Nobel Laureates Meet for Peace Symposium

Many of the world’s Nobel Peace Prize laureates met here Thursday along with leading international scholars to discuss the ambitious topic of how to achieve peace in the 21st century.

The three-day symposium began with the feel of a reunion among old friends. The Dalai Lama greeted acquaintances with his trademark mellow laugh. South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu cheerfully bounced from one laureate to another, greeting as many as he could before the opening session began.

Little was said about the fighting in Afghanistan. But several speakers alluded to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States, generally making the argument that rich countries should confront tragedies such as hunger and the global HIV/AIDS epidemic with the same sense of urgency devoted to the war on terrorism.

Some of the peace prize laureates are known as practitioners of realpolitik, and others are inclined toward pacifist moral inspiration. But a broad consensus on factors that would contribute to world peace was reflected in the discussion topics, ranging from boosting democracy, human rights and the values of peace to strengthening collective security and promoting trade.

Many of the laureates expressed some optimism, but none exuded overwhelming confidence.

The elusiveness of the participants’ goal was reflected by the absence of Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat, who shared the 1994 prize with the late Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. They were too busy grappling with the spiraling violence of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Myanmar pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi missed the event because she is still under house arrest.

About 20 peace prize laureates had been scheduled to attend, but several others also were absent, including former Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev. Representatives of winning organizations also were invited to the discussions, part of the centennial celebration of the Nobel prizes.

When asked whether such a conference could achieve anything, the Dalai Lama laughed and replied: “How much effect will come, that’s difficult to say.”

Speakers stressed the gap between rich and poor as a fundamental cause of war and terrorism. Some also said the epidemic of HIV, the human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS, marks a rapidly growing threat whose dimensions are still not widely understood. In addition to a huge death toll, AIDS will bring growing economic disruption and risks of war, they said.

In the next 10 years, more people are expected to die of AIDS than were killed in all the wars and natural disasters of the last 50 years, said Didier J. Cherpitel, secretary-general of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

“Seven thousand [AIDS victims] died on Sept. 11,” he said. “Who talks about that? Seven thousand people die of HIV every day. Life-saving drugs and treatment must be affordable and accessible.”

Territorial Battles Called Outdated

South Korean President Kim Dae Jung said he finds hope in globalization and the end of an industrial age when economies were dependent on land, capital and labor. With education and technology now the primary sources of wealth, there is little reason for nations to fight over territory, he said. But “the digital divide” between rich and poor is “a dark shadow” on the promise of the global economy, Kim said.

Terrorist acts must be fought and the root causes of terrorism eliminated, Kim added. “Poverty is the main cause for terrorism,” he said. “We must root out poverty. That is the most important step we can take. We must not expect poor nations and poor people to be patient forever.”

Former Polish President Lech Walesa--winner of the peace prize in his earlier role as leader of the anti-Communist Solidarity trade union--agreed that “it will not pay to fight wars” because technology such as computers and the Internet “will be the assets to obtain resources.”

Mairead Corrigan-Maguire, who shared the 1976 prize for founding a Protestant-Roman Catholic peace movement in Northern Ireland, stressed an approach focused on people-to-people exchanges. She read a letter she wrote this week to an Iraqi woman, Umm Reyda. In the letter, Maguire notes that she met Reyda two years ago when the Iraqi was a guide at a former bomb shelter that has been turned into a memorial to civilians killed by U.S. bombs during the 1991 Persian Gulf War.

Northern Ireland Used as an Example

“I am ashamed to witness the continuing imposition of economic sanctions, a silent bomb, which cost the lives of thousands of Iraqi children,” Maguire wrote. “I understand your increased fear [from] the threats, being made openly, that your country will again be targeted because of the war in Afghanistan. I want you to know that I, just as openly, am opposed to these threats, and will continue to work in a peaceful way to prevent these becoming a reality.”

Maguire said progress in Northern Ireland shows that complex issues “cannot be solved by military or paramilitary means, but only by building a peace process through dialogue at all levels.”

Eric Hobsbawm, a University of London history professor who reviewed the sources of conflict in the 20th century, said that “the danger of nuclear war, of nuclear suicide, has receded” and that this was “largely” thanks to Gorbachev.

That prompted a quick rebuttal from Walesa, who claimed some of the credit, speaking of himself in the third person--and inadvertently providing a reminder that there can be personal rivalries even among Nobel Peace Prize winners.

“When Mr. Gorbachev became the president of the Soviet Union, it was impossible to use nuclear weapons because the political situation was so advanced,” Walesa said. “There was [former Russian President Boris N.] Yeltsin, who wanted to take Russia away from the Soviet Union. There was the Nobel prize awarded to Walesa. So Gorbachev didn’t go that far. So I think that thanking him for that is too far-reaching a simplification.”