Launching a New Initiative: Towards an Inclusive Peace 2017

After months of careful planning and hard work, the big moment finally arrived. Towards an Inclusive Peace, a new event of the Caux Forum, was launched on 23 July with some 100 people from 39 countries gathered for the opening session.

Participants were greeted by Barbara Hintermann, Secretary General of the CAUX-IofC Foundation, and Kate Monkhouse, member of the TIP organizing team. They highlighted IofC’s long tradition of peacebuilding and the central role that Caux has played in it.

Ms Hintermann described TIP as a much-needed and timely addition to the Caux Forum’s line-up of events, since its goal was to look at violent extremism in its broadest sense. The forum would address the social, economic and cultural roots of extremism and look for solutions which could create a just and sustainable peace.

The keynote address was given by Fatima Zaman from Extremely Together, a youth programme of the Kofi Annan Foundation. A passionate activist against violent extremism activist from the UK, she began by describing how she witnessed the 7/7 terrorist attacks in London.

Since then, her driving force had been to challenge extremist propaganda and deliver a positive narrative in schools and beyond.. She said that violent extremists were fed on a narrative of hate and weaponization, together with a romanticized image of their role in fighting injustice.

Fatima Zaman challenged her own generation, the millennials, to counter this narrative with one of love and inclusion. She also called on the military, government and civil society organizations to work together, using a more coherent approach. She concluded that sending a message of peace and hope to counter isolation and pent-up frustration was far more effective than military strategies.

Participants left the meeting with a sense of excitement and anticipation.