| Posted: April 30 2005,14:27 |
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PROGRESS: Has your organization seen
progress toward a culture of peace and nonviolence in your domain of
action and in your constituency during the first half of the Decade? |
Most
members of our organization, the Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society
(SPAS) are showing an interest in working actively with peaceful
conflict resolution. In 2004 a new group was formed within SPAS that
will work more systematically with these issues.
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OBSTACLES: What are the most important obstacles that have prevented progress?
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During
the last couple of years people engaged in peace and disarmament issues
have been focusing quite a lot on protests against the so called "war
on terrorism" and the war in Iraq, which has also meant that there has
not been so much attention given to actively trying to promote a
culture of peace.
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ACTIONS: What actions have been
undertaken by your organization to promote a culture of peace and
nonviolence during the first half of the Decade?
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In
2001 SPAS organised an international conference on civilian crisis
management within the European Union. In 2002 SPAS organised an
international 3-days conference on nonviolence and peaceful conflict
resolution in Gothenburg, Sweden. In 2002 SPAS also organised an
international conference on the UN and conflict management. In 2004
SPAS organised a seminar for the promotion of the International
Criminal Court. In 2005 SPAS organised an international seminar on the
topic of nuclear non-proliferation.
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ADVICE: What advice would you like to
give to the Secretary-General and the General Assembly to promote a
culture of peace and nonviolence during the second half of the Decade? |
That
he should work for a more interaction between the UN and governments
and peace and disarmament NGOs. That he should continue to work for
UN-reform. That he and the GA should not silently accept military
actions taken outside of the UN-system. We would like to continue to
encourage the secretary-general to stand firmly against actions such as
the US decision to go to war against Iraq.
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PARTNERSHIPS: What partnerships and
networks does your organization participate in, thus strengthening the
global movement for a culture of peace? |
The International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL)
The Cluster Munitions Coalition (CMC)
The International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA)
The International Peace Bureau (IPB)
The European Network Against Arms Trade (ENAAT)
The Committee of Russian Soldier's Mothers
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PLANS: What new engagements are
planned by your organization to promote a culture of peace and
nonviolence in the second half of the Decade (2005-2010)? |
Promoting
a culture of peace is a broad agenda. We view all our work as part of
such global efforts. We do not necessarily think that "new" engagements
are more important than continuing our old ones.
Our plans are
focussed on three headlines and under these we give exampels of our
work. For more details on exact plans see our website
Democracy
We
believe that democracy is important for peace. We believe that NGOs
like our own are important for democracy. We will continue to run joint
programmes with NGO's in our regional neighborhood in which we can give
related NGO's some part of our knowledge from 120 years of peace
activities as an NGO. In particular we will continue to work with the
Committee of Russian Soldier's Mothers. This is especially important
for us in the light of the ongoing war in Chechnya.
Disarmament
We
believe that the system of having nation states arming themselvs in
order to feel secure from attacs from other nation states is medieval
and something that should be exchanged into a world were peace and
security are seen as truly international questions and
responsibilities. We favour lower military expenditure in all countries
and beeing a Swedish NGO we also critizise the Swedish government
for it's lack to reduce the national military expenditure as much as we
would like it to be lowered. Since some weapons and some warfare is
even worse than other we actively campaign against nuclear arms, mines,
clustermunitions and against general arms trade to countries which to
not respect human rights.
Conflict Management
We believe
that all conflicts can be solved without violence if handled at an
early stage. To this end we campaign for an increase in the aid budgets
of all countries and especially our own. We also believe that civilian
crises management tools should be promoted and more actively used,
especially NGO-activities should be supported and encouraged. Never the
less we find that there are situations were military force is needed in
order to secure stability or put an end to violent attacks.
For
us it is important that the decision to use military force is the sole
responsibility of the UN. Thus we will campaign against regional groups
taking upon themselves to take such actions without UN-mandates.
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Postal address of organization
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Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society (SPAS)
Box 4134, 102 63 Stockholm, Sweden
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E-mail address of organization
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info@svenskafreds.se
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Website address of organization
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www.svenskafreds.se
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Highest priority action domain of a culture of peace
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International peace and security
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Second priority action domain of a culture of peace
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Democratic Participation
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Highest priority country of action (or international)
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Primary national focus is Sweden.
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Second priority country of action (or international)
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Secondary
national focus is Russia. But we also have a regional focus on both the
European Union and on Eastern Europe, as well as an international
focus.
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