the order of the world in which we live…”

American-born aid worker, Williams played a key role in the establishment of an international treaty banning antipersonnel landmines. Writing about the achievement of the signing of the Mine Ban Treaty in 1997, Williams said: “It has shown that in a partnership of civil society and governments, each brings particular assets to the process, which is made stronger by the participation of both. It demonstrates that small and middle powers can work together with civil society and address humanitarian concerns with breathtaking speed. It shows that such a partnership can be a new kind of "superpower" in the post-Cold War world.”

Along with Laureate Dr. Shirin Ebadi of Iran, in 2006 Williams took the lead in establishing the “Nobel Women’s Initiative,” together with sister Laureates Wangari Maathai, Rigoberta Menchu Tum, Betty Williams and Mairead Corrigan Maguire. Its mission is to use the prestige and access afforded by the Nobel Prize to spotlight and promote efforts of women’s rights activists, researchers and organizations working to advance peace, justice and equality for women.

"We believe that peace is much more than the absence of armed conflict. Peace is the commitment to equality and justice; a democratic world free of physical, economic, cultural, political, religious, sexual and environmental violence and the constant threat of these forms of violence against women – indeed against all of humanity. We also believe that violence is a choice and the creation of a just and peaceful world must start with people.”

The Vancouver Peace Summit is a four-day event, held September 26-29, 2009. Speakers from across the globe will gather to discuss education and compassion as a means of achieving peace. It is presented in collaboration with the Fetzer Institute www.fetzer.org



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