Albabtain delivers a speech today at the United Nations General Assembly.
September 5, 2018
Abdulaziz Saud Albabtain delivered a speech before the United Nations General Assembly, in which he stated that the Albabtain Cultural Foundation will present ready-made curricula for teaching a culture of just peace at various educational levels around the world during the forthcoming World Forum to be hosted at the International Court of Justice in The Hague. The Forum is being organized by Abdulaziz Saud Albabtain Cultural Foundation.
In the beginning, Albabtain expressed: "On this distinguished Forum, I renew our Foundation's commitment to work towards enhancing a culture of just peace, a commitment that stems from Kuwait's commitment, led by His Highness the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, to the constant support of peace worldwide. In collaboration with our partners, we focus on three principles."
"The first principle is the 'Peaceful Nature of Identity,' and the challenges to this principle cannot be left to affect the authentic nature of identity. Instead, we offer effective programs that counter and support identity challenges, as we believe that identities, whether geographically distant or close, are interconnected and complementary. The second cornerstone is the 'Positive Interaction of Identities,' as no local identity can thrive without positively interacting with other identities, forming together a global and local identity (GLOCAL). The third cornerstone is the 'Global Centrality of Peace Culture,' emphasizing that peace culture, global citizenship, and global identity are interrelated conceptual elements, none of which can exist independently without the others. We firmly establish a global culture of peace, which we aim to spread worldwide, as it preserves our comprehensive global identity."
Albabtain further stated: "During your General Assembly session last year, on September 7, 2017, I presented the project 'Peace Culture for the Security of Future Generations.' Through this project, I proposed the inclusion of peace culture in educational programs and curricula, starting from kindergarten to university. The project received acceptance and appreciation from the General Assembly, and I express my sincere gratitude for that. This motivated me to take the first step in its implementation, as we inaugurated the Abdulaziz Saud Albabtain Chair for the Culture of Peace on November 22, 2017, in Rome. We entrusted the European Inter-University Centre for Human Rights and Democratisation to initiate the teaching of peace culture in a hundred universities worldwide, from various countries. I am delighted to inform you that peace culture is now being taught on all continents. Subsequently, the Foundation, in collaboration with its partners, formed an international supervisory committee to facilitate the task of those who will teach future generations peace culture. The committee's responsibility was to design curricula for all educational levels, from kindergarten to university."
Albabtain elaborated on the preparation process of the curricula, stating: "Currently, three teams of experts are editing a total of seventeen curricula based on the main guidelines drawn from this model curriculum. These teams consist of experts in primary and elementary education, experts in secondary education, and experts in higher education."
All the curricula will be presented in a printed format to our esteemed guests at the inaugural session of the World Forum for Peace Culture, organized by the Abdulaziz Saud Albabtain Cultural Foundation at the International Court of Justice in The Hague on June 13, 2019. The Forum will be attended by several world leaders, political, social, and cultural figures.
On another occasion, Albabtain spoke at the International Peace Institute (IPI) in the presence of the Institute's President, Terry Rod Larsen. In his speech, he emphasized: "Our vision of peace is based on a fundamental premise that peace is a vital necessity. Today, more than ever before, we need to transition peace from being merely possible to being a necessity for the continuity of humanity. We must move beyond the idea of peace as something that could happen to recognizing it as an essential requirement, which calls upon us to reflect on our social duties and responsibilities. We need to be convinced that peace is a necessity, not just a possibility. We aspire to a life free from conflict, where competition prevails. When peace becomes a necessity, not merely a possibility, we will establish a better world."
Albabtain added: "When we think of universalizing peace as a necessity that encompasses the entire world, it means harnessing our behavior, symbols, and all means of communication towards the loftiest goal, which is peace. The essence of the world of peace lies in diversity, where there is no single language, color, culture, race, sect, or religion, but a multitude of languages in one language, colors in one color, cultures in one culture, and sects in one sect. In essence, it is the world of multi-dimensional human."