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The Vienna UN Conference highlighted actions and challenges linked to the Sustainable Development Goal 5 (SDG 5) and in the spirit of SDG 17. The Vienna Liaison Office of the Academic Council on the United Nations System (ACUNS) organized the Conference from January 10-12, 2018. It was co-ordinated by Heather Wokusch. She mentored a group of young journalists who produced a series of articles IDN-INPS is delighted to carry.
By SWAN
PARIS (IDN | SWAN) – “Are there bookshops in Nigeria?”, asked a French journalist of famous Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, igniting a firestorm on social media following an event in Paris on January 25.
Many outraged observers accused the journalist of racism and ignorance, while lauding Adichie’s response
“I think it reflects very poorly on French people that you have to ask this question. Come on, it’s 2018,” Adichie replied, after the journalist qualified her question by saying French people knew little about Nigeria, apart from hearing about Boko Haram and violence.
By Geneva Centre for Human Rights Advancement
GENEVA (IDN-INPS) – In response to the protracted migrant and refugee crisis that has affected primarily Europe and the MENA region, a coalition of international organizations took the initiative to adopt the 2017 Geneva Declaration entitled “Mobility and human solidarity, a challenge and an opportunity for Europe and the MENA region” pledging increased cooperation between decision-makers to address the adverse impact of the crisis.
The Geneva Declaration is the fruit of a panel debate entitled “Migration and human solidarity, a challenge and an opportunity for Europe and the MENA region” that was organized by the Geneva Centre for Human Rights Advancement and Global Dialogue – a think-tank holding special consultative status with the United Nations Economic and Social Council - on 14 December 2017 at the United Nations Office at Geneva.
From Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury
Following is the text of the message Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury, former Under-Secretary-General and High Representative of the United Nations and Founder of the Global Movement for the Culture of Peace, sent on the occasion of the 90h birthday of Daisaku Ikeda, peacebuilder, Buddhist philosopher, educator, author and poet, and President of the Soka Gakkai International (SGI), based in Tokyo.
NEW YORK - My life partner Mariam and I have immense pleasure and deep honor in sending to President Daisaku Ikeda our joyous felicitations and fondly respectful greetings on the occasion of his very auspicious and uniquely significant 90th birth anniversary on 2 January 2018.
By Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury
Following are extensive excerpts from the keynote address by Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury, former Under-Secretary-General and High Representative of the United Nations at the Gala Culminating Event of the year-round Celebration of the 50th anniversary of the International House (IH) of the University of Sydney on 2 December 2017.*
SYDNEY - It is a distinct honor to be invited as the keynote speaker of the gala culminating event of the year-long celebration of the 50th anniversary of the International House of the prestigious University of Sydney. I am particularly delighted as this International House – and for that matter all I-Houses in other universities – is a place where students can learn to relate to other people from other parts of the world, respectfully debate differences in values and cultures, learn more about world issues, and really begin to become true global citizens. It is wonderful for me to stand in front of all these flags decorating the podium – looks like the mini-United Nations – there, of course, are 193 flags of countries.
By Alice Slater*
NEW YORK (IDN-INPS) – In Oslo on December 10, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) and was accepted on behalf of the Campaign by its executive director, Beatrice Fihn, and by Setsuko Thurlow, an ICAN campaigner and survivor of the 1945 Hiroshima bombing.
Both spoke for the thousands of campaigners in over 400 organizations and more than 100 countries around the world who succeeded this fall in working with friendly governments to move a majority of states at the United Nations to adopt a treaty to prohibit to ban nuclear weapons, making their possession, use, or threat of use unlawful.
By António Guterres, UN Secretary-General
Following are extensive excerpts from UN Secretary-General António Guterres' remarks at open debate of the Security Council on 'Addressing complex contemporary challenges to international peace and security' on December 20, 2017 during Japan's presidency of the Council for the month. – The Editor
UNITED NATIONS (IDN-INPS) – I would like to make three main points today. First, we are seeing not only a quantitative but also a qualitative change in threats to international peace and security. The perils of nuclear weapons are again front and centre, with tensions higher than they have been since the end of the Cold War.
Viewpoint by Jonathan Power*
LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) – The nuclear weapon missile business is contradictory, full of missteps, highly dangerous and prepared in its madness (Mutually Assured Destruction, aka MAD, they used to call it in Cold War days) to plunge the world into a nuclear war that will reduce most of the world to dust.
A new book, “The Doomsday Machine” by Daniel Ellsberg tells the whole nuclear bomb story in detail. No one has done it better. The only rival is the movie, “Dr Strangelove”, that got the essentials right without being privy to much of the Ellsberg’s knowledge.
By Martin Plaut*
AMSTERDAM (IDN-INPS) – In 2015, Dutch professor and human rights advocate Mirjam van Reisen was interviewed by Dutch radio station 'BNR Nieuwsradio' about people with ties to the Eritrean regime being employed as interpreters at the Dutch Immigration and Naturalisation Service (IND).
Van Reisen is professor at the Tilburg University and Leiden University.
By Setsuko Thurlow
Setsuko Thurlow is a Japanese-Canadian nuclear disarmament campaigner who survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima in 1945. She is a leading figure in the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), which won the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize. Thurlow accepted the prize on behalf of the campaign at a ceremony in Oslo on 10 December 2017, together with Beatrice Fihn, the executive director of ICAN. Following are extensive excerpts from her Nobel Peace Prize Acceptance Speech. – The Editor
OSLO (IDN) – It is a great privilege to accept this award, together with Beatrice, on behalf of all the remarkable human beings who form the ICAN movement. You each give me such tremendous hope that we can – and will – bring the era of nuclear weapons to an end.
