UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Friday that countries emerging from conflict will slip back into violence unless they deliver “concrete peace dividends” to their people, including improved safety, justice and jobs.
Speaking at an open meeting of the UN Security Council on peacebuilding after conflicts, the UN chief emphasized the importance of responding “early and robustly” once fighting stops, coordinating efforts of national and international actors, and remaining engaged over the long term.
A top priority is to “build peace in the minds and hearts of people,” Ban said. “This means delivering concrete peace dividends. Peace will not last until people see real benefits in their daily lives — safety, justice, jobs, prospects for a better future.”
He also said that peace would not endure unless governments police the streets, uphold the rule of law, deliver basic services, demobilize and reintegrate former combatants into society and develop a professional security sector.
The UN Peacebuilding Fund has helped 16 countries emerging from conflict since it was launched in late 2006 and has about US$350 million in deposits and pledges from 48 donors, Ban said.
But the secretary-general stressed that the fund can’t meet the financial needs of countries emerging from conflict alone, and he appealed to donors to provide additional help either bilaterally, through UN agencies, or international financial institutions.
Japanese Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada, who presided over the council because his country holds the presidency this month, emphasized the importance of “achieving peaceful coexistence and reconciliation among parties to the conflict” and ensuring that “the fruits of democratic elections, which include political stability, be shared among all the people, including those who did not prevail.”
Sierra Leone Defense Minister Alfred Palo Conteh, whose country has been engaged in peacebuilding since an 11-year civil war ended in 2002, told the council that “adopting a strategy that includes comprehensive measures to protect and promote human rights, strengthen governance and rebuild democratic institutions will inevitably address many of the root causes of conflict.”
Auschwitz survivor Eva Schloss, the stepsister of teenage diarist Anne Frank and a tireless educator about the horrors of the Holocaust, has died. She was 96. The Anne Frank Trust UK, of which Schloss was honorary president, said she died on Saturday in London, where she lived. Britain’s King Charles III said he was “privileged and proud” to have known Schloss, who cofounded the charitable trust to help young people challenge prejudice. “The horrors that she endured as a young woman are impossible to comprehend and yet she devoted the rest of her life to overcoming hatred and prejudice, promoting kindness, courage, understanding
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