DICTpeace NOBEL

NGUYEN Huu Vien
DICTIONARY OF
PEACE
DEFINED BY THE NOBEL PRIZE LAUREATES
Prefaced by Dr. Norman Ernest
BORLAUG
1970 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate
Founder of The World Food Prize
The 21st Century
Paris - Hanoi
For my Father who told me tenderly how many

times with all his heart when Peace returned we
would come back Hanoi.....but he never returned
since he had left his beloved Capital and he died
after 1975 for regretting to build that inhuman
“machine” to destroy all his own sons .....Until now I
still feel his suffering.....
For Hanoi, “the City of Peace” & her Sword

Lake with all my Love and Emotion …once upon a
time as a very young and young baby in Hanoi….
Paris, at the end of Tan Ty 2001
Nguyễn Hữu Viện
" The city has had an impressive course of improvement, especially in

the rehabilitation of its historic heritages, assistance to artistic and cultural
exchanges, encouragement of traditional craft, improvement of health
services for the old people, protection of environment and green parks.
Hanoi has also paid appropriate attention to the cause of education and
training of the younger generation, regarding it as a priority in its
development policy. Moreover the city has also shown its all-round and
humanitarian viewpoint in relation to all the existing problems that it is now
facing: to maintain its efforts for developing the urban and technological
infrastructure, especially in the improvement of the living condition of over
2.5 million people. "
Federico Mayor, Director General of UNESCO
At the UNESCO Award "City for Peace"
La Paz of Bolivia on July 26, 1999
"Chúng ta đang có co may sống trong một kỷ nguyên kỳ diệu, ranh

giới của hai thiên niên kỷ, thiên kỷ truớc với chinh chiến đau thuong và
thiên kỷ tới của hoà bình, an lạc, công lý và đạo lý."
Dr. Linus Pauling
" Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that
the defences of peace must be constructed "
Constitution of UNESCO, 1945
“The destiny of world civilization depends upon providing a decent

standard of living for all mankind. The guiding principles of the recipient of
the 1969 Nobel Peace Prize, the International Labour Organization, are
expressed in its charter words, ‘Universal and lasting peace can be
established only if it is based upon social justice. If you desire peace,
cultivate justice.’ This is magnificent; no one can disagree with this lofty
principle.”
Norman E. BORLAUG
Peace starts with a smile”
Mother TERESA
I would hope that the nations of the world might say

that we had built a lasting peace, built not on weapons of
war but on international policies which reflect our own most
precious values.
Jimmy CARTER
" Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that
the defences of peace must be constructed "
Constitution of UNESCO, 1945
“The destiny of world civilization depends upon providing a decent

standard of living for all mankind. The guiding principles of the recipient of
the 1969 Nobel Peace Prize, the International Labour Organization, are
expressed in its charter words, ‘Universal and lasting peace can be
established only if it is based upon social justice. If you desire peace,
cultivate justice.’ This is magnificent; no one can disagree with this lofty
principle.
Almost certainly, however, the first essential component of social
justice is adequate food for all mankind. Food is the moral right of all who
are born into this world. Yet today fifty percent of the world’s population
goes hungry. Without food, man can live at most but a few weeks; without it,
all other components of social justice are meaningless. Therefore I feel that
the aforementioned guiding principle must be modified to read: If you desire
peace, cultivate justice, but at the same time cultivate the fields to produce
more bread; otherwise there will be no peace.”
Norman E. BORLAUG
PREFACE
I feel honored and privileged to be asked

to write the Preface for the Dictionary of Peace,
a collection of thoughts from the writings of
Nobel Peace Laureates over the past one
hundred years.
The achievement of global peace has

eluded humankind to date. Certainly it will
require a greater triumph of love over hate,
benevolence over selfishness, and respect over
intolerance than the peoples and nations have
been able to demonstrate so far.
A necessary, but by no means sufficient,

condition for world peace will be the enjoyment
by all people of what I consider to be the basic
human requirements to permit the realization of
individual genetic potential—adequate
nutrition, health, shelter, education, and
freedom to attain a decent standard of living.
Sadly, despite the tremendous scientific,

economic, social, and political progress over
past 100 years in some nations, eight out of ten
babies born into the world today, begin life in
abject poverty, without access to the basic
nutrition and health services needed for a
humane and productive life. Yet we have the
technical and financial means—if we were to
mobilize them—to assure the world’s poorest
citizens have access to these basic blessings. In
doing so, both the rich and poor would benefit,
and humankind would have moved a long way
down the road toward global prosperity and
world peace.
I applaud the efforts of Nguyen Huu Vien,

a child of war in Vietnam and a political
refugee, to compile this anthology dedicated to
the aspirations of Peace for all the peoples of the
world. It is my hope that the thoughts contained
herein will provide inspiration to each reader
and motivation to make even a modest
contribution to a better world.
Dr. Norman BORLAUG
1970 Nobel Peace Laureate

Founder, The World Food Prize
FOREWORD
I have been preparing this Dictionary of Peace for several years as an answer to
the International Year's programme for the Culture of Peace in the Year 2000
proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly and the United Nations Educational,
Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) and the 100th Anniversary of the
Nobel Peace Prize (1901 - 2001).
I hope this modest book will be a tool of the Culture of Peace and education
support for a reader who can find the essential concepts on the universal culture of Peace.
Education is a basic human right and a fundamental means for the promotion and
protection of all human rights and basic freedom. That is why the promotion of Peace and
Human Rights through teaching and training has become one of priorities of UNESCO.
This dictionary is selected and based principally on all the speeches and lectures
delivered by the Nobel Peace Prize Laureates. That is why this is an anthology on
Peace and a collection of the only collective voice of all the heroes of peace in the
most warlike 20th century. This dictionary of peace is the collective utopian
testaments from the 'élites' of our planet for the next generations.
I hope the landscape and perspective of Peace will be open towards news
horizons of our common aspirations at the dawn of the 21st Century on all
continents. We believe that the United Nations Institutions and particularly the
UNESCO will give the most effective assistance to the ideal and cause of Peace and
Human Rights throughout the world. But the struggle and the fight for a durable
peace and human rights still remains in the last year of this century ….
The author particularly thanks Dr. Norman BORLAUG, 1970 Nobel Peace
Prize for his major role in temporarily alleviating world famine, Founder of the
World Food Prize, Father and a Central Figure in the "Green Revolution", has
saved literally millions of lives, Scientist, Agriculturist, Forester, Farmer, but more
importantly, a Man with the most noble mission: to alleviate hunger and his leading
research achievement was to hasten the perfection of dwarf spring wheat, for
prefacing this dictionary in spite of the multiples charges of his high functions and
activity at 87 for fighting world hunger .
Paris/Hanoi Autumn 2001
Vien NGUYEN
0,1,2,3 …
We have to choose between a global market driven only by calculations of short-
term profit, and one which has a human face. Between a world which condemns a
quarter of the human race to starvation and squalor, and one which offers everyone
at least a chance of prosperity, in a healthy environment. Between a selfish free-for-all in
which we ignore the fate of the losers, and a future in which the strong and the successful
accept their responsibilities, showing global vision and leadership.
Kofi
ANNAN
We have entered the third millennium through a gate of fire. If today, after the
horror of 11 September, we see better, and we see further - we will realize that
humanity is indivisible. New threats make no distinction between races, nations or
regions. A new insecurity has entered every mind, regardless of wealth or status. A
deeper awareness of the bonds that bind us all - in pain as in prosperity - has gripped
young and old.
Kofi
ANNAN
The 20th century was perhaps the deadliest in human history, devastated by
innumerable conflicts, untold suffering, and unimaginable crimes. Time after time, a
group or a nation inflicted extreme violence on another, often driven by irrational hatred
and suspicion, or unbounded arrogance and thirst for power and resources. In response to
these cataclysms, the leaders of the world came together at mid-century to unite the
nations as never before.
Kofi
ANNAN
The reforms will continue in Korea. We are committed to the early completion of
the current reform measures, as well as to reform as an on-going process of
transformation into a first-rate economy of the 21st century. This we hope to achieve
by combining the strength of our traditional industries with the endless possibilities that
lie in the information and bio-tech fields.
KIM Dae
Jung
Today, the Jews have been outlawed in many countries. This is happening more
and more as governments become more unfeeling and the people more fearful and
suspicious. Here is just one recent example. A group of some thirty people of the
Jewish faith, including men, women, and children, had been forced to seek refuge on a
little strip of no-man's-land to which neither of the neighbouring states had established
a title. There these people were left day after day without ground cover and without any
kind of roof over their heads. On neither side of the frontier did the local authorities dare
to allow them into their country. Nor would they let them have any food, or even water. It
was cold, and two young girls of eighteen or nineteen contracted pneumonia. They lay
there on the bare ground in a high fever while more days passed. Nobody dared to help
these "untouchables", to use the new European meaning of the word. In the end, some
journalists happened by who, believing in the old Samaritan tradition, managed to help
them through the worst of their distress. It is not known what finally became of these
poor people.
Michael
HANSSON
President of the Nansen International Office for
Refugees
This growing concern is comforting, even though it comes 500 years later, to
the suffering, the discrimination, the oppression and the exploitation that our people has
been exposed to, but who, thanks to their own cosmovision - and concept of life, have
managed to withstand and finally see some promising prospects. How those roots, that
were to be eradicated, now begin to grow with strength, hopes and visions for the future!
Rigoberta MENCHU TUM
I always wonder that 4-500 years ago as St. Francis of Assisi composed this
prayer that they had the same difficulties that we have today, as we compose this prayer
that fits very nicely for us also.
Mother TERESA
It is only now that all the horror of our existence rises up at us. But the essential
fact that we must surely feel in our hearts, and which we ought to have felt for a long
time, is that we are becoming inhuman in proportion as we become supermen. We have
tolerated the mass killing of men in war -- about 20,000,000 in the second World War
-- the reduction to nothing by the atomic bomb of whole towns with their inhabitants,
the transformation of men into living torches by incendiary bombs.
While we avowed that these deeds are the result of inhumane action, the avowal is
accompanied by the reflection that the fact of war condemns us to accept them. By
resigning ourselves without resistance to our fate we make ourselves guilty of
inhumanity.
Albert SCHWEITZER
Of the 600 million children today (1965) believed to be living at, or below, the
minimum subsistence level, some sixteen and a half million still die before they attain
their first birthdays. Despite the progress of the last decade, mortality rates among infants
in the less developed regions are still as much as five times higher than in the developed
areas; they are up to forty times higher for children in the one to five age group.
It is estimated that some 500 million children have actually experienced hunger or
suffer from varying degrees of starvation or malnutrition. The grim picture of the
emaciated child, misshapen, with its swollen belly and tragic questioning eyes, has left an
indelible mark on those sensitive to harrowing misery.
United Nations Children's Fund

(UNICEF)
The dangers posed by the tens of thousands of nuclear weapons that are
still deployed at various stages of readiness for use -- primarily in the United States and
Russia but also, with numbers in the hundreds, in the "intermediate" and undeclared
nuclear-weapon states. Contrary to public perceptions, it is still all too possible that these
nuclear weapons COULD be used, in greater or lesser numbers, as a result of various
combinations of crisis conditions, electronic and mechanical malfunctions, breaks in the
chain of official command and control, and human errors, misjudgments, or misguided
impulses.
John P. HOLDREN
Pugwash Conferences on Science and World
Affairs
I now say that the world has the technology – either available or well advanced in
the research pipeline – to feed on a sustainable basis a population of 10 billion people.
The more pertinent question today is whether farmers and ranchers will be permitted to
use this new technology?
While the affluent nations can certainly afford to adopt ultra low-risk positions,
and pay more for food produced by the so-called “organic” methods, the one billion
chronically undernourished people of the low-income, food-deficit nations cannot.
Norman E. BORLAUG
Special 30th Anniversary Lecture, The Norwegian Nobel Institute, Oslo
September 8, 2000
Twenty-seven years ago, in my acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize, I
said that the Green Revolution had won a temporary success in man's war against hunger,
which if fully implemented, could provide sufficient food for humankind through to the
end of the 20'th century. But I warned that unless the frightening power of human
reproduction was curbed, the success of the Green Revolution would only be ephemeral.
I now say that the world has the technology - either available or well-advanced in
the research pipeline - to feed a population of 10 billion people. The more pertinent
question today is whether farmers and ranchers will be permitted to use this new
technology.
Norman E. Borlaug
The International Conference on the Economic Aspects of Disarmament, meeting

in Oslo, heard from a survey prepared for it that 180 billion dollars (1965) are being
spent annually on arms. Each atomic submarine costs approximately 160 million dollars
and the latest supersonic fighter planes are priced at several millions of dollars. A Polaris
nuclear-powered submarine costs 200 million dollars.
UNICEF, together with all those engaged in the struggle for social betterment and
the raising of standards of living, the governments, the organizations, and individuals
who have understood its purposes and provided moral and material support, has the
formula to put life and substance into the words of the Declaration. If only the nations of
the world could together agree to spend a fraction of their outlay on building "deterrent
strengths", to develop the capacity of the young generation to adjust in health and
happiness to the needs of a dynamic society! Perhaps each abortive disarmament
conference would set itself a penalty - a contribution to UNICEF, the equivalent cost of
one submarine or a dozen fighter planes. Today's children are surely the central factor in
the strategy for peace and survival.

(UNICEF)
A…….
Here also we have ancient habits to deal with, vast structures of power,
indescribably complicated problems to solve. But unless we abdicate our humanity
altogether and succumb to fear and impotence in the presence of the weapons we have
ourselves created, it is as imperative and urgent to put an end to war and violence
between nations as it is to put an end to racial injustice. Equality with whites will hardly
solve the problems of either whites or Negroes if it means equality in a society under the
spell of terror and a world doomed to extinction.
Martin Luther KING
In newly emergent democracies many who have been disappointed in their

expectations of immediate material betterment have sought to work out their frustrations
by subscribing to outmoded and obscure conspiracy theories that foster prejudice,
paranoia and violence. The search for scapegoats is essentially an abnegation of
responsibility: it indicates an inability to assess honestly and intelligently the true
nature of the problems which lie at the root of social and economic difficulties and a lack
of resolve in grappling with them. The valuation of achievement in predominantly
material terms implies a limited and limiting view of human society, denying it many of
the qualities that make it more than a conglomerate of egoistic consumer-gatherers who
have advanced little beyond the prehistoric instinct for survival.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
And we read in the Scripture, for God says very clearly: Even if a mother could
forget her child - I will not forget you - I have carved you in the palm of my hand. We are
carved in the palm of His hand, so close to Him that unborn child has been carved in the
hand of God. And that is what strikes me most, the beginning of that sentence, that even
if a mother could forget something impossible - but even if she could forget - I will not
forget you. And today the greatest means - the greatest destroyer of peace is abortion.
Mother TERESA
Peace, to us, a value and an interest. Peace is an absolute human value which
will help man develop his humanity with freedom that cannot be limited by regional,
religious or national restrictions. It restores to the Arab-Jewish relationship its innocent
nature and gives the Arab conscience the opportunity to express - through absolute
human terms - its understanding of the European tragedy of the Jews. It also gives the
Jewish conscience the opportunity to express the suffering of the Palestinian peoples
which resulted from this historical intersection and to find an echo for this suffering in
the pained Jewish soul. The pained people are more capable than others of understanding
the suffering of other people.
Yasser Arafat
I don't believe in accidents. There are only encounters in history. There are no
accidents.
Elie WIESEL
I must say, with due respect and humility, that from 1975 onward, the United
States was an accomplice to Indonesia's crime of genocide by providing to the
Indonesian government weapons and military training
José RAMOS-HORTA
Salomon Centre, May 25.
The Soviet press, Soviet representatives abroad, and some of my Soviet

colleagues during foreign missions, in contacts with people in the West who are
concerned about my fate, in an attempt to disorganize my defence, assert that I am
against detente, have spoken out against SALT, and have even permitted the divulgence
of state secrets; they also emphasize the mildness of the measures taken against me. My
attitude and open way of life and actions are well known and show how absurd these
accusations are.
I have never infringed state secrecy, and any talk of this is slander. I regard
thermonuclear war as the main danger threatening mankind, and consider that the
problem of preventing it takes priority over other international problems; I am in favour
of disarmament and a strategic balance, I support the SALT-II agreement as a necessary
stage in disarmament negotiations. I am against any expansion, against Soviet
intervention in Afghanistan, but in favour of aid to refugees and the starving throughout
the world. I regard as very important an international agreement on refusal to be the first
to use nuclear weapons, concluded on the basis of a strategic balance in the field of
conventional weapons.
Andrei SAKHAROV
The principle of non-violent resistance seeks to reconcile the truths of two

opposites - acquiescence and violence - while avoiding the extremes and immoralities
of both. The non-violent resister aggress with the person who acquisces that one should
not be physically aggressive toward his opponent; but he balances the equation by
agreeing with the person of violence that evil must be resisted. He avoids the non-
resistance of the former and the violent resistance of the latter. With non-violent
resistance, no individual or group need to submit to any wrong, nor need anyone resort to
violence in order to right a wrong.
Martin Luther King
Now, of course, it is an act of faith. But all of life is actually based on faith.
When I got married even when I'm head-over-heels in love, there's no guarantee that the
person I married I will still love a few years down the line. It is an act of faith. It is an act
of faith that that bus coming down the road is not certainly going to break the laws of
gravity and float up in the sky. There's nothing to actually stop that from happening. It's
an act of faith to say that this universe is rational is orderly.
DESMOND TUTU
Despite grand debates on world order, the act of humanitarianism comes

down to one thing: individual human beings reaching out to their counterparts who find
themselves in the most difficult circumstances. One bandage at a time, one suture at a
time, one vaccination at a time.
Médecin sans Frontières
We achieve everything by our efforts alone. Our fate is not decided by an

almighty God. We decide our own fate by our actions. You have to gain mastery over
yourself...It is not a matter of sitting back and accepting.
Aung San Suu Kyi
He who, after a hard fight, is willing for the sake of the fatherland to serve the
German people with love and loyalty and to defend present-day Germany, is more
valuable for the durability of the state than a superficial convert.
The concept of active cooperation has taken the place of opposition to the
new form of government and of dreamy resignation entranced with the beauty of times
past. Therefore, not only the present but also the future will have this republican
Germany to reckon with.
Gustav STRESEMANN
Speaking surely also meant negotiating and being open to conciliation, not
unilateral concession. An active peace policy will remain for a long time to come the
test of our intellectual and material vitality.
Willy BRANDT
And active policy of co-existence should be based neither on fear nor on
blind confidence. I know that the Western alliance would function; the potential
adversary will have no illusions about this. But we must also discard that unimaginative
principle that nations with different social and economic system cannot live side by side
without being in grave conflict.
Willy BRANDT
Many people are very, very concerned with the children in India, with the children
in Africa where quite a number die, maybe of malnutrition, of hunger and so on, but
millions are dying deliberately by the will of the mother. And this is what is the greatest
destroyer of peace today. Because if a mother can kill her own child - what is left for me
to kill you and you kill me - there is nothing between. And this I appeal in India, I appeal
everywhere: Let us bring the child back, and this year being the child's year: What have
we done for the child? At the beginning of the year I told, I spoke everywhere and I said:
Let us make this year that we make every single child born, and unborn, wanted. And
today is the end of the year, have we really made the children wanted? I will give you
something terrifying. We are fighting abortion by adoption, we have saved thousands
of lives, we have sent words to all the clinics, to the hospitals, police stations - please
don't destroy the child, we will take the child. So every hour of the day and night it is
always somebody, we have quite a number of unwedded mothers - tell them come, we
will take care of you, we will take the child from you, and we will get a home for the
child. And we have a tremendous demand from families who have no children, that is the
blessing of God for us. And also, we are doing another thing which is very beautiful - we
are teaching our beggars, our leprosy patients, our slum dwellers, our people of the street,
natural family planning.
Mother TERESA
Friends will be found active in adult and youth education, but perhaps their
unique contribution in the intellectual field of peacemaking has been made through the
Friends' International Centres. Over a period of twenty-seven years these have been
established in many of the great cities of Europe and at some of the international
crossroads of the East. The aim of such Centres is one of reconciliation and creative
peacemaking, and a great variety of activities have resulted. Here men and women can
come, seeking together the truths of the spirit, and find freedom of converse on neutral
ground where conflicting views can be discussed in friendship. These Centres are staffed
by people drawn from at least three and sometimes more countries and in themselves
demonstrate the possibility of international understanding when united by the same spirit.
From them Quaker ambassadors of peace can go out to plead with authorities or act as
reconcilers in times of crisis.
Friends Service Council (The

Quakers)
Some people, however, appear to have lost heart because Japan and Russia are
engaged in a sanguinary conflict. But the most ardent advocates of peace never
expected that treaties of arbitration would at once put an end to all wars, any more than
those who, when mankind was emerging from barbarism, first framed crude laws and set
up rude courts of justice, expected that by so doing all men would immediately cease to
fight out their personal differences.
William Randal
CREMER
This award could not be for me alone, nor for just South Africa, but for Africa as
a whole. Africa presently is the most deeply torn with strife and most bitterly stricken
with racial conflict. How strange then it is that a man of Africa should be here to receive
an award given for service to the cause of peace and brotherhood between men.
Albert John
LUTULI
When that moment comes, we shall, together, rejoice in a common victory over racism,
apartheid and white minority rule. That triumph will finally bring to a close a history of
five hundred years of African colonisation that began with the establishment of the
Portuguese empire. Thus, it will mark a great step forward in history and also serve as a
common pledge of the peoples of the world to fight racism, wherever it occurs and
whatever guise it assumes.
Nelson
MANDELA
In our African language we say 'a person is a person through other persons.' I
would not know how to be a human being at all except I learned this from other human
beings. We are made for a delicate network of relationships, of interdependence. We are
meant to complement each other. All kinds of things go horribly wrong when we break
that fundamental law of our being. Not even the most powerful nation can be completely
self-sufficient.
Desmond TUTU
We stand here today as nothing more than a representative of the millions of our people
who dared to rise up against a social system whose very essence is war, violence,
racism, oppression, repression and the impoverishment of an entire people.
Nelson
MANDELA
We must not move too fast or believe that, in our age of rapid
communication (1908), minds can be reshaped as quickly and easily as matter. There
are some forms of resistance and even of hesitation that only time, allied with education,
can overcome. Jurists and journalists can do a great deal to pave the way for the reform of
nefarious practices. They can succeed - and there are examples of this in influencing a
nation to give up barbaric measures which its government has been unwilling to
renounce.
Louis RENAULT
Most certainly, agricultural scientists have a moral obligation to warn the

political, educational, and religious leaders about the magnitude and seriousness of the
arable land, food, population and environmental problems that lie ahead. These problems
will not vanish by themselves. Unless they are addressed in a forthright manner future
solutions will be more difficult to achieve.
Norman E. BORLAUG
I am impatient and do not accept the need for slow change and evolution to
improve the agriculture and food production of the emerging countries. I
advocate instead a "yield kick-off"; or " yield blast-off". There is no time to be lost,
considering the magnitude of the world food and population problem.
Norman BORLAUG
All Africa has this single aim : our goal is a united Africa in which the
standards of life and liberty are constantly expanding; in which the ancient legacy of
illiteracy and disease is swept aside; in which the dignity of man is rescued from beneath
the heels of colonialism which have trampled it. This goal, pursued by millions of our
people with revolutionary zeal, by means of books, representations, demonstrations, and
in some places armed force provoked by the adamancy of white rule, carries the only real
promise of peace in Africa. Whatever means have been used, the efforts have gone to end
alien rule and race oppression.
Albert John LUTULI
As a military man, as a commander, as a minister of defence, I ordered to carry

out many military operations. And together with the joy of victory and the grief of
bereavement, I shall always remember the moment just after taking such decisions: the
hush as senior officers or cabinet ministers slowly rise from their seats; the sight of their
receding backs; the sound of the closing door; and then the silence in which I remain
alone.
Yitzhak Rabin
One of the most persistent ambiguities that we face is that everybody talks
about peace as a goal. However, it does not take sharpest-eyed sophistication to discern
that while everybody talks about peace, peace has become practically nobody's business
among the power-wielders. Many men cry Peace! Peace! but they refuse to do the things
that make for peace.
Martin Luther King
I wish to dwell for a moment on the subject of America. This land of limitless
opportunities is marked by its ability to carry out new and daring plans of enormous
imagination and scope, while often using the simplest methods. In other words, it is a
nation idealistic in its concepts and practical in its execution of them. We feel that the
modem peace movement has every chance in America of attracting strong support and of
finding a clear formula for the implementation of its aims.
Bertha von SUTTNER
America's future will be determined by the home and the school. The child
becomes largely what it is taught; hence we must watch what we teach it, and how we
live before it.
Jane ADDAMS
I would also say that America and Europe cannot be separated. They need
each other as self-confident, equal partners. The heavier the burden the United States has
to carry, the more will that great country be able to rely on our friendship.
Willy BRANDT
In this respect the United States offers the most striking example. Great Britain
also owes its strength at least in part to its capacity to absorb foreign elements, including
Jews. Our own country's history gives similar evidence of the assets brought us by
immigrant families over the centuries. It is no exaggeration to say that the remarkable
development and progress that Norway has enjoyed since the beginning of the last
century are in no small measure due to the immigrants, without whose talents Norway
would not today stand where she does, either intellectually or economically.
There is much talk of the danger of mixing races, without anyone's being able to
offer a precise scientific definition of the term "race". Still, scientific study of the human
species does confirm the existence of several distinct generic types. It has found that even
such a homogeneous people as the French is composed of three, and our own nation of
two quite different types. When we talk of the mixing of races, we generally mean the
mixing of different nationalities. Naturally, the fusion of people of different nations, or
"races" - if you prefer to use the word in its usual connotation - is easier if the differences
are not too great, but the fusion, the assimilation, the absorption also depend to a large
degree upon the character of the nation concerned, on its intellectual intensity, on the
very rhythm in which life is lived. Thus, for example, the intensity of the American
way of life, both intellectual and material, transforms most immigrants into
"Americans" within a relatively short period of time. Very few of the families that have
emigrated to Norway have failed to become "Norwegian" within the course of one or, at
the most, two generations.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
There is a possibility that some centres of political and economic power, some
statesmen and intellectuals, have not yet managed to see the advantages of the active
participation of the Indian people in all the fields of human activity. However, the
movement initiated by different political and intellectual "Amerindians" will finally
convince them that, from an objective point of view, we are a constituent part of the
historical alternatives that are being discussed at international levels.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Political imprisonment, torture, the death penalty - these are the specific issues
that Amnesty International has sought to grapple with during the sixteen years of its
existence. We have also tried to find constructive ways to prevent such injustices in the
future. Our program has been carried out mainly by individuals and small groups of men
and women, bearing the cost of their own labours, working together in a worldwide non-
governmental organization.
Amnesty International
Norman Angell, the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize for 1933, is one of the
educators, one of those who instruct public opinion, who pave the way for reforms which
the statesmen attempt to carry out. His share in this educational task has been original and
influential. Ralph Norman Angell Lane is a farmer's son from Norfolk who will be sixty
years old next Boxing Day. His health was never strong and in his youth he lived several
years in California. Thus he established contacts with the United States and with
American public opinion which he has kept up throughout life. He became a journalist,
and when first I met him - now more than twenty years ago - he was the business
manager of the Paris edition of the Daily Mail and had been living in France for some
years. His intimate knowledge of public opinion in three of the big powers of the world
has qualified him superbly for his chosen work.
……
Norman Angell is a great writer and journalist. He possesses the greatest gift of
the pamphleteer, the gift of saying the same thing again and again, but in new ways, with
new and apt illustrations. He has been compared with Swift and with Cobden . That is
high praise, but well-deserved praise. He is fundamentally different from both of them.
He does not have Swift's cutting contempt. Nor has he Cobden's persuasive and magnetic
eloquence, which drew tens of thousands to his meetings and carried the cause of free
trade to victory in less than a generation, both in England and in Europe - alas, for all too
short a time.
Christian Louis LANGE
For each name that is known, there are the countless unknown: anonymous
prisoners of conscience held in secret interrogation centres, in overcrowded jails, in
labour camps on remote islands. There are young people who have been born and who
have grown up in the prisons where their mothers are held. There are children who have
been kidnapped and kept as hostages by government agents seeking to arrest their
relatives. The victims of arbitrary arrest and detention come from all walks of life:
workers, peasants, lawyers, journalists, professors. Among them also are the voices of the
human imagination, painters, actors and actresses, film-makers and dancers, musicians,
poets.
Apartheid is upheld by a phalanx of iniquitous laws, such as the Population

Registration Act, which decrees that all South Africans must be classified ethnically and
duly registered according to these race categories. Many times, in the same family one
child has been classified white while another with a slightly darker hue has been
classified Coloured, with all the horrible consequences for the latter of being shut out
from membership of a greatly privileged caste. There have, as a result, been several child
suicides. This is too high a price to pay for racial purity, for it is doubtful whether any
end, however desirable, can justify such a means. There are laws, such as the Prohibition
of Mixed Marriages Act, which regard marriages between a white and a person of
another race as illegal. Race becomes as impediment to a valid marriage. Two persons
who have fallen in love are prevented by race from consummating their love in the
marriage bond. Something beautiful is made to be sordid and ugly. The Immorality Act
decrees that fornication and adultery are illegal if they happen between a white and one
of another race. The police are reduced to the level of Peeping Toms to catch couples red-
handed. Many whites have committed suicide rather than face the disastrous
consequences that follow in the train of even just being charged under this law. The cost
is too great and intolerable.
Desmond TUTU
These calls to arms are for the purpose of re-establishing the natural order of
affairs as it was before its violation by foreign invasions in an era when force superseded
law; they are simply the result of these invasions and of the oppressive measures taken to
assure their continued effect. These wars would not have occurred, nor would these
situations themselves have arisen, if a regime of international justice such as that
advocated by the friends of peace had been established rather than repressed for over two
thousand years by the apologists of war.
Élie DUCOMMUN
Man's greatest advances these last few generations have been made by the
application of human intelligence to the management of matter. Now we are confronted
by a more difficult problem, the application of intelligence to the management of
human relations. Unless we can advance in that field also, the very instruments that man's
intelligence has created may be the instruments of his destruction.
Norman ANGELL
Any life lost in war is the life of a human being, irrespective of whether it is an
Arab or an Israeli.
The wife who becomes widowed is a human being, entitled to live in a happy
family, Arab or Israeli.
Innocent children, deprived of paternal care and sympathy, are all our children,
whether they live on Arab or Israeli soil, and we owe them the biggest responsibility
of providing them with a happy present and bright future.
Mohamed Anwar El SADAT
Compulsory arbitration is a practical instrument of pacification and, as such, it

can and should be enacted by the Hague Conference. By laying down the procedure and
the rules for arbitration, by placing a permanent court of arbitration at the disposal of
conflicting powers, the Conference has no more than made a start upon its task in the
realm of international justice. All of this is discretionary and left to the goodwill of
nations.
…….
In this sphere of arbitration treaties, the Hague Conference could introduce a
ruling that certain categories of international disputes should be submitted to arbitration.
In my opinion this is the most that can be hoped for at present - I repeat, in the sphere of
arbitration treaties.
Charles Albert GOBAT
For certain problems, arbitration had been recognized as the fairest and most
efficient instrument for settling disputes not resolved through diplomatic channels. Its use
remained optional, but it still constituted a piece of legal machinery easily set in motion -
something not to be disdained. When two powers agree to settle a dispute legally by
arbitration, it is preferable that they should not first have to discuss details of the
organization of the tribunal or of procedure. such discussion can easily become a source
of friction which, although completely dissociated from the dispute itself, makes
settlement of the dispute that much more difficult. How much better it is to be able to use
an instrument set up in advance when there was no particular dispute in view, and no
objective except that of finding the best means to serve the general cause of justice!
….
In the first place, when a dispute does arise, the idea of settling it by arbitration
is now readily accepted, whereas previously those who proposed such a solution were
regarded by men of action as pure theorists, I can confirm this from personal experience.
The important thing is that arbitration be used to avoid conflict; whether it is
used here or there, whether through this or that procedure is of little consequence. Let me
add, however, that we should not want too many such arbitrations. Undoubtedly; it is
better to plead than to fight; but it is better still to come to a direct understanding without
having to plead. It is the fear of arbitration and possible public censure by a tribunal,
however, that prompts a government to be prudent enough to relinquish an unfounded
claim.
Louis RENAULT
For a long time practically the only solution visualized was a court of arbitration.
This is the older method, one by which conflicts apparently not soluble through
diplomatic channels are placed before an ad hoc court of arbitration. Great progress was
made when arbitration treaties were concluded in which the contracting powers
pledge in advance to submit all conflicts to an arbitration court, treaties which not only
specify the composition of the court, but also its procedure.
Ludwig QUIDDE
Armaments are necessary - or are maintained on the pretext of necessity -

because of a real or an imagined danger of war. Let us assume that the ideal were
reached; let us imagine a state of international life in which the danger of war no longer
exists. Then no one would dare to demand a penny for obviously completely superfluous
armaments. The theory held by us pacifists, particularly by Alfred Fried, was:
"Disarmament will be the result of secure peace rather than the means of obtaining it."
The security of which we speak is to be attained by the development of
international law through an international organization based on the principles of law and
justice. So long as peace is not attained by law (so argue the advocates of armaments) the
military protection of a country must not be undermined, and until such is the case
disarmament is impossible.
Ludwig QUIDDE
With respect to the dismantling of surplus nuclear and chemical weapons and,
especially, the protection and ultimate disposition of their active ingredients, it is
deplorable how much foot-dragging has characterized U.S. and Russian implementation
of such measures -- including, particularly, cooperative programs between the two
countries that have been authorized and negotiated but only fractionally carried out.
While this problem has received some high-level political attention on both sides, it needs
more. The bureaucrats in both countries with responsibility for these matters, most of
whom appear to be in no great hurry to get on with the job, need to be reminded that
protecting plutonium and highly enriched uranium -- and ultimately disposing of these
materials in ways that effectively preclude their re-use in weapons -- represent not only
one of the most urgent of arms-control and non-proliferation tasks but also one of
the most cost-effective.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
Accordingly, I call on all scientists in all countries to cease and desist from work
creating, developing, improving and manufacturing further nuclear weapons - and, for
that matter, other weapons of potential mass destruction such as chemical and biological
weapons. If all scientists heeded this call there would be no more new nuclear warheads;
no French scientists at Moruroa; no new chemical and biological poisons. The arms
race would be over.
Joseph ROTBLAT
The economic burden of armaments is now almost overpowering, and where

public opinion can bring itself effectively to bear on government, the pressure is nearly
always for the greatest possible amount of butter and the fewest possible number of
gun…
Lester B. PEARSON
……….
Mankind's survival is dependent upon man's ability to solve the problems of racial
injustice, poverty, and war. The solution of these problems is in turn dependent upon man
squaring his moral progress with his scientific progress, and learning the practical art of
living in harmony.
Martin Luther KING
Asia was rich in the intellectual and institutional traditions that would provide
fertile grounds for democracy. What Asia did not have was the organizations of
representative democracy. The genius of the west was to create the organizations, a
remarkable accomplishment that has greatly advanced the history of humankind.
Brought into Asian countries with deep roots in the respect for demos, western
democratic institutions have adapted and functioned admirably, as can be seen in the
cases of Korea, Japan, the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, India, Bangladesh, Nepal,
and Sri Lanka. ….
KIM Dae Jung
Poverty Still Haunts Asia. Despite the successes of smallholder Asian

farmers in applying Green Revolution technologies to triple cereal production since
1961, the battle to ensure food security for millions of miserably poor people is far from
won, especially in South Asia. Of the roughly 1.3 billion people in this sub-region, 500
million live on less than US$ 1 per day, 400 million are illiterate adults, 264 million lack
access to health services, 230 million to safe drinking water, and 80 million children
under 4 are malnourished (Eliminating World Poverty. UK White Paper, 1997).
Norman E. BORLAUG
Special 30th Anniversary Lecture, The Norwegian Nobel Institute,
Oslo
September 8, 2000
From my earliest youth, I have known that while obliged to plan with care the
stages of our journey, we are entitled to dream, and keep dreaming, of its destination. A
man may feel as old as his years, yet as young as his dreams. The laws of biology do not
apply to sanguine aspiration.
Shimon PERES
As a result of the World War and of a peace whose imperfections and risks are no
longer denied by anyone, are we not even further away from the great aspirations and
hopes for peace and fraternity than we were one or two decades ago?
Karl Hjalmar
BRANTING
This is an attack on the citizens of many nations. But above all, it is an assault
on democracy, and the right to live free from fear.
Now is the time for people of all races and creeds to stand united. Together we
can - and must - overcome terrorism.
David TRIMBLE
(On the Events of September 11th )
But if, in fact, the world is so gloomy, it is to be hoped that many of those who
complain will, at least once in their lives, make a sacrifice for the establishment of a
better state of affairs in this world, the sacrifice of a minute to be occupied in reading and
signing a declaration which favours taking an axe to the root of the evil. Otherwise, all
their laments are in vain.
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
This terrorist attack has been called an attack on freedom. It obviously is.
Civilians in an open society not at war have been killed. But many have also expressed
concern that other freedoms are at risk as well in the aftermath of the terror. History has
shown too many times that when a country sees itself in a state of war, individual
freedoms are subordinated to the survival of the state.
attacks on innocent people anywhere cannot be tolerated. Those who
perpetrated this heinous crime need to be brought to justice. They need to be found and
tried in a court of law. Their network needs to be dismantled.
But I share the concern of many others who dedicate their lives to peace and
justice and human rights that the very difficult question of how to respond must be
considered long and hard and not contribute to an escalation of violence.
Joddy
WILLIAMS
(On the Events of
September 11th )
More than half a century after the Jewish holocaust and centuries after the
genocide of the indigenous peoples of Australia and the Americas, the same attitude
that has allowed these crime to take place persists today. Opinion-makers and leaders,
academics, writers and journalists who pretend to be objective and neutral in the face of
racism and discrimination, the rape of a small nation by a larger power, the persecution of
a weaker people by a ruthless army, must share the guilt. No amount of intellectual
arguments will suffice to erase their responsibility.
José RAMOS HORTA
Always one to practise what he preached, AUNG SAN himself constantly

demonstrated courage - not just the physical sort but the kind that enabled him to speak
the truth, to stand by his word, to accept criticism, to admit his faults, to correct his
mistakes, to respect the opposition, to parley with the enemy and to let people be the
judge of his worthiness as a leader. It is for such moral courage that he will always be
loved and respected in Burma - not merely as a warrior hero but as the inspiration and
conscience of the nation. The words used by Jawaharlal Nehru to describe Mahatma
Gandhi could well be applied to Aung San: 'The essence of his teaching was fearlessness
and truth, and action allied to these, always keeping the welfare of the masses in view.'
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
Aung San Suu Kyi of Burma: If we have to use the word courage, she's it
personified, personified. Six years under house arrest the democratically elected leader of
her country Burma took the vote, 62% of the vote. No man in history has ever pulled a
democratic vote like that and 40 indigenous peoples. We're not just dealing with one, but
40 indigenous groups.
The SLORC regime, the State Law and Order Restoration Council of Burma-
military thugs is what they are-have told her you're free anytime you want to go. Suu says
no. That's courage of the most incredible kind. I want any woman who sees this to say a
wee prayer for Aung San Suu Kyi of Burma. I don't think I would have that kind of
courage.
Betty WILLIAMS
In relation to these matters, we appeal to those who govern Burma that they
release our fellow Nobel Peace Prize laureate, AUNG SAN Suu Kyi, and engage her
and those she represents in serious dialogue, for the benefit of all the people of Burma.
We pray that those who have the power to do so will, without further delay,
permit that she uses her talents and energies for the greater good of the people of her
country and humanity as a whole.
Nelson MANDELA
My visit with President Clinton, Vice President Al Gore, and the National
Security Council was extremely productive. I went to plead on behalf of Aung San
Suu Kyi and the embattled people of Burma. President Clinton and Vice President Gore
listened intently and all the men in the room were obviously moved as I recounted the
terrible suffering the Burmese people face daily in the refugee camps in Thailand.
President Clinton promised he would release a statement condemning the regime in
Burma.
As I left the Oval Office, I looked once more on the face of my President. Already
there was obvious fatigue. "Thank you Mr. President," I said quietly. Then I hugged him!
I don't really know why I did that except perhaps I felt he needed a hug. The next day the
President issued a statement asking for the immediate and unconditional release of Aung
San Suu Kyi and all political prisoners in Burma. Such a response provides the beacon
of light the rest of the world looks to as its lighthouse, the lighthouse of democracy in a
sea of confusion. The message is that the light still burns bright in the hearts of at least
one American and a very important one at that. It shows we do care and I know the State
Law and Order Restoration Council, or SLORC, which rules Burma with an iron fist, also
heard. The Burmese Junta heard my President's words and will be worried.
Betty WILLIAMS
In Myanmar, Madam AUNG SAN Suu Kyi is still leading the struggle for
democracy. She retains wide support of the people. I have every confidence that there,
too, democracy will prevail and a representative government will be restored.”
Desmond TUTU
And question of questions: Where was God in all this? It seemed as impossible to
conceive of Auschwitz with God as to conceive of Auschwitz without God.
Therefore, everything had to be reassessed because everything had changed. With one
stroke, mankind's achievements seemed to have been erased. Was Auschwitz a
consequence or an aberration of "civilization"? All we know is that Auschwitz called
that civilization into question as it called into question everything that had preceded
Auschwitz. Scientific abstraction, social and economic contention, nationalism,
xenophobia, religious fanaticism, racism, mass hysteria. All found their ultimate
expression in Auschwitz.
Elie WIESEL
Neither should it ever happen that once more the avenues to peaceful change
are blocked by usurpers who seek to take power away from the people, in pursuit of their
own, ignoble purposes.
Nelson MANDELA
On the other hand, the award is a democratic declaration of solidarity with those
who fight to widen the area of liberty in my part of the world. As such, it is the sort of
gesture which gives me and millions who think as I do, tremendous encouragement.
Albert John LUTULI
This award is for you - Mothers, who sit near railway stations trying to eke out
an existence, selling potatoes, selling meali, selling pigs' trotters.
This award is for you - Fathers, sitting in a single-sex hostel, separated from your
children for eleven months of the year.
This award is for you - Mothers in the squatter camps, whose shelters are destroyed
callously every day and who have to sit on soaking mattresses in the winter rain, holding
whimpering babies and whose crime in this country is that you want to be with your
husbands.
This award is for you - three and a half million of our people who have been uprooted
and dumped as if they were rubbish. The world says we recognize you, we recognize that
you are people who love peace.
This award is for you - dear children, who despite receiving a poisonous gruel,
designed to make you believe that you are inferior, have said 'there is something that God
put into us which will not be manipulated by man, which tells us that we are your
children.' This award is for you-and I am proud to accept it on your behalf as you spurn a
travesty of an education.
This award is for you, who down the ages have said we seek to change this evil system
peacefully. The world recognizes that we are agents of peace, of reconciliation, of love,
of justice, of caring, of compassion. I have the great honour of receiving this award on
your behalf. It is our prize. It is not Desmond Tutu's prize. The world recognizes that and
thank God that our God is God. Thank God that our God is in charge.
Desmond TUTU
There is no room for complacency. All of us who believe in peace must redouble
our efforts to reassure all our countrymen that their rights and security will be assured.
I have no doubt that we will succeed. There is growing awareness among all
South Africans of our interdependence - of the fact that none of us can flourish if we do
not work together - that all of us will fail if we try to pursue narrow sectional interests.
Frederik Willem DE KLERK
……….
B
My friends, the simple fact of the matter is this: if we cannot make globalisation
work for all, in the end it will work for none. The unequal distribution of benefits, and
the imbalances in global rule-making, which characterize globalisation today, inevitably
will produce backlash and protectionism. And that, in turn, threatens to
undermine and ultimately to unravel the open world economy that has been so
painstakingly constructed over the course of the past half-century.
Kofi
ANNAN
But my banishment, without trial in infringement of all constitutional
guarantees, the isolation measures applied, interference of the KGB in my life, are
completely illegal and inadmissible as an infringement of my personal rights, and as a
dangerous precedent of the actions of the authorities, who are casting aside even that
pitiful imitation of legality in the persecution of dissidents that they displayed in recent
years. Only a court has the right to establish that a law has been infringed and to define
the manner of punishment. Any deliberations about culpability and mercy without a trial
are inadmissible and against a person's rights.
Andrei SAKHAROV
I travelled to Pyongyang for the historic meeting with Chairman Kim Jong-il of
the North Korean National Defence Commission. I went with a heavy heart not knowing
what to expect, but convinced that I must go for the reconciliation of my people and
peace on the Korean peninsula. There was no guarantee that the summit meeting would
go well. Divided for half-a-century after a three-year war, South and North Korea have
lived in mutual distrust and enmity across the barbed-wire fence of the demilitarised
zone.
KIM Dae Jung

May the men who hold the fate of nations in their hands avoid with anxious care
all that may worsen the situation in which we find ourselves and make it even more
dangerous. And may they take to heart the words of the Apostle Paul: "So far as it lies in
your power, be at peace with all men."
These words apply not only to individuals, but to nations as well. May they, in
their efforts to maintain peace, go to all lengths possible to give the spirit time to grow
and to act.
Albert SCHWEITZER
The World War showed how very necessary it is that this work be brought to a
victorious conclusion. It is a matter of nothing less than our civilization's "to be or not
to be". Europe cannot survive another world war.
I come from a beautiful land, richly endowed by God with wonderful natural
resources, wide expanses, rolling mountains, singing, birds, bright shining stars out of
blue skies, with radiant sunshine, gold sunshine. There is enough of the good things that
come from God's bounty, there is enough for everyone, but apartheid has confirmed some
in their selfishness, causing them to grasp readily a disproportionate share, the lion's
share, because of their power.
Desmond TUTU
I have stated in writing many times already that I intend to refrain from making
any concrete political prognoses. There is a large measure of tragedy in my life at
present. The sentences lately passed on my close friends - Sergei Kovalev (who just
exactly at the time of the Nobel Prize ceremony was sentenced to seven years'
imprisonment and three years' exile) and Andrei Tverdokhlebov - represent the clearest
and most unequivocal evidence of this. Yet, even so, both now and for always, I intend to
hold fast to my belief in the hidden strength of the human spirit.
Andrei SAKHAROV
As believer, I think this was my mission. This is the way fate threw me into it.
Lech WALESA
If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each
other.
Mother Teresa
……….
The most striking aspect of the Berlin wall was the absurd division of what had
remained intact of the whole organism of a metropolis, with all the lamentable
consequences for the people.
Willy BRANDT
Unfortunately some didn't depart, they stay on, and they themselves betray the
principles, the ideals they fought for. They stay too long in power, and power corrupts.
And they betray the many years of dreams, of sacrifice.
José RAMOS-HORTA
The Tibetan plateau would be transformed into the world's largest natural park or
biosphere. Strict laws would be enforced to protect wildlife and plant life; the
exploitation of natural resources would be carefully regulated so as not to damage
relevant ecosystems; and a policy of sustainable development would be adopted in
populated areas.
Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai

Lama
In the last 20 years, biotechnology has developed invaluable new scientific

methodologies and products which need active financial and organizational support to
bring them to fruition.
Norman E. BORLAUG
Oslo
September 8, 2000
I believe that it is also important for governments to fund significant programs of

biotechnology research in the public sector. Such publicly funded research is not
only important as a complement and balance to private sector proprietary research, but it
is also needed to ensure the proper training of new generations of scientists, both for
private and public sector research institutions.
Norman E. BORLAUG
Oslo
September 8, 2000
I live in an apartment with a policeman stationed at the door round-the-clock. I

often live completely alone, since my wife is forced to spend a great deal of time in
Moscow.
……
My wife and I normally cannot communicate with the West by telephone. This is
especially hard for us, since our children live in America. Our letters often fail to get
through. (They are illegally seized by the KGB.)
I still receive some scientific mail from the West, but probably not all of it. I am
deeply grateful to my correspondents, but I don't receive personal letters. I didn't receive
a single letter of congratulations from the West on my 60th birthday, not even from our
children. To give you an example of the KGB's pettiness, on May 16 1 sent a telegram to
my friends who had gathered in our Moscow apartment to celebrate my 60th birthday,
but that telegram wasn't delivered until the following evening. Many domestic telegrams
sent to me, or that I send, never reach their destination. The same is true for letters.
I wish to devote the major part of my energy to scientific work. But it is simply
impossible to talk of "quiet scientific work" when I am kept isolated in illegal exile and
the repeated thefts of my scientific and other manuscripts require me to spend enormous
energy simply restoring those works.
Andrei SAKHAROV
Everywhere else in the world they would be highly commended, but in South
Africa, a land which claims to be Christian and which boasts a public holiday called
Family Day, these gallant women are treated so inhumanely. Yet all they want is to have
a decent and stable family life. Unfortunately, in the land of their birth it is a criminal
offence for them to live happily with their husbands and the fathers of their children.
Black family life is thus being undermined, not accidentally but by deliberate
government policy. It is part of the price human beings, God's children, are called to pay
for apartheid. An unacceptable price.
Desmond TUTU
We will prevail because we regard the building of peace as a great blessing for
us, for our children after us.
Yitzhak Rabin
The blood of the workers who had put their trust in me. It was my stupidity
in not taking it to victory that time. I wanted to improve on myself.
Lech WALESA
In order to expand food production for a growing world population within the
parameters of likely water availability, the inevitable conclusion is that humankind in the
21 st century will need to bring about a “Blue Revolution” to complement the “Green
Revolution” of the 20 th century. In the new Blue Continued genetic improvement of
food crops – using both conventional as well as biotechnology research tools – is needed
to shift the yield frontier higher and to increase stability of yield. While biotechnology
research tools offer much promise, it is also important to recognize that conventional
plant breeding methods are continuing to make significant contributions to improved
food production and enhanced nutrition.
Norman E. BORLAUG
Oslo
September 8, 2000
And here we come back to history. We must remember the suffering of my

people, as we must remember that of the Ethiopians, the Cambodians, the boat people,
Palestinians, the Mesquite Indians, the Argentinian "desaparecidos” - the list seems
endless.
Elie WIESEL
…When religion is manipulated, when ethnicity, rivalries among communities are

exploited, it brings war, it brings violence. …
One of the leaders of this modern 20th century that I admire the most…is Willy
Brandt. Why Willy Brandt? Simple reason: One day I had heard in the news that he
had been to Poland and kneeled down, apologized for World War II.
Well, a leader who has courage and humility, and to be humble, you must really
have a lot of courage. A leader who acknowledges his country's collective responsibility,
and apologizes, that is a great leader. That's why I always admire Willy Brandt.
José RAMOS-HORTA
We eat the same bread ……
Lech WALESA
We read that in France, just as in Germany, the war veterans meet together. When
these old comrades call upon Mr. Briand ( Prix Nobel )for his opinions, is it not a
pleasure for him to speak to them and feel himself one of them? I have read the speech
given by Mr. Briand before the soldiers who fought in the East, in which he said that one
of the three happiest moments of his life came when he received the news that the
Germans had failed to take Verdun. Why then should a German be blamed if he counts as
one of his happiest moments the time when he heard that the Battle of Tarmenberg had
saved German soil from enemy hands? I address Mr. Briand himself and remind him of
his words in Geneva when he spoke of the great deeds of both nations in their struggles
with each other in the mighty days of the past - deeds so great that they make new deeds
unnecessary. I, like Mr. Briand, am sure that those who experienced the glory and
horror of the front in the World War will be those who will support a new era of peace. A
few individuals who make speeches to the contrary cannot delude us about that.
Gustav STRESEMANN
We are in the midst of building the peace. The architects and the engineers of this
enterprise are engaged in their work even as we gather here tonight, building the peace,
layer by layer, brick by brick. The job is difficult, complex, trying. Mistakes could
topple the whole structure and bring disaster down upon us.
And so we are determined to do the job well -- despite the toll of murderous
terrorism, despite the fanatic and cruel enemies of peace.
Yitzhak Rabin
East Timor is at the cross-roads of three major cultures: Melanesian which binds
us to our brothers and sisters in the South Pacific region; Malay-Polynesian binding us to
Southeast Asia; and the Latin Catholic influence, a legacy of almost 500 years of
Portuguese colonisation. This rich historical and cultural existence places us in a unique
position to build bridges of dialogue and co-operation between the peoples of the
region.
José RAMOS – HORTA
The realisation that we are all basically the same human beings, who seek
happiness and try to avoid suffering, is very helpful in developing a sense of
brotherhood and sisterhood; a warm feeling of love and compassion for others.
This, in turn, is essential if we are to survive in this ever shrinking world we live in. For if
we each selfishly pursue only what we believe to be in our own interest, without caring
about the needs of others, we not only may end up harming others but also ourselves.
This fact has become very clear during the course of this century. We know that to wage
a nuclear war today, for example, would be a form of suicide; or that by polluting the air
or the oceans, in order to achieve some short-term benefit, we are destroying the very
basis for our survival. As inter-dependents, therefore, we have no other choice than to
develop what I call a sense of universal responsibility.
The Dalai Lama
Buddhism, the foundation of traditional Burmese culture, places the greatest

value on man, who alone of all beings can achieve the supreme state of Buddha-hood.
Each man has in him the potential to realize the truth through his own will and endeavour
and to help others to realise it. Human life therefore is infinitely precious.
AUNG SAN Suu
Kyi
The people of Burma had wearied of a precarious state of passive apprehension

where they were 'as water in the cupped hands' of the powers that be.
Emerald cool we may be

As water in cupped hands
But oh that we might be
As splinters of glass
In cupped hands.
Glass splinters, the smallest with its sharp, glinting power to defend itself against hands
that try to crush, could be seen as a vivid symbol of the spark of courage that is an
essential attribute of those who would free themselves from the grip of oppression.
Bogyoke Aung San regarded himself as a revolutionary and searched tirelessly for
answers to the problems that beset Burma during her times of trial. He exhorted the
people to develop courage: 'Don't just depend on the courage and intrepidity of others.
Each and every one of you must make sacrifices to become a hero possessed of courage
and intrepidity. Then only shall we all be able to enjoy true freedom.'
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
Scientists tell us that the world of nature is so small and interdependent that a
butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon rainforest can generate a violent storm on the
other side of the earth. This principle is known as the “Butterfly Effect.” Today, we
realize, perhaps more than ever, that the world of human activity also has its own
“Butterfly Effect” -- for better or for worse.
Kofi ANNAN
C
……….
In attempting to bring mankind to a condition of permanent peace in which war

will be regarded as criminal conduct, just as civilized communities have been brought to
a condition of permanent order, broken only by criminals who war against society, we
have to deal with innate ideas, impulses, and habits, which became a part of the
caveman's nature by necessity from the conditions under which he lived; and these
ideas and impulses still survive more or less dormant under the veneer of civilization,
ready to be excited to action by events often of the most trifling character. As Lord Bacon
says, "Nature is often hidden, sometimes overcome, seldom extinguished." To eradicate
or modify or curb the tendencies which thus survive among civilized men is not a matter
of intellectual conviction or training. It is a matter primarily of development of character
and the shifting of standards of conduct - a long, slow process in which advance is to be
measured, not by days and years, but by generations and centuries in the life of nations.
Elihu ROOT
Our cause is the cause of equality between nations and peoples. Only thus can
the brotherhood of man be firmly established. It is encouraging and elating to remind you
that, despite her humiliation and torment at the hands of white rule, the spirit of Africa in
the quest for freedom has been, generally, for peaceful means to the utmost…
Albert John LUTULI
The first and most obvious cause for international controversy which
suggests itself is in the field of international rights and obligations. Claims of right and
insistence upon obligations may depend upon treaty stipulations, or upon the rules of
international law, or upon the sense of natural justice applied to the circumstances of a
particular case, or upon disputed facts. Upon all these there are continually arising
controversies as to what are the true facts; what is the rule of international law applicable
to the case; what is the true interpretation of the treaty; what is just and fair under the
circumstances. This category does not by any means cover the entire field out of which
causes of war arise, but no one should underestimate its importance.
Elihu ROOT
In the name of all those who suffer in the cause of peace, I dare ask the peoples
to take the first step on this new road. None of them will lose by it one jot of the power
necessary for their own defence. If thus we undertake the liquidation of war, then a little
confidence can be born among peoples.
Albert SCHWEITZER
My eternal gratitude to those who nominated me. I am forever morally indebted to

them, and I can assure them, that God's modest gifts of health and wisdom to me will
always be put to the service of peace and justice not only for my country and people but
also for the cause of peace, freedom and democracy everywhere my faint voice
can be heard.
These declarations, although enforced by no binding stipulation, nevertheless

have become principles of action in international affairs because, through the progress of
civilization and the influence of many generations of devoted spirits in the cause of
humanity, the world had become ready for the setting up of the standard. The
convention would have been a dead letter if the world had not been made ready for it,
and, because the world was ready, conformity to the standard year by year has become
more universal and complete. Since this convention, which was binding upon no state,
113 obligatory general treaties of arbitration have been made between powers who have
taken part in the Hague Conferences, and sixteen international controversies have been
heard and decided, or are pending before that tribunal according to the last report of the
Administrative Council of the Court.
Quite apart from the statistics of cases actually heard or pending, it is impossible
to estimate the effect produced by the existence of this court, for the fact that there is a
court to which appeal may be made always leads to the settlement of far more
controversies than are brought to judgment. Nor can we estimate the value of having this
system a part of the common stock of knowledge of civilized men, so that, when an
international controversy arises, the first reaction is not to consider war but to consider
peaceful litigation.
Elihu ROOT
Now, having freely admitted the limitations of our work and the qualifications to
be borne in mind, I feel that I have the right to have my words taken seriously when I
point out where, in my judgment, great advance can be made in the cause of
international peace. I speak as a practical man, and whatever I now advocate I
actually tried to do when I was for the time being the head of a great nation and keenly
jealous of its honour and interest. I ask other nations to do only what I should be glad to
see my own nation do.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
In the five decades of Israel's existence, our efforts have focused on re-
establishing our territorial centre. In the future, we shall have to devote our main effort to
strengthen our spiritual centre. Judaism -- or Jewishness -- is a fusion of belief, history,
land and language. Being Jewish means to belong to a people that is both unique and
universal. My greatest hope is that our children, like our forefathers, will not make do
with the transient and the sham, but will continue to plow the historic Jewish furrow in
the fields of human spirit, that Israel will become the centre of our heritage, not
merely a homeland for our people; that the Jewish people will be inspired by others, but
at the same be to them a source of inspiration.
Shimon PERES
Upon the union of the male germ cell with the female egg cell, a new cell is
created which almost immediately splits into two parts. One of these grows rapidly,
creating the human body of the individual with all its organs, and dies only with the
individual. The other part remains as living germ plasm in the male body and as ova in
the female. In this way there live in each one of us actual, tangible, traceable cells which
come from our parents and from their parents and ancestors before them, and which -
through conception - can in turn become our children and our children's children. Each of
us is, literally and physiologically, a link in the big chain that makes up mankind.
In such a world all war would be civil war, and we must hope that it will grow
increasingly inconceivable. It has already become capable of such unlimited destruction
and such fearful possibilities of uncontrollable and little understood "chain
reactions" of all sorts that it would seem that no one not literally insane could decide
to start an atomic war.
I have spoken against fear as a basis for peace. What we ought to fear, especially
we Americans, is not that someone may drop atomic bombs on us but that we may allow
a world situation to develop in which ordinarily reasonable and humane men, acting as
our representatives, may use such weapons in our name. We ought to be resolved
beforehand that no provocation, no temptation shall induce us to resort to the last
dreadful alternative of war.
May no young man ever again be faced with the choice between violating his
conscience by cooperating in competitive mass slaughter or separating himself from
those who, endeavouring to serve liberty, democracy, humanity, can find no better way
than to conscript young men to kill.
Emily Greene BALCH
And so, the challenge now is to grasp and shape history: to show that past
grievances and injustices can give way to a new generosity of spirit and action.
John HUME
As war is an adventure, peace is also a challenge and a gamble. If we do not

fortify peace to stand against storms and wind, and if we do not support it and strengthen
it, the gamble will then be exposed to blackmail, perhaps to fall. Therefore, I call on my
partners in peace on this high platform to expedite the peace process, achieve early
withdrawal, pave the road for elections, and to move to the second stage in record time,
so that peace will grow and become a firm reality.
Yasser Arafat
Let me put it this way. People are always scared of change. Change frightens
them. But we need to educate the people about the benefits that the change will bring
them. And that is why we need to mesh various branches of our sciences together, so that
the people who do not know much cannot scare others.
Norman E. BORLAUG
Oslo
September 8, 2000
Too many lives have already been lost in Ireland in the pursuit of political goals.
Bloodshed for political change prevents the only change that truly matter: in the human
heart. We must now shape a future of change that will be truly radical and that will offer
a focus for real unity of purpose: harnessing new forces of idealism and commitment for
the benefit of Ireland and all its people.
John HUME
A major change has occurred in the world balance of forces, and this change is
intensifying. It is true, of course, that the development of new technology and the growth
in number of weapons have not been confined to the Soviet Union. This is a mutually
stimulating process in virtually all technologically developed countries. In the United
States, in particular, such developments have perhaps proceeded on a higher scientific-
technological level and this, in turn, caused alarm in the Soviet Union.
Andrei SAKHAROV
We must dare to believe that in their heart of hearts men desire peace on earth, but
we shall never achieve this merely by coining slogans such as 'We Want Peace!' Our aim
must be backed by intense efforts to find constructive proposals. The challenge facing
peace workers is not to be found in a single universal question-and-answer, but in
peaceful solutions to a host of conflicts, and in the exertion to achieve peace on many
different levels.
Alva MYRDAL
We speak here of the challenge of the dichotomies of war and peace,
violence and non-violence, racism and human dignity, oppression and repression, and
liberty and human rights, poverty and freedom from want.
Nelson R. MANDELA
I look to a day when people will not be judged by the colour of their skin, but by
the content of their character.
Martin Luther KING
I'm often asked why I lead the International Green Cross. And the first question is
always about the 1986 nuclear accident at Chernobyl: was that disaster the defining
moment for my concern about ecological issues?
Chernobyl did have a tremendous impact on my thinking about the
environment and nuclear weapons. But my understanding of the importance of the natural
environment came much earlier. I am of peasant stock, and as a young man I worked on a
collective farm in Stavropol. A large part of my life was spent on the land. I saw the
effects of such problems as soil erosion, the spread of the deserts, and air and water
pollution. I saw that man's intrusions in nature were often imprudent and harmful to man
himself. Acting as the master and even king of nature, man gave no thought to the
consequences.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
Everything I experienced in Mit Abul-Kum made me happy. Nothing is of such

great importance as the fact that you are a child of this Earth. The earth can never die
- in it lies the mystery of creation.
The child of today is the farmer, the teacher, the politician, and the worker of
tomorrow. The child, indeed, is the father of the man, or, as is said in Proverbs 22:6,
"Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it."
….
Systematic analysis, appraisal, evaluation, and research were required if the
overall needs of the child were to be fully understood and progress made. It became clear
that the child had to be prepared for life in all its manifestations as well as protected
against its hazards.
(UNICEF)
What about the children? Oh, we see them on television, we read about them in
the papers, and we do so with a broken heart. Their fate is always the most tragic,
inevitably. When adults wage war, children perish. We see their faces, their eyes. Do
we hear their pleas? Do we feel their pain, their agony? Every minute one of them dies of
disease, violence, famine. Some of them -- so many of them -- could be saved.
Elie WIESEL
It will and must be measured by the happiness and welfare of the children, at once the
most vulnerable citizens in any society and the greatest of our treasures.
The children must, at last, play in the open veld, no longer tortured by the pangs of
hunger or ravaged by disease or threatened with the scourge of ignorance, molestation
and abuse, and no longer required to engage in deeds whose gravity exceeds the demands
of their tender years.
Nelson MANDELA
The health of children and young people could not be viewed as a separate field of
work, nor could their nutrition requirements, their education, or their emotional
development. Children could not be regarded as a separate entity, but rather as an
integral part of the population, the family, and the community, requiring certain priority
consideration in national, economic, and social development planning. Services for the
child should be taken for granted as a vitally important aspect of government
responsibility to ensure economic viability, progress, and stability.
(UNICEF)
For unflagging interest and enjoyment, a household of children, if things go

reasonably well, certainly all other forms of success and achievement lose their
importance by comparison.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
It was soon acknowledged, however, that many more children were victims of a
hostile environment, of poverty, inertia and neglect. Children in Asia, the Middle East,
Africa, and Latin America died in their millions of sickness and starvation, abandoned in
the backwash of history, left behind in the surge of time. Child suffering could not be
distinguished by virtue of its cause or origin. Children in desperate need anywhere and
everywhere required help and attention.

(UNICEF)
China has been more successful in achieving broad-based economic growth and
poverty reduction than India. Nobel Economics Laureate, Professor Amartya Sen,
attributes this to the greater priority the Chinese government has given to investments in
rural education and health care services. Nearly 80 percent of the Chinese population is
literate while only 50 percent of the Indian population can read and write. India has more
than half of its population below the poverty line whereas China has less than 30 percent.
Only 17 percent of Chinese children are malnourished compared to 63 percent in India.
With a healthier and better-educated rural population, China’s economy has been able to
grow about twice as fast as the Indian economy over the past two decades and today
China has a per capita income nearly twice that of India.
Norman E. BORLAUG
September 8, 2000
I then think the Dalai Lama is the holiest man, a man that I adore. When I think of
him, I just fill with tears because his spiritually and kindness are so overwhelming that
when you're in his company-you're the only person in the room-and there may be
thousands around you. You're centred so much with this beautiful spiritual force and a
force of goodness, that you would wonder how the world would allow the Chinese
communists to take over his country and to kill a culture-try to kill the Tibetan culture.
It's so cruel. It's one of the most magnificent cultures that has ever existed on this planet
Earth. In its gentleness and in its faith and in its humility and in its understanding and in
its love, the Dalai Lama could show the world leadership how to love one another.
I think of the cruelty-not of the Chinese people, because the Chinese people are
wonderful, gentle souls-but of a government that is allowed to do this and continue to
have Most Favoured Nation status, when it should be ostracized by the rest of the world
instead of being developed into a second super power.
We don't need any more super powers. Tina Turner said it better than I could ever
say it: "We don't need another hero." If we have to have heroes, I want Father Tutu as
mine. He's mine - what a man, what a man. The Dalai Lama's mine. Those are my
heroes, not the other guys.
Betty WILLIAMS
In any case, we have no choice. The alternative is unacceptable. Let me quote

the last sentence of the Russell-Einstein Manifesto:
We appeal, as human beings, to human beings: Remember your humanity and

forget the rest. If you can do so, the way lies open for a new paradise; If you cannot, there
lies before you the risk of universal death.
Joseph ROTBLAT
And as if that was not enough - it was not enough to become a man - Christ died
on the cross to show that greater love, and he died for you and for me and for that leper
and for that man dying of hunger and that naked person lying in the street not only of
Calcutta, but of Africa, and New York, and London, and Oslo - and insisted that we love
one another as he loves each one of us.
Mother TERESA
Only Jesus Christ could take a few loaves of bread and feed the thousands ...
Only Jesus Christ could solve problems such as these.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
(On describing the problems posed to him
with the break-up of the 15 republics of the
Soviet Union.)
These ideas of peace and justice were a prelude to Christianity which, while
preaching brotherhood among all men, established its principal centre in Rome. When the
Empire fell under the sword of the barbarian, the ideal of humanitarianism and peace
survived in Italy by finding refuge and support in the Roman church. The church set out
to educate even the barbarians; it opposed the cruelty of the times with the Christian law
of love; and it almost always used its moral authority, intensified by the very violence
and rampant anarchy of the day, to foster the free and civil association of peoples. This
international arbitration, which, for want of any communal law, we still regard as the best
protection of peace today, was practiced by the best and greatest of the pontiffs of the
early Middle Ages who censured injustice and the corruption of the aristocracy and who
defended the liberty of the common man.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
The church must, therefore, uphold the sanctity of law and promote its
development in the name of Christ, both inside and outside national boundaries. She
must, therefore, fight against all glorification of violence and against any force contrary
to the rule of law, and she must preach that nations and communities, like individuals,
must act according to ethical principles, basing their hopes for coexistence on the
principles of truth, justice, and love.
Wherever the church has erred in this respect she must humbly confess it and
correct the mistakes.
Nathan SODERLOM
Cicero was against all wars unless they were absolutely unavoidable.
"Disputes", he said, "can be settled in two ways: by reason or by force; one way belongs
to man and the other to the beasts; one should employ force only when reason proves
impossible." He possessed a much greater breadth of vision than Aristotle, who justified
slavery and believed that it would last until doomsday. "Beneath the cloak of the slaves",
said Cicero, "breathes a man who is not just a thing, but a person who hires out his
services and who has a right to decent treatment and a fair wage." He wanted all people
to be equal in the eyes of justice: "True law is reason, just and consistent with nature; it
imposes obligations and forbids fraud; it cannot be different in Athens from what it is in
Rome."
Although in the realm of ethics Cicero was far ahead of his time, he was not
alone in propounding such ideas.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
The most important conditions for international trust and security are the openness
of society, the observation of the civil and political rights of man -- freedom of
information, freedom of religion, freedom to choose one's country of residence (that is, to
emigrate and return freely), freedom to travel abroad, and freedom to choose one's
residence within a country.
Andrei SAKHAROV
What the main sections of the civil rights movement in the United States are
saying is that the demand for dignity, equality, jobs, and citizenship will not be
abandoned or diluted or postponed. If that means resistance and conflict we shall not
flinch. We shall not be cowed. We are no longer afraid.
Martin Luther KING
Jr.
The Nobel Prize is a symbol of peace, and of the efforts to build up a real
democracy. It will stimulate the civil sectors so that through a solid national unity,
these may contribute to the process of negotiations that seek peace, reflecting the general
feeling - although at times not possible to express because of fear - of the Guatemalan
society: to establish political and legal grounds that will give irreversible impulses to a
solution as to what initiated the internal armed conflict .
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Certainly the ease and speed of communication as a result of technological

developments have had a great impact on the ability of civil society from diverse
cultures to dialogue and formulate global political strategies, but e-mail alone has not
"moved the movement." ….
Jody WILLIAMS
As civil society we exist relative to the state, to its institutions and its power.
We also exist relative to other non-state actors such as the private sector. Ours is not to
displace the responsibility of the state. Ours is not to allow a humanitarian alibi to mask
the state responsibility to ensure justice and security. And ours is not to be co-managers
of misery with the state. If civil society identifies a problem, it is not theirs to provide a
solution, but it is theirs to expect that states will translate this into concrete and just
solutions. Only the state has the legitimacy and power to do this. Today, a growing
injustice confronts us. More than 90% of all death and suffering from infectious diseases
occurs in the developing world. Some of the reasons that people die from diseases like
AIDS, TB, Sleeping Sickness and other tropical diseases is that life saving essential
medicines are either too expensive, are not available because they are not seen as
financially viable, or because there is virtually no new research and development for
priority tropical diseases. This market failure is our next challenge. The challenge
however, is not ours alone. It is also for governments, International Government
Institutions, the Pharmaceutical Industry and other NGOs to confront this injustice. What
we as a civil society movement demand is change, not charity.
None of us are entirely innocent. But thanks to our strong sense of civil
society, thanks to our religious recognition that none of us are perfect, thanks to the
thousands of people from both sides who made countless acts of good authority, thanks to
a tradition of parliamentary democracy which meant that paramilitarism never displaced
politics, thanks to all these specific, concrete circumstances we, thank god, stopped short
of that abyss that engulfed Bosnia, Kosovo, Somalia and Rwanda.
David TRIMBLE
Gentlemen, at this most solemn moment of my life, before you citizens and
representatives of this illustrious Norway whose example has taught all nations, large and
small, how to achieve without violence the greatest civil victories - in view of the
patriotic and humanitarian ideals in the name of which Italy has come into its third
existence, and in memory of the long list of heroes and martyrs who died on the
battlefields, in prisons, or on the scaffold for those ideals - I give the solemn assurance, as
a seal to my speech, that Italy will never fail in the commitment she made before the
world: to be, once free to control her own destiny, an element of order and of progress, of
pacification and of civilization in Europe. Yes, I am fully convinced that she will never
fail, for one can say of Italy what your great Ibsen said of your country:
After a heavy sleep,
She awoke renewed in strength, ready for the word of command,
And now she is the race which has the will and the faith,
Will and faith in the peaceful progress of mankind.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
The idea that the reign of peace must come one day has been given expression by
a number of peoples who have attained a certain level of civilisation … But the
situation today is such that it must become reality in one way or another; otherwise
mankind will perish.
Albert SCHWEITZER
Civilization is a method of living and an attitude of equal respect for all people.
Jane ADDAMS
Civilization and morality have not yet influenced nations to consider inviolable
a promise or agreement, solemnly signed and sealed, when it becomes part of
international law. Ordinary citizens are obliged and, if need be, compelled by force to
meet their commitments. But let higher obligations of an international order be involved,
and governments repudiate them, more often than not with a disdainful shrug of the
shoulders.

Other civilizations, perhaps more successful ones, may exist an infinite number
of times on the preceding and following pages of the Book of the Universe. Yet we
should not minimize our sacred endeavours in this world, where, like faint glimmers in
the dark, we have emerged for a moment from the nothingness of unconsciousness into
material existence. We must make demands of reason and create a life worthy of
ourselves and of the goals we only dimly perceive.
Andrei SAKHAROV
What I have called "pacigérance" is clearly part of the larger struggle for
civilization which is progressing on an increasingly broad front: it is civilization's
battle between rule by law and rule by power. In this context, pacifists should stress
more and more that it is the rule of law for which they are fighting. It is quite usual to
maintain that treaties become just so much wastepaper when war breaks out. This is a
military concept that pacifists should not tolerate. We should do everything within our
power to insure that the idea of law conquers. What contributes largely to the confusion
of ideas is the accepted division of the world into major powers and small states. We
understand a "power" to be a state which has a large population and well-developed
armed forces, army and navy, and so on. This is comparable to believing that a great man
is a very tall and big man. By a great man, however, we mean a man who, because of his
spiritual gifts, his character, and other qualities, deserves to be called great and who as a
result earns the power to influence others. By the same token it must follow that the state
we now call a small state is in reality a power if it plays such a role in the development of
civilization that it marches in the front ranks and wins victories in the fight for law which
surpass those of the so-called great powers.
Fredrik BAJER
Please allow me, ladies and gentlemen, to say some words about my country and
the Civilization of the Mayas. The Maya people developed and spread
geographically through some 300,000 square km; they occupied parts of the South of
Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, as well as Honduras and El Salvador; they developed a very
rich civilization in the area of political organization, as well as in social and economic
fields; they were great scientists in the fields of mathematics, astronomy, agriculture,
architecture and engineering; they were great artists in the fields of sculpture, painting,
weaving and carving. …
Today it is important to emphasize the deep respect that the Maya civilization
had towards life and nature in general.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
However alluring the picture of an amphictyonic council embracing all civilized

nations may be, I do not believe that our efforts should be directed toward this end, an
end whose realization can scarcely be glimpsed even in some dim and distant future. In
any case, the Hague Conference can offer to mankind, to civilization, and to justice the
same services that an international parliament could offer. And since it already exists,
there is no need to create it. What is necessary is to perfect its organization and to ensure
its ability to function properly.
Now that war is upon us, I feel it is imperative that the present conflict not be
inflamed and extended into a "clash of civilizations," nor that it be painted as a jihad
or a crusade--two concepts that have been sorely abused over the course of history. There
is truly nothing more disturbing than killing in the name of God and religion. …
Oscar Arias SANCHEZ

As long as we have decided to coexist and live in peace, then we should

coexist on a solid basis that can last through all time and that is acceptable to the future
generations. In this context, full withdrawal from the West Bank and the Gaza Strip
requires deep discussions about the settlements that cut through geographic and political
unity, prevent free movement between the areas of the West Bank and the Strip, and
create hotbeds of tension that conflict with the spirit of peace, which we want to be free
of anything that spoils its purity.
Yasser Arafat
Under the threat of mankind’s self-destruction, co-existence has become a

question of the very existence of man. Co-existence became not one of several
acceptable possibilities but the only chance of survival….
Willy BRANDT
How can there be co-operative co-existence, which is the only kind that means
anything, if men are cut off from each other, if they are not allowed to learn more about
each other? So let's throw aside the curtains against contacts and communication …..
Lester B. PEARSON
The conflict in East Timor can be traced back to the political context of the Cold
War.
You might recall a picture that made headlines in the spring of 1975. I refer to the
picture of an American helicopter landing on the rooftop of the US Embassy in Saigon to
rescue remaining diplomats, CIA operatives and a few privileged South Vietnamese
stooges as Saigon fell to the Vietcong. Cambodia and Laos followed. This picture
illustrated, better than a thousand words, the ignominious American retreat from
Indochina.
……..
The invasion of East Timor which took place within hours of Ford's departure
from Jakarta was a mere footnote in the Cold War events of 1975.
Thousands of East Timorese who died in the days, weeks, months and years that
followed were mere footnotes to the post-Vietnam and Cold Wars.
The Cold War with its sterile paradox of freezing frontiers without eliminating
the risk of conflict did not point the way to a solution. So the powers concerned began to
keep extreme risks within bounds and to reduce tensions. In Cuba and Berlin they learned
how to keep conflicts under control. De Gaulle and Nixon set the course for co-operation
rather than confrontation, and Brezhnev and Kossygin began in their own way to steer
towards a new relationship with the West.
Willy BRANDT
The agenda of dangers still to be overcome is hardly less daunting than the one
faced by the founders of the Pugwash Conferences in the Cold War gloom of the 1950s.
But the world did finally escape the Cold War, and with a bit of luck, a bit of wisdom,
and a lot of work it may yet escape the remaining dangers, too.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
Unless there is a change in the basic philosophy, we will not see a reduction of
nuclear arsenals to zero for a very long time, if ever. The present basic philosophy is
nuclear deterrence. This was stated clearly In the US Nuclear Posture Review which
concluded:
"Post-Cold War environment requires nuclear deterrence," and this is echoed by
other nuclear states. Nuclear weapons are kept as a hedge against some unspecified
dangers.
This policy is simply an inertial continuation from the Cold War era. The Cold
War is over but Cold War thinking survives, Then, we were told that a world war
was prevented by the existence of nuclear weapons. Now, we are told that nuclear
weapons prevent all lands of war. These are armaments that purport to prove a negative.
Joseph ROTBLAT
The set of problems in the post-Cold-War security landscape has to do with

the dangers and destruction engendered by local armed conflicts, actual and incipient,
arising from all of the traditional causes of war: religious and ethnic hatreds, disputes
over territory and resources, the tensions of emergent statehood, the aspirations of power-
hungry dictators, and the stresses of frustrated economic aspirations. Such conflicts
occurred throughout the Cold War, of course, as well as before; but, like the proliferation
dangers they may have become even more dangerous in its aftermath. Confined in
geographic scope but not in ferocity or in the indiscriminate killing of non-combatants,
these wars have been fuelled in many cases by vast flows of conventional weaponry from
armories built up to service the Cold War, as well as by emergent indigenous arms
industries in the South; they have already seen the use of chemical weapons in some
instances, and are likely to see wider use of weapons of mass destruction in the future;
and the existing array of regional and global security institutions seems almost powerless
to prevent or contain them.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
In surveying where the problem of peace stands, we must begin by casting a

glance back upon the period of the World War and at the lines on which the world has
been tackling this problem ever since. The more the history of the World War and what
led up to it is studied, the more clearly those tragic years become revealed as a vast
collapse of civilization. It was a war which resulted from the false standards of
patriotism and ideas of what constitute the honour and vital interests of nations. It
revealed the incapacity of nations to find the best way to defend these interests and to
become adjusted to the facts of the modern world. Two of these great facts are the
increasing cultural and material interdependence of nations and the growing deadliness of
warfare. The world before 1914 was already a world in which the welfare of each
individual nation was inextricably bound up with the prosperity of the whole community
of nations. Moreover, war has become a thing potentially so terrible and destructive that
it should have been the common aim of statesmen to put an end to it forever. But the
standards of statecraft insisted upon the untrammelled claim of each nation to uphold its
own view of its rights by force and to build whatever armaments it considered necessary
for this purpose.
Arthur HENDERSON
Almost all regimes which did not place the sanctity of life at the heart of their
worldview, all those regimes have collapsed and are no more. You can see it for
yourselves in our own time.
Yitzhak Rabin
No national interest can today be isolated from collective responsibility for

peace. This fact must be recognised in all foreign relations. As a medium for achieving
European and world-wide security, therefore, foreign policy must aim to reduce tensions
and promote communication beyond frontiers ….
Willy BRANDT
The terrorist attacks in the United States of America last week shook all of
humanity. It starkly reminded us again of the depth to which we can sink in our
inhumanity towards one another.
It was a source of encouragement to note that almost the entire world responded
with utter revulsion to such cowardly acts that cruelly and horrendously took the lives of
so many innocent people merely going about their ordinary daily lives. Amidst the
indescribable tragedy the overwhelming decency of human beings the world over found
expression in the unreserved condemnation of those terrible deeds of cruelty.
To that we wish to add our collective voice of condemnation of those acts
and to express our deep felt sympathy to the American government, people and
particularly those who lost family and friends. We share in their sense of loss and can
only trust that they will take some sustenance from the knowledge that so many people
all over the world mourn with them.
Nelson MANDELA
Frederik Willem de KLERK
Desmond TUTU
At a time when the commemoration of the Fifth Centenary of the arrival of

Columbus in America has repercussions all over the world, the revival of hopes for the
Indian people claims that we reassert to the world our existence and the value of our
cultural identity. It demands that we endeavour to actively participate in the decisions that
concern our destiny, in the building-up of our countries/nations. Should we, in spite of
all, not be taken into consideration, there are factors that guarantee our future: struggle
and endurance; courage; the decision to maintain our traditions that have been exposed to
so many perils and sufferings; solidarity towards our struggle on the part of numerous
countries, governments, organizations and citizens of the world.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Since these developments were not without periods of regression, because the
intense hopes were followed by disappointment, Germany's development was also not
without fluctuation. The feelings and emotions of an individualistic people like the
Germans cannot easily be reduced to a common denominator. Nevertheless, it can
be said today, and it has been demonstrated by recent debates in the Reichstag, that the
overwhelming majority of the German people are united in a desire for peace and
reconciliation.
Gustav STRESEMANN
If peace, the ideal, is to be our common destiny, then peace, the experience,
must be our common practice. For this to be so, the leaders of all nations must remember
that their political decisions of war or peace are realised in the human suffering or well-
being of their people.
Henry KISSINGER
If we could but recognize our common humanity, that we do belong together,

that our destinies are bound up with one another's that we can be free only together, that
we can survive only together, that we can be human only together, then a glorious South
Africa would come into being where all of us lived harmoniously together as members of
one family, the human family. In truth a transfiguration would have taken place.
Desmond TUTU
It is the political authority over common interests that internationalism wants

to transfer to a common management. Thus, a world federation, in which individual
nations linked in groups can participate as members, is the political ideal of
internationalism. Before the war, a first groping step was taken in this direction with the
work at The Hague. The League of Nations marks the first serious and conscious attempt
to approach that goal.
But common sense dictates that I cannot for ever convince society that real
peace is at hand if there is not a beginning to the decommissioning of weapons as an
earnest of the decommissioning of hearts that must follow.
David TRIMBLE
In the past month, the world has witnessed something previously

unknown: a common stand taken by America, Russia, Europe, India, China,
Cuba, most of the Islamic world and numerous other regions and countries.
Despite many serious differences between them, they united to save civilization.
It is now the responsibility of the world community to transform the
coalition against terror into a coalition for a new, peaceful and just world order.
Let us not, as happened during the 1990's, miss the chance to build such an
order.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
At a meeting in Pasadena, I testified under oath that a statement that I had

prepared to the effect that I was not a Communist, never had been a Communist, and
never had been associated with the Communist Party, was true...
I would like to know more about Marxism than I know. I believe that we never
can know too much about anything...I do not understand dialectical materialism, either.
But I do not believe in censorship. I believe in freedom of publication.
Linus Carl
Pauling
Today we know how rich and at the same time how limited man is in his
possibilities. We know him in his aggression and in his brotherliness. We know that he is
capable of applying his inventions for his own good, but also of using them to destroy
himself. Let us drop all these terrible excessive demands. I believe in active
compassion and therefore in man’s responsibility. And I believe in the absolute
necessity of peace.
Willy BRANDT
It should be a comprehending leadership. It should reveal a vivid awareness

of the present expansive, urgent, and dangerous world situation. The leaders must
understand its antecedents and background. They must know the real battleground,
therefore the forces and factors that oppose, and those that are with us. They must indeed
know our world, our time, and our destiny. In discovering the leaders of tomorrow we
must become acquainted with the unanswered questions of ambitious youth and the
possibilities of human nature. Above all, we must rely upon the superhuman resources.
John Raleigh
MOTT
The compromises we have reached demand sacrifices on all sides. It was not
easy for the supporters of Mr Mandela or mine to relinquish the ideals they had cherished
for many decades.
But we did it. And because we did it, there is hope.
The second dream is about the Middle East. In the Middle East most people are
impoverished and wretched. A new scale of priorities is needed, with weapons on the
bottom and regional market economy at the top. Most inhabitants of the region -- more
than sixty percent -- are under the age of eighteen. The Middle East is a huge
kindergarten, a huge school. A new future can be and should be offered to them. Israel
has computerized its education and has achieved excellent results. Education can be
computerized throughout the Middle East, allowing young people, Arabs and others, to
progress not just from grade to grade but from generation to generation.
Shimon PERES
A new power is emerging from the depths and slowly spreading over land and
water. It is the concept of peace of the ancient sagas, enriched by new and immense
cultural progress. Those who seek after the lost paradise can see it shimmering in the
sunrise of a new era, presaging the fulfilment of the Christian prayer and the heathen
saga, presaging the kingdom of peace which we pray for in saying "Our Father - Thy
kingdom come" and which the old inhabitants of the North sensed in the happy era of the
ancient sagas - when the streets were paved with gold which remained untouched and
when human beings were good, their customs and laws mild and wise.
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
Thus the concept of peace, mankind's most brilliant treasure, has at last been
disclosed to the eyes of us all. No one now denies its beauty; all extol its worth. But these
tributes have all too often taken the form of words alone, seldom that of actions as well.
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
One has only to think about it to appreciate the difficulties bound to arise in any
attempt to draft a formula which will be acceptable to the representatives of so many
nations differing in interests, customs, and institutions. Even when there is a solid basis
for agreement, there are always innumerable nuances suggesting diversity in attitudes of
mind, ways of thinking and of reasoning. People may even speak the same language, but
they do not speak it identically nor give to words the same shades of meaning. It is
necessary indeed to accept compromises and to agree to conciliatory schemes which
the logical, critical mind and which the learned scholar at his desk would not tolerate. I
hasten to plead extenuating circumstances on behalf of one who has often used the pen
and who knows, better than anyone else, that the end result is not perfect. Had he been as
uncompromising in the drafting of resolutions as he would be in the formulating of a
purely scientific work, he would have achieved nothing.
Louis RENAULT
I conclude offering again my deepest sorrow and condolences to the victims of

this unthinkable act. This attack has changed too many landscapes, some of them
permanently. I hope that one of those changed landscapes is not outrage so immense that
peoples committed to justice and law and human rights think about descending to the
level of the perpetrators of such acts.
Joddy WILLIAMS
Confidence is for all enterprises the important capital without which no useful
work can be achieved. It creates in every sphere the conditions for fruitful development.
In the atmosphere of confidence thus created we will be able to undertake a just
settlement of the problems created by the two wars.
Albert SCHWEITZER
Let us return, however, to the League of Nations. To create an organization which

is in a position to protect peace in this world of conflicting interests and egotistic
wills is a frighteningly difficult task. But the difficulties must not hold us back. I
conclude with a few lines from James Bryce, which could be said to epitomize the
testament of this venerable champion of peace and humanity:
"The obstacles are not insuperable. But whatever they may be, we must tackle
them head on, for they are much less than the dangers which will continue to menace
civilization if present conditions continue any longer. The world cannot be left where it is
at present. If the nations do not try to annihilate war, then war will annihilate them. Some
kind of common action by all states who set a value on peace is a compelling necessity,
and instead of shrinking from the difficulties, we must recognize this necessity and then
go forward."
Karl Hjalmar
BRANTING
The plight of the child continued to cause anxiety. The conscience of the
world was shaken by the knowledge of the excruciating suffering of its most vulnerable
citizens. In 1959, the General Assembly again underlined its deep concern in the
Declaration of the Rights of the Child, which stressed the child's right to maternal
protection, health, adequate food, shelter, and education.

(UNICEF)
Human rights are concrete and specific. All governments are tempted to occupy
themselves with abstract and generalized formulations. The repetition of these formulas
tend to become a substitute for responsible action. The Universal Declaration of Human
Rights, adopted thirty years ago by the United Nations, states unequivocally that no one
shall be subjected to torture - and yet torture persists in the world with the knowledge,
and often even support, of governments. This discrepancy between word and deed is even
more obvious if one studies the implementation of the legally-binding international
covenants on human rights, which have now been in force for more than a year. Even
governments which have ratified these covenants are breaching them. Such international
hypocrisy risks the erosion of public respect for international institutions and human
rights declarations. It is here, at the conjunction of rhetoric and reality, that non-
governmental human rights may not always be welcome in the halls of government, and
certainly they are not always popular. But they have a task to perform which is crucial to
the peace of the world.
The aspect of congresses and such meetings generally to which I attach the
greatest importance is the discussion. That is why people assemble: to hear different
opinions, rather than to pass resolutions. To read the report of a discussion in which
arguments for and against are presented, in which a subject has been covered from
different points of view, with new ideas advanced - this is far more instructive than to
read a brief account of the resolution passed on the matter. Here we can learn something
from the Swedes who, if they fail to reach agreement after discussing a matter, often
conclude their meetings with a vote that "diskussionen är svar på frågan" [the discussion
is a reply to the question].
Fredrik BAJER
I think that my reputation and example may well have led many young people to
work for peace in this way. My conscience does not allow me to protect myself by
sacrificing these idealistic and hopeful people. And I am not going to do it... For (he
continued later) anyone called before this committee is rendered vulnerable. He may lose
his job.
Linus Carl PAULING
Our method will be that of persuasion not coercion. We will only say to the
people let your conscience be your guide.
Martin Luther KING
The great endeavour of the Christian community to be the salt of the earth and the
light of the world can and must be realized by the Evangelical church in a spiritual way,
through its preaching and its example. The church should represent the waking
conscience of mankind. Together with the Christians in all nations at war, we are
deeply aware of the incompatibility between war and the spirit of Christ, and we would,
therefore, like to stress some main points regarding the part to be played by Christians in
community life.
Nathan SODERLOM
There are many beautiful Constitutions, I don't mention countries or regions.

The Constitutions, the ideals that they proclaim, what they describe are all beautiful. But
I wonder what the founding fathers of some of those great countries, long dead, if they
were to return to earth and see what has been done after they're gone, what they would
think.
José RAMOS-HORTA
So let all of us who can exert any influence on international relations, be it in the
sphere of theory or of practice, set to work. Let us devote ourselves neither to blind
enthusiasm nor to blind disparagement of what has been done, but to constructive
criticism that can lead the way to improvement; let us give properly measured
consideration to every attempt and to every suggestion made to achieve success. Let all
of us in each country search carefully for the real interests involved in any given question
and for the changes in practice that might be effected by compromise - for habit is often a
poor counsellor, encouraging unjustified opposition to measures which would be to the
general good.
Louis RENAULT
I believe that we are not real social workers. We may be doing social work in the
eyes of the people, but we are really contemplatives in the heart of the world. For we
are touching the Body of Christ 24 hours. We have 24 hours in this presence, and so you
and I. You too try to bring that presence of God in your family, for the family that prays
together stays together. And I think that we in our family don't need bombs and guns, to
destroy to bring peace - just get together, love one another, bring that peace, that joy, that
strength of presence of each other in the home. And we will be able to overcome all the
evil that is in the world.
Mother TERESA
Who can now deny, after the experiences of the World War, that this view was
correct! The contradiction between nationalism and internationalism, which appears
so stark when seen in the light of a warped and one-sided exposition of the duties and
significance of each,. is in reality non-existent. "The same workers," wrote this great man
Jean Jaurès, "who now misuse paradoxical phrases and hurl their hatred against the very
concept of a fatherland, will rise up to a man the day their national independence is in
danger." Prophetic words, confirmed on both sides of the battlefront; yet, it had actually
been supposed, before any issue was at stake, that the countries on both sides could be
invaded with impunity.
Karl Hjalmar
BRANTING
There is no contradiction between a nation's strong self-esteem and its will to
internationalise itself (to use a current expression) with other peoples in order to promote
better understanding - the supreme aim of peace. This concept of international
understanding is what Alfred Nobel called "fraternity among nations". It is not enough to
cry out, "Lay down your arms"; and this, incidentally, is not the same as "Away with
armaments." We must also shout, "Lift up your hearts!"
Fredrik BAJER
The Convention for the Pacific Settlement of International

Disputes' signed at The Hague in 1899 by twenty-six nations offers a solution to
international conflicts by a method unknown in the ancient world, in the Middle Ages, or
even in modem history, a method of settling quarrels between nations without bloodshed.
The method is not yet perfect, it is true, but it is an expression of what we were hoping
for in bettering the conditions which gave it birth. Let it become a duty to apply its
provisions in every case possible, and the friends of peace will be satisfied with this
beginning. Later, after some experience has been gained, it will be perfected, and the
human conscience, at last awakened, will regard it as the cornerstone of the structure of
law and justice which will preside over international relations in the future.
Élie
DUCOMMUN
As it turned out, everything in our part of the world remained peaceful. The
Cuban crisis was overcome by a sense of responsibility and cool-headedness.
This was a significant experience and a turning-point.
Willy BRANDT
I believe the Committee also recognized that this era of global challenges leaves
no choice but cooperation at the global level. When States undermine the rule of
law and violate the rights of their individual citizens, they become a menace not only to
their own people, but also to their neighbours, and indeed the world. What we need today
is better governance - legitimate, democratic governance that allows each individual to
flourish, and each State to thrive.
Kofi ANNAN
This has to be considered very carefully and with great concern, for this evolution
may determine to a large extent whether a constructive and cooperative dialogue
may or may not be established between the different cultures of the planet; it will also
determine the possibility for building the space and the mechanisms for intercultural
relation on equal terms and rights for all peoples and cultures.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Internationalism will not eradicate these spiritual distinctions. On the contrary, it

will develop national characteristics, protect their existence, and free their development.
Internationalism differs in this from cosmopolitanism. The latter wants to wipe out or
at least to minimize all national characteristics, even in the spiritual field.
Internationalism on the other hand admits that spiritual achievements have their roots
deep in national life; from this national consciousness art and literature derive their
character and strength and on it even many of the humanistic sciences are firmly based.
Diversity in national intellectual development, distinctive character in local self-
government - both of these are wholly compatible with inter-nationalism, which indeed is
really a prerequisite for a rich and varied development.
No one today is unaware of this divide between the world's rich and poor. No one
today can claim ignorance of the cost that this divide imposes on the poor and
dispossessed who are no less deserving of human dignity, fundamental freedoms,
security, food and education than any of us. The cost, however, is not borne by them
alone. Ultimately, it is borne by all of us - North and South, rich and poor, men and
women of all races and religions.
Kofi ANNAN
Costa Rica‘s fortress, the strength which makes it invincible by force, which
makes it stronger than a thousand armies, is the power of liberty of its principles, of the
great ideals of our civilisation.
Oscar Arias SANCHEZ
When I visited Costa Rica earlier this year, I saw how a country can develop
successfully without an army, to become a stable democracy committed to peace and the
protection of the natural environment. This confirmed my belief that my vision of Tibet
in the future is a realistic plan, not merely a dream.
Lama
A man who is good enough to shed his blood for his country is good enough to
be given a square deal afterwards. More than that no man is entitled to, and less than that
no man shall have.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
We understand their call, that we devote what remains of our lives to the use of
our country's unique and painful experience to demonstrate, in practice, that the
normal condition for human existence is democracy, justice, peace, non-racism, non-
sexism, prosperity for everybody, a healthy environment and equality and solidarity
among the peoples.
Nelson R. MANDELA
We must build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.
Martin Luther KING

Fearlessness may be a gift but perhaps more precious is the courage acquired
through endeavour, courage that comes from cultivating the habit of refusing to let fear
dictate one's actions, courage that could be described as 'grace under pressure' - grace
which is renewed repeatedly in the face of harsh, unremitting pressure.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
Our forefathers, however, were not disheartened. The courts were continued for
those who preferred to use them, and now we seldom hear of individual disputes being
settled by brute force. What was formerly the universal practice is now regarded as
degrading and brutalizing.
That is what we believe will be the ultimate effect upon nations of concluding
treaties and setting up tribunals.
It may be that for a long time some nations will continue to fight each other, but
the example of those nations who prefer arbitration to war, law courts to the battlefield,
must sooner or later influence the belligerent powers and make war as unpopular as
pugilism is now.
William Randal
CREMER
……….
The leadership so imperatively needed just now must be truly creative. The
demand is for thinkers and not mechanical workers. Bishop Gore, one of the most
discerning leaders of his day, summed up our need in an aphorism as apt today as
yesterday: "We do not think and we do not pray"; that is, we do not use the principal
power at our disposal - the power of thought - and we do not avail ourselves of
incomparably our greatest power - the superhuman power of prayer. Well may we heed
the injunction of St. Peter to "gird up the loins of your mind". How essential it is that
those who tomorrow are to lead the constructive forces should give diligent heed that the
discipline of their lives, the culture of their souls, and the thoroughness of their processes
of spiritual discovery and appropriations be such as will enable them to meet the demands
of a most exacting age.
John Raleigh MOTT
Somehow we must transform the dynamics of the world power struggle from the
negative nuclear arms race which no one can win to a positive contest to harness man's
creative genius for the purpose of making peace and prosperity a reality for all of the
nations of the world. In short, we must shift the arms race into a ' peace race '.
Martin Luther KING

Sadly, however, there is another side to the picture. The creativity of science
has been employed to the detriment of mankind. The application of science and
technology to the development and manufacture of weapons of mass destruction has
created a real threat to the continued existence of the human race on this planet. We have
seen this happen in the case of nuclear weapons.
Joseph ROTBLAT
Yet this is not the whole picture. To preserve the sanctity of life, we must
sometimes risk it. Sometimes there is no other way to defend our citizens than to fight for
their lives, for their safety and freedom. This is the creed of every democratic state.
Yitzhak Rabin
As we celebrate together the first sight of the crescent of peace, I, at this
podium stare into the open eyes of the martyrs within my conscience. They ask me about
the national soil and their vacant seats there. I conceal my tears from them and tell them:
How true you were; your generous blood has enabled us to see the holy land and to take
our first steps in a difficult battle, the battle of peace, the peace of the brave.
Yasser Arafat
Terrorism is the enemy of all peace-loving people around the world. Whatever the
reason and whatever the target of attack, terrorism is the most heinous crime that no one
should commit.
KIM Dae Jung
Granted that the easygoing optimism of yesterday is impossible. Granted that

those who pioneer in the struggle for peace and freedom will still face uncomfortable jail
terms, painful threats of death; they will still be battered by the storms of persecution,
leading them to the nagging feeling that they can no longer bear such a heavy burden, and
the temptation of wanting to retreat to a more quiet and serene life. Granted that we face a
world crisis which leaves us standing so often amid the surging murmur of life's restless
sea. But every crisis has both its dangers and its opportunities. It can spell either
salvation or doom. In a dark confused world the kingdom of God may yet reign in the
hearts of men.
Martin Luther KING

Jr.
There cannot be a crisis next week. My schedule is already full.
Henry KISSINGER
As Mayor of Berlin I experienced how critical situations influence our

thinking. I knew, though, that steadfastness serves the cause of peace.
Willy BRANDT
Let me end with a personal note of thanks to all of you and our friends who are
not here today. The concern and support which you have expressed for the plight of the
Tibetans have touched us all greatly, and continue to give us courage to struggle for
freedom and justice: not through the use of arms, but with the powerful weapons of truth
and determination. I know that I speak on behalf of all the people of Tibet when I thank
you and ask you not to forget Tibet at this critical time in our country's history.
We too hope to contribute to the development of a more peaceful, more humane and
more beautiful world. A future free Tibet will seek to help those in need throughout the
world, to protect nature, and to promote peace. I believe that our Tibetan ability to
combine spiritual qualities with a realistic and practical attitude enables us to make a
special contribution, in however modest a way. This is my hope and prayer.
Lama
The expressions of great happiness by the Indian Organizations in the entire
Continent and the worldwide congratulations received for the award of the Nobel Peace
Prize, clearly indicate the great importance of this decision. It is the recognition of the
European debt to the American indigenous people; it is an appeal to the conscience of
Humanity so that those conditions of marginalization that condemned them to
colonialism and exploitation may be eradicated; it is a cry for life, peace, justice,
equality and fraternity between human beings.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
……………..
The Cuba crisis, on a more dramatic scale and with even more at stake, showed
the delimitation and the changing relations between the nuclear giants.
Willy BRANDT
If you desire peace, cultivate justice, but at the same time cultivate the fields
to produce more bread; otherwise there will be no peace.
Norman BORLAUG
I believe that all language communities have the right to preserve their linguistic
and cultural heritage. The encouragement and promotion of these will go a long way in
enriching the linguistic and cultural diversity of our common world.
DALAI LAMA
A narrowly focussed materialism that seeks to block out all considerations

apparently irrelevant to one's own well-being tends finally to block out what is in fact
most relevant. Discussing the "culture of contentment" which poses a challenge to
the social and economic future of the United States of America, Professor John Kenneth
Galbraith has pointed out that the fortunate and the favoured are so preoccupied with
immediate comfort and contentment they have ceased to contemplate or respond to their
own longer term well-being. "And this is not only in the capitalist world, as it is still
called; a deeper and more general human instinct is here involved", he wrote. If the
instinct to opt for narrow, short-term benefits can present a significant threat to the
continued prosperity and stability of a rich, industrialized state shored up by strongly
established democratic institutions, how much more of a threat might it be to nations
which have but recently embarked, rather unsteadily, on the grand adventure of free
market economics and democratic politics? And it would surely be of the utmost danger
to those societies still hovering on the edge of liberty and justice, still dominated by a
minority well conte, with its monopoly on economic and political power.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
The first is that all of us must help to develop the culture of tolerance: live
and let live. Let us practice the motto: I disagree with what you say, but I will defend to
the death your right to say it. Let us learn to agree to disagree. Those who disagree with
us are not necessarily enemies, otherwise there would be very few husbands and wives
around.
Desmond TUTU
It may seem presumptuous on my part, but I personally believe we need to think

seriously whether a violent reaction is the right thing to do and in the greater interest of
the nation and people in the long run. I believe violence will only increase the cycle of
violence. But how do we deal with hatred and anger which are often the root causes of
such senseless violence? This is a very difficult question, especially when it concerns a
nation and we have certain fixed conceptions of how to deal with such attacks.
The Dalai Lama

……………..
D
……………..
I live in the hope which I surely share with many others. I am confident that one
day our daily effort will have its reward.
Adolfo Pérez
ESQUIVEL
Dante saw the danger and the pity of this division into jealous and antagonistic
city states. In his poem, attacking parties, he says in an immortal line that Italy, "no
longer the mistress of provinces," has become the slave of cruel and pitiless sects.
This masterpiece in which Dante sets forth the fundamentals of his doctrine can
be said, if one discards the now obsolete part which was adapted to his own day and to
the metaphysics of Aristotle, to present the rules of government and of humanitarian life
under one law; to this end, he wanted the Empire transferred to Rome, for he perceived in
the Romans those qualities most suited to governing the world.
The purpose of civilization, he said, is to put man's intellectual potential to
practical use, in short, to develop his faculties to their fullest extent. So too, do universal
peace and the free functioning of public bodies and of nations coordinate in aiming for
the ultimate establishment of a universal society.
Translate these highly philosophical words into common parlance and you see
outlined the way to attain universal peace and, at the same time, to attain the greatest
possible universal perfection.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
Let a new age dawn !
Nelson MANDELA
The long dark night of the Cold War has finally passed, and with its passing
the peril of a global thermonuclear conflagration has greatly receded. This alleviation of
the nuclear danger is unquestionably a great blessing and a proper cause for celebration.
But it is not, as so many seem to be supposing, a cause for either self-congratulation or
complacency. Those who are congratulating themselves for the role they played in this
narrow escape -- the hawks, who believe that potent deterrent forces and frequent saber-
rattling kept the nuclear peace, and the doves, who believe that candid communication
and negotiated arms-control agreements made the difference -- are all probably
underestimating the extent to which good luck, more than clear-eyed leadership or
sensible restraint, allowed the superpowers to careen for forty years along the edge of the
nuclear chasm without falling in. And those who complacently believe that the danger of
nuclear destruction is now completely under control have simply not surveyed the new
landscape of insecurity that the post-Cold-War dawn has revealed.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
Remembering is a noble and necessary act. The call of memory, the call to
memory, reaches us from the very dawn of history.
Elie WIESEL
It is with the greatest sadness that the people of the World watched the tragedy of
the horrific events of Tuesday 11th September, 2001, in America.
The day of this atrocity will remain in all our memories; it has moved many
millions of people to tears of shock and sadness.
Mairead CORRIGAN
The day when children are taught to respect the people of other nations and to
seek that which unites men rather than that which divides them, then we shall have no
more need of treaties - then peace will truly reign among nations.
Aristide BRIAND
I was a young man who has now grown fully in years. And of all the memories I
have stored up in my seventy-two years, I now recall the hopes.
Our people have chosen us to give them life. Terrible as it is to say, their lives are
in our hands. Tonight, their eyes are upon us and their hearts are asking: How is the
power vested in these men and women being used? What will they decide? Into what
kind of morning will we rise tomorrow? A day of peace? Of war? Of laughter? Of tears?
Yitzhak Rabin
Far from the rough and tumble of the politics of our own country. I would like to
take this opportunity to join the Norwegian Nobel Committee and pay tribute to my joint
laureate. Mr. F.W. De Klerk.
He had the courage to admit that a terrible wrong had been done to our country
and people through the imposition of the system of apartheid.
He had the foresight to understand and accept that all the people of South Africa
must through negotiations and as equal participants in the process, together determine
what they want to make of their future.
Nelson MANDELA
In response to both the retention of judicial execution by governments and the

incidence of extra judicial murder committed or tolerated by governments, Amnesty
International has initiated a program of work aimed at the total and global abolition of the
death penalty. This very weekend Amnesty International is convening in Stockholm
its first world conference on death penalty.
We achieve everything by our efforts alone. Our fate is not decided by an

almighty God. We decide our own fate by our actions. You have to gain mastery
over yourself...It is not a matter of sitting back and accepting.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
That is the moment you grasp that as a result of the decision just made, people
might go to their deaths. People from my nation, people from other nations. And they still
don't know it.
Yitzhak Rabin
In any moment of decision the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next
best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
Decisive measures for the cause of peace must be undertaken and decisive
results acquired, and that with little delay.
Whether peace comes or does not come this event depends on the direction in
which the mentality of individuals develops and consequently that of the peoples.
Albert SCHWEITZER
The codification of public international law can be traced back to the Congress
held in Paris in 1856 following the Crimean War. The diplomatic act of April 16, 1856,
known as the Declaration of Paris, contains four rules relating to maritime warfare
which are universally accepted today. They brought about great progress, particularly in
reconciling on two important points two widely varying systems, that of France and that
of Great Britain. This rapprochement, at first forced by the necessity of waging a
common war and later maintained after the peace, was established under conditions that
complied with both justice and the general interest. Each country gave up practices in its
system which seemed, if not unjust, then particularly harsh; the result was entirely
favourable to the neutrals, who comprised the largest group concerned: the flag covered
the cargo without confiscating it. It is in such a way that all conciliations should be
worked out.
However, it is not the Declaration of Paris itself which I want to examine

here; rather, it is the procedure that was followed to achieve its extraordinary result, that
is to say, the adoption by the whole world of the rules it laid down.
Louis RENAULT
In this direction also great progress has been made within recent years. The
ordinary process of reaching rules of international law through the universal assent of
nations, expressed as particular cases arise from time to time in the ordinary course of
international affairs, is so slow that, instead of making progress towards a comprehensive
law of nations by such a method, the progress of the law has been outstripped by the
changes of condition in international affairs, so that the law has been growing less and
less adequate to settle the questions continually arising. The Declaration of Paris, in
1856, by a few simple rules a, dealing not with particular cases but looking to the future
through an agreement of the powers signing the convention, was a new departure in the
method of forming international law. That method has developed into the action of the
two Hague Conferences of 1899 and 1907, which were really lawmaking bodies,
establishing, by the unanimous vote of the powers, rules of conduct for the future,
covering extensive portions of the field of international conduct. The action of the Hague
Conferences would have been impossible if it had not been for the long continued and
devoted labours of the Institut de Droit International, which, in its annual meetings for
forty years, has brought together the leaders of thought in the science of the law of
nations in all the countries of the civilized world to discuss unofficially, with a free and
full expression of personal opinion, the unsettled problems as to what the law is and
ought to be. The conclusions of that body furnished to the successive Hague Conferences
the matured results of years of well-directed labour and bore the same relation to the
deliberations of the conferences as the report of a committee of a legislative body in
furnishing the basis for deliberation and action. Their work should be encouraged and
their example should be followed.
Elihu ROOT
Alfred Nobel once said, "If you could only understand that we can help a human
being without any ulterior motive." It is precisely this spirit that has animated UNICEF's
work and made possible a record of unique cooperation. Differences of view have been
welded, almost always, into an accepted consensus in the search for agreement on the
best methods of providing assistance to alleviate the agony of children who are victims of
cruel circumstance. The nations of the world agreed, when they approved unanimously
the Declaration of the Rights of the Child, that "mankind owes the child the best
it has to give." It is UNICEF's responsibility to help them make that best a worthy and
effective contribution to ensure healthy growth and development, to translate an
acknowledged duty into programs of practical action.
(UNICEF)
Consider the French Revolution which should have introduced the ideals of peace,
equality, and fraternity into international relations and instead, two years after the
Declaration of the Rights of Man, let loose a tempest of war such as the world had not
seen since Attila (The French Revolution, which began in 1789, and its Declaration of the
Rights of Man, which was adopted as part of the French constitution of 1791. were
followed by the French Revolutionary Wars and they in turn by the Napoleonic Wars.
Attila(406?-453), leader of the Huns, ravaged much of central Europe (451-452). ).
Consider the fact that two years after the founding of the Society of the Friends of Peace
in France (Société française des amis de la paix (later known as Socitété française pour
l'arbitrage entre nations) was founded by Frédéric Passy in 1867 under the name La
Ligue internationale et permanente de la paix ), which was greeted warmly by men of
letters, by statesmen, and by workers' associations throughout France and Germany, came
the outbreak of the Franco-German War, disastrous not only for France, but also for the
cause of peace throughout Europe.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
With the decline of the freedom and sovereignty of the city states came a
reawakened interest in Greek and Roman letters and through it the Renaissance which,
scorning politics and disdaining military glory, held the supremacy of the mind and of the
cult of truth and beauty to constitute the ideal life. It paved the way for the association of
nations by creating a fellow-feeling among scholars and men of science.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
Let us remember that words count only when they give expression to deeds, or are to be
translated into them. The leaders of the Red Terror prattled of peace while they steeped
their hands in the blood of the innocent; and many a tyrant has called it peace when he
has scourged honest protest into silence. Our words must be judged by our deeds; and in
striving for a lofty ideal we must use practical methods; and if we cannot attain all at one
leap, we must advance towards it step by step, reasonably content so long as we do
actually make some progress in the right direction

Theodore ROOSEVELT
Nansen's deep compassion for the Armenian people and his long fight
over the years on their behalf are well known. A few years ago, I went to Syria to inspect
the important work undertaken there by Nansen and, after his death, by the Nansen
Office. Villages have been created in the country and houses built in the towns for some
40.000 of the poorest among the Armenian refugees. When I visited Aleppo, thirty or
forty Armenian leaders invited me to a small reception at which I was asked to speak. As
I mentioned Nansen's name for the first time, the whole company rose to their feet as one
man and stood for some minutes in silent prayer. I was so moved by this spontaneous
show of devotion to the memory of Nansen that I had difficulty in continuing my speech.
When I later mentioned this incident to one of my neighbours at the table, he said: "I will
tell you something, we Armenians believe that Nansen sits at our Lord's side watching
over the destiny of the Armenian people."
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
Our actions must be guided by the deepest principles of our Christian

faith... Once again we must hear the words of Jesus echoing across the centuries: "Love
your enemies, bless them that curse you, and pray for them that despitefully use you.
Martin Luther KING
Incidentally, the fact that nations do everywhere put defence before peace means that
our problem is to reconcile peace with national defence. War arises out of the measures
which armed states take for their defence, from popular misconception as to the means by
which defence can be secured. It might be described as arising from a perversion of the
instinct of self-preservation.
…..
Now, if defence means the defence of the nation's rights, interests, see where it
leaves you when a people asks for superiority of power "for defence". One great state
says to others, as each in effect has been saying during the ten years of armament debate:
"It is true that we ask for considerable power. Perhaps, all things considered, greater
power than you. But it need not disturb you in the least, for we give you our most positive
assurance that that power will be used purely for defence. And by defence we mean this:
that when we get into a dispute with you as to our respective rights, when, that is, the
question is whether you are right or we are right, what we mean by defence is that we
shall always be in a position to be sole judge of the question. And so much stronger than
you, that you will have to accept our verdict without any possibility of appeal. Could
anything be fairer?"
Norman ANGELL
When will we learn that human beings are of infinite value because they have
been created in the image of God, that it is blasphemy to treat them as if they were less
than this, and to do so ultimately recoils on those who do this? In dehumanising
others, they are themselves dehumanised. Perhaps oppression dehumanises the
oppressor as much as, if not more than, the oppressed. They need each other to become
truly free, to become human. We can be human only in fellowship, in community, in
koinonia , in peace.
Let us work to be peacemakers, those given a wonderful share in our Lord's
ministry of reconciliation. If we want peace, so we have been told, let us work for justice.
Let us beat our swords into plowshares.
Desmond TUTU
Our experience has taught us to regard peace as a delicate, ever-fleeting

condition, its roots too shallow to bear the strain of social and political discontent. We
tend to accept the lessons of that experience and work toward those solutions that at best
relieve specific sources of strain, lest our neglect allows war to overtake peace.
Henry KISSINGER
The quest for democracy in Burma is the struggle of a people to live whole,
meaningful lives as free and equal members of the world community. It is part of the
unceasing human endeavour to prove that the spirit of man can transcend the flaws of his
nature.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
Democracy is an ideal widely influential throughout our whole modern world.

Doubtless the word has different meanings to different people. We say that to the
Russians "democratic" means favourable to the Soviet system and that to the Western
peoples it means friendly to the parliamentary form of government. There is nevertheless
a basic area of common meaning in spite of the fact that each is concerned with a
different aspect of one immensely challenging and difficult ideal. They both mean by a
democratic system one which serves the interest of all men alike and not that of
privileged persons, and one in which the ultimate power is in the hands of the entire
population and wielded in their name, a society in which inequities and inequalities are
reduced to a minimum.
Emily Greene BALCH

I believe that democracy is the absolute value that makes for human dignity, as
well as the only road to sustained economic development and social justice.
Democracy and market economy are like two wheels of a cart, and both must
move together and depend on each other for forward motion
KIM Dae Jung
I have fought against white domination, and I have fought against black
domination. I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which
all persons live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal which I
hope to live for and to achieve. But if needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to
die.
Nelson MANDELA
I have come to the conclusion that the real well-being of the people cannot be
realized unless a genuine democratic political system is firmly established by
ending the dictatorship which ignores the will of the people and downgrades the National
Assembly.
KIM Dae Jung
The students were protesting not just against the death of their comrades but
against the denial of their right to life by a totalitarian regime which deprived the
present of meaningfulness and held out no hope for the future. And because the students'
protests articulated the frustrations of the people at large, the demonstrations quickly
grew into a nationwide movement. Some of its keenest supporters were businessmen who
had developed the skills and the contacts necessary not only to survive but to prosper
within the system. But their affluence offered them no genuine sense of security or
fulfilment, and they could not but see that if they and their fellow citizens, regardless of
economic status, were to achieve a worthwhile existence, an accountable administration
was at least a necessary if not a sufficient condition.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
The International Committee found itself separated by an impenetrable barrier

from so many deportees to whom it would have liked to extend its material and moral
support. In trying to help these deportees, it took a number of steps, not only in the hope
that it might be allowed to visit their camps, but also in an attempt to alleviate conditions
for many of them.
Comité International de la Croix

Rouge
The Court orders and federal enforcement agencies are of inestimable value in
achieving desegregation, but desegregation is only a partial, though necessary, step
towards the final goal which we seek to realize, genuine inter-group and interpersonal
living...
But something must touch the hearts and souls of men so that they will come
together spiritually because it is natural and right...
Martin Luther
KING
With the Cold War era apparently drawing to a close, people everywhere live with
renewed hope. Sadly, the courageous efforts of the Chinese people to bring similar
change to their country was brutally crushed last June. But their efforts too are a source
of hope. The military might has not extinguished the desire for freedom and the
determination of the Chinese people to achieve it. I particularly admire the fact that these
young people who have been taught that "power grows from the barrel of the gun",
chose, instead, to use non-violence as their weapon.
What these positive changes indicate, is that reason, courage, determination, and
the inextinguishable desire for freedom can ultimately win. In the struggle between
forces of war, violence and oppression on the one hand, and peace, reason and freedom
on the other, the latter are gaining the upper hand. This realisation fills us Tibetans with
hope that some day we too will once again be free.
Lama
One way or another, everyone is tracing their destinies and registering in their
pinnacle notebooks storms, defeats and triumphs, calmness and anxieties.
Adolfo Pérez
ESQUIVEL
Nowadays, science can be said to have acquired a somewhat similar role in

relation to humanity; the destiny of mankind lying in the hands of scientists. The
time has thus come for some sort of Hippocratic Oath to be formulated for scientists. A
solemn oath, or a pledge, taken when receiving the degree in science, would, at the least,
have an important symbolic value, but it might also generate awareness and stimulate
thoughts about the wider issues among young scientists.
Joseph ROTBLAT
I have seen a determination for peace become a shared bond that has brought
together people of all political persuasions in Northern Ireland and throughout the island
of Ireland.
John HUME
Unfortunately, agricultural science – like many other areas of human endeavour –

is subject to changing fashions and fads, generated from both within the scientific
community and imposed upon it by external forces, especially the politically-induced
ones. Increasingly, I fear, too much of international and national research budgets are
being directed towards “development bandwagons” that will not solve Third
World food production problems, and for which scientists are ill-equipped to solve.
Norman E. BORLAUG
Oslo
September 8, 2000
The second line of advance in this same field of international controversy is in

pressing forward the development of international law and the agreement of
nations upon its rules. Lord Mansfield described the law of nations as "founded upon
justice, equity, convenience, the reason of the thing, and confirmed by long usage". There
are multitudes of events liable to occur frequently in the intercourse of nations, regarding
which there has never been any agreement as to what is just, equitable, or convenient,
and, as to many of the classes of controversy, different views are held by different
nations, so that in a large part of the field with which an arbitral tribunal or international
court should deal there is really no law to be applied. Where there is no law, a submission
to arbitration or to judicial decision is an appeal, not to the rule of law, but to the
unknown opinions or predilections of the men who happen to be selected to decide. The
development of the peaceable settlement of international disputes by the decision of
impartial tribunals waits therefore upon the further development of international law by a
more complete establishment of known and accepted rules for the government of
international conduct.
Elihu ROOT
We have reached the age where dialogue is really the only way to run the world.
Shimon PERES
Dialogues and the political negotiations are, no doubt, adequate means to solve
these problems, in order to respond in a specific way to the vital and urgent needs for life
and for the implementation of democracy for our Guatemalan people.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
I used all my strength to resist the dictatorial regimes, because there was no
other way to defend the people and promote democracy. I felt like a homeowner whose
house was invaded by a robber. I had to fight the intruder with my bare hands to protect
my family and property without thinking of my own safety.
KIM Dae Jung
A diplomatic conference must be prepared carefully and the problems

awaiting solution subjected to careful study in. the various countries so that the
delegations can come equipped with precise instructions about the main issues, thus
avoiding the necessity of referring them to their respective governments at every stage.
Louis RENAULT
For the purpose of preserving general peace, the Convention established

procedures for making offers of good offices and for mediation. The first entails an offer
made by one or several nations, in the event of imminent war or during the course of
actual war, to intercede between the belligerents in an effort to effect conciliation - a very
useful procedure and one easily carried out, for all that is required is a diplomatic
note. And since, under the terms of the Hague Convention, neither the offer of good
offices nor its rejection can be considered an unfriendly act, all powers, especially those
favourably disposed to one or the other of the adversaries, should be only too anxious to
offer their services. It is highly probable that in most cases war could be avoided or
ended. For discussions allow passion to subside; and to persuade alienated neighbours, or
at least one of them, to listen to the voice of a conciliator, is a step in the direction of
peace.
No one who has closely followed disarmament negotiations since 1919 is likely to
be guilty of facile optimism about the prospect of success. But no one who understands
the present arms race should be guilty of facile pessimism, which is by far the graver
fault. Defeatism about the feasibility of plans for disarmament and ordered peace has
been the most calamitous of all the errors made by democratic governments in modern
times.
Philip J. NOEL
-BAKER
Not too many years ago, Dr. Kirtley Mather, a Harvard geologist, wrote a book
entitled Enough and to Spare. He set forth the basic theme that famine is wholly
unnecessary in the modern world. Today, therefore, the question on the agenda must
read: Why should there be hunger and privation in any land, in any city, at any table
when man has the resources and the scientific know-how to provide all mankind with the
basic necessities of life? Even deserts can be irrigated and top soil can be replaced. We
cannot complain of a lack of land, for there are twenty-five million square miles of
tillable land, of which we are using less than seven million. We have amazing knowledge
of vitamins, nutrition, the chemistry of food, and the versatility of atoms. There is no
deficit in human resources; the deficit is in human will. The well-off and the
secure have too often become indifferent and oblivious to the poverty and deprivation in
their midst. The poor in our countries have been shut out of our minds, and driven from
the mainstream of our societies, because we have allowed them to become invisible. Just
as non-violence exposed the ugliness of racial injustice, so must the infection and
sickness of poverty be exposed and healed - not only its symptoms but its basic causes.
This, too, will be a fierce struggle, but we must not be afraid to pursue the remedy no
matter how formidable the task.
Martin Luther KING
The democratic principle is just as important in international as in national

affairs.
That, then, is what we stand for; and that is one of the great reasons, no doubt,
why we support the League of Nations.
I like to think that, in this principle, we had the active help of such a man as your
great statesman, Dr. Nansen, and we look - not in vain, I am convinced - to the race to
which he belonged to keep alight the torch of freedom and progress.
That these ideas will ultimately triumph, I have no doubt. Nor is it open to
question that by the combined efforts of the peace-loving peoples they can be made to
triumph now, before Europe has been again plunged into a fresh bloodbath.
Viscount CECIL of Chelwood
I have to Ping to your notice a terrifying reality: with the development of nuclear
weapons Man has acquired, for the first time in history, the technical means to destroy
the whole of civilization in a single act. Indeed, the whole human species is
endangered, by nuclear weapons or by other means of wholesale destruction which
further advances in science are likely to produce.
Joseph ROTBLAT
Their (Khrushchev and Mikoyan) sincerity can only be tested by offering them the
detailed text of a controlled disarmament system that would translate into
reality the measures which they say they will accept.
Philip J. NOEL –
BAKER
Since the beginning of this century, Gentlemen, you too have always kept your
hopes alive. While awaiting the time when humanity will justify you, as it surely will,
you have steadfastly continued to mark milestones reached along the way to victory.
Two ideas have assured the advancement of your work. One stems from a new
concept of war. The other concerns the recent development of the human
conscience.
As far as a brief account such as this will allow, I should like to consider in turn
each of these two deep-rooted causes of change in the state of affairs and in the state of
our morale.
Ferdinand BUISSON
As that man whom we picked up from the drain, half eaten with worms, and we
brought him to the home. I have lived like an animal in the street, but I am going to die
like an angel, loved and cared for. And it was so wonderful to see the greatness of that
man who could speak like that, who could die like that without blaming anybody, without
cursing anybody, without comparing anything. Like an angel - this is the greatness of our
people. And that is why we believe what Jesus had said: I was hungry - I was naked - I
was homeless - I was unwanted, unloved, uncared for - and you did it to me.
Mother TERESA
All conflict is about difference, whether the difference is race, religion or

nationality The European visionaries decided that difference is not a threat,
difference is natural. Difference is of the essence of humanity. Difference is an
accident of birth and it should therefore never be the source of hatred or conflict. The
answer to difference is to respect it. Therein lies a most fundamental principle of peace
- respect for diversity.
The peoples of Europe then created institutions which respected their diversity - a
Council of Ministers, the European Commission and the European Parliament - but
allowed them to work together in their common and substantial economic interest. They
spilt their sweat and not their blood and by doing so broke down the barriers of distrust of
centuries and the new Europe has evolved and is still evolving, based on agreement and
respect for difference.
John HUME
There is much to be done, there is much that can be done. One person – a Raoul
Wallenberg, an Albert Schweitzer, one person of integrity – can make a difference, a
difference of life and death. As long as one dissident is in prison, our freedom will
not be true. As long as one child is hungry, our lives will be filled with anguish and
shame.
Elie WIESEL
I find hope in globalisation and the end of an industrial age when economies were
dependent on land, capital and labour. With education and technology the primary
sources of current wealth, nations have little reason to fight over territory. But "the
digital divide" between rich and poor is "a dark shadow" on the promise of the global
economy.
KIM Dae Jung

Another critical area where partnerships could make an enormous difference to
developing countries is information technology. I have set up a small group of advisers
to help find ways of bridging the "digital divide" -- many of whom are present here
today. My special thanks to them, and to all the others who have agreed to work with me
on this issue, which I believe is crucial for the future of many poor countries.
Kofi ANNAN
Classical diplomacy and strategy were aimed at identifying enemies and
confronting them. Now they have to identify dangers, global and local, to tackle them
before they become disasters.
Shimon PERES
There are three directions in which the education of the millions, who in the last
resort determine the policies which determine the fate of society, seems to need
development. First, the ordinary citizen and voter must acquire a greater awareness of his
own nature, his liability to certain follies, ever recurrent and ever disastrous; secondly, a
greater knowledge of the nature of the necessary mechanism of society; and thirdly, of
the nature of truth, of true methods of interpretation, the means by which the lessons told
by common facts can be applied to the solution of social problems as they arise.
Norman ANGELL
The wonderful thing about family is that you are not expected to agree about
everything under the sun. Show me a man and wife who have never disagreed and I
would show you some accomplished fibbers. But those disagreements, pray God, do
not usually destroy the unity of the family.
Desmond TUTU
Recent years have seen an alarming increase in disappearances, and the use of
summary execution without benefit of fair or even of any trial. This is particularly true of
military regimes and of extra-governmental forces acting with or without official
sanction. Increasingly, Amnesty International receives information about the sudden
disappearance of individuals in countries where clandestine torture and killings by
faction groups have reached almost uncontrollable proportions.
Disarmament treaties will be militarily useless, for they are practically

worthless for air and gas warfare since the necessary war material can be supplied by
peacetime industry. If we want to avoid the unthinkable horror of aerial and gas warfare,
then we must not make war; we must secure peace. Thus, the problem of disarmament
brings us back to the problem of security.
Does the proposal for international disarmament therefore lose its significance?
From the military technical point of view perhaps, but not from the economic and
political-ethical standpoint. We could release billions of marks for cultural and social
work. They could be used to combat destitution and misery. At the same time we would
manifest and strengthen the will to preserve the peace by means of disarmament. Therein
lies the great significance of a disarmament treaty even when the treaty itself, considered
from the purely military viewpoint, may be useless.
…..
Along with working for disarmament we must work toward securing peace. We
must learn to recognize that Europe has a choice only between the total devastation that
will result from a future war employing gas and other such modern methods of war, and
peace secured by rule of law.
Ludwig QUIDDE
Is it not significant that the first great discovery, that of using the force resulting
from the detonation of gunpowder, was offered only as a means of killing somebody at a
distance?
The conquest of the air, thanks to the internal combustion engine, marks a
decisive advance for humanity. Men immediately profited from the opportunity it offered
to kill and destroy from a height.
A new step was the discovery of the enormous forces released by the
disintegration of the atom and by its utilization. After a certain stage was reached it had
to be admitted that the destructive capacity of a bomb charged with such a power had
become incalculable, and that already large-scale experiments were capable of provoking
catastrophes menacing the very existence of mankind.
Albert SCHWEITZER
I have already mentioned that recent years have brought with them much
disillusionment concerning what has so far been achieved by humanity. But it is
possible that, in the days ahead, these years we have lived through may eventually be
thought of simply as a period of disturbance and regression.
The signs of renewal are far too numerous and promising to allow of despair.
Never since the dawn of history, with its perpetual wars between wild tribes, never up to
the present day throughout the unfolding of the ages, during which wars and devastation
have occurred with such frequency and with interruptions for only such short periods of
peace and recovery, never has our race experienced such a concentrated period of
disturbance or such devastation of a large part of the world as that which began in 1914.
Karl Hjalmar
BRANTING
It is perfectly natural that all people should wish for a secure refuge. It is
unfortunate that in spite of strong evidence to the contrary, so many still act as though
security would be guaranteed if they fortified themselves with an abundance of material
possessions. The greatest threats to global security today come not from the economic
deficiencies of the poorest nations but from religious, racial (or tribal) and political
dissension raging in those regions where principles and practices which could reconcile
the diverse instincts and aspirations of mankind have been ignored, repressed or distorted.
Man-made disasters are made by dominant individuals and cliques which refuse to move
beyond the autistic confines of partisan interest. An eminent development economist has
observed that the best defence against famine is an accountable government. It makes
little political or economic sense to give aid without trying to address the circumstances
that render aid ineffectual. No amount of material goods and technological know-how
will compensate for human irresponsibility and viciousness.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
Peace, stability and unity cannot be bought or coerced; they have to be nurtured
by promoting a sensitivity to human needs and respect for the rights and opinions of
others. Diversity and dissent need not inhibit the emergence of strong, stable societies,
but inflexibility, narrowness and unadulterated materialism can prevent healthy growth.
And when attitudes have been allowed to harden to the point that otherness becomes a
sufficient reason for nullifying a person's claim to be treated as a fellow human being, the
trappings of modern civilization crumble with frightening speed.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
Young people often expect me to give an unqualified ‘Yes’, a clear ‘No’. But it
has become impossible for me to believe in one, in the single truth, so I can say to my
young friends and to others who want to hear it: There are several truths, not merely the
one truth which excludes all others. That is why I believe in diversity and hence in
doubt. It is productive. It questions existing things. It can be strong enough to smash
fossilised injustice. Doubt proved its worth during the resistance. It is tough enough to
outlast defeats and to disillusion victors.
Willy BRANDT
An opinion is being formed everywhere about a phenomenon of today, that in

spite of being expressed between wars and violence, calls upon the entire Humanity to
protect its historical values: unity in the diversity. And this calls upon us to reflect
about the incorporation of important elements of change and transformation in all aspects
of life on earth, in the search for specific and definite solutions to the deep ethical crisis
that afflicts Humanity. This will, no doubt have decisive influence on the structuring of
the future.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
No Four-Power status did anything to alter the fact that the Berlin Wall had
become the dividing line between the nuclear superpowers. And no one in a position of
responsibility demanded that the Western Powers should use military force and risk a war
to preserve their share of what originally was common responsibility.
Willy BRANDT
Today, in Afghanistan, a girl will be born. Her mother will hold her and feed her,
comfort her and care for her - just as any mother would anywhere in the world. In these
most basic acts of human nature, humanity knows no divisions. But to be born a girl in
today's Afghanistan is to begin life centuries away from the prosperity that one small part
of humanity has achieved. It is to live under conditions that many of us in this hall would
consider inhuman.
Kofi ANNAN
Having made these general remarks, I propose to take up, briefly, the three great
divisions of international relations and to show on what lines they have
developed since the Peace Conference. Those three divisions are: first, economic
relations; second, the pacific settlement of disputes; and third, guarantees against war,
which include renunciation of war, disarmament, and common action to restrain an
aggressor.
Arthur HENDERSON
Thus, every dollar invested by UNICEF must be matched by at least one dollar
or its equivalent. In practice, over the years, the government investment has exceeded, by
far, UNICEF's contribution.

(UNICEF)
We live in a period of great crisis, a period of troubling world developments. It is

not possible to find peace in the soul without security and harmony between the people.
For this reason, I look forward with faith and hope to my meeting with the Holy Father;
to an exchange of ideas and feelings, and to his suggestions, so as to open the door to a
progressive pacification between people.
Lama
There is no doubt whatsoever that it constitutes a sign of hope in the struggle of

the indigenous people in the entire Continent.
It (The Nobel Prize) is also a tribute to the Centro-American people who still
search for their stability, for the structuring of their future, and the path for their
development and integration, based on civil democracy and mutual respect.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
It is my dream that the entire Tibetan plateau should become a free refuge
where humanity and nature can live in peace and in harmonious balance. It would be a
place where people from all over the world could come to seek the true meaning of peace
within themselves, away from the tensions and pressures of much of the rest of the world.
Tibet could indeed become a creative centre for the promotion and development of peace.

Lama
At an age when most youngsters are struggling to unravel the secrets of

mathematics and the mysteries of the Bible; at an age when first love blooms; at the
tender age of sixteen, I was handed a rifle so that I could defend myself.
That was not my dream. I wanted to be a water engineer. I studied in an
agricultural school and I thought being a water engineer was an important profession in
the parched Middle East. I still think so today. However, I was compelled to resort to the
gun.
Yitzhak Rabin
Now, I say to you today my friends, even though we face the difficulties of today
and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American
dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true
meaning of its creed: -- we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created
equal.
Martin Luther KING

That is why I dream of the day when the relationship between the indigenous
people and other people is strengthened; when they can join their potentialities and their
capabilities and contribute to make life on this planet less unequal.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
We had no houses, no electricity, no running water. But we had a magnificent
view and a lofty dream: to build a new, egalitarian society that would ennoble each of
its members.
Not all of it came true, but not all of it went to waste. The part that came true
created a new landscape. The part that did not come true resides in our hearts to this very
day.
Shimon PERES
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning
of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal."
Martin Luther KING
Brute force might silence and keep dormant the dreams and aspirations of
a people but the anger simmering for decades will inevitably resurface and break up the
country.
The debate on the «Droit d'Ingerence» – the right of state intervention for so
called humanitarian purposes – is further evidence of this ambiguity. It seeks to put at the
level of the humanitarian, the political question of the abuse of power, and to seek a
humanitarian legitimacy for a security action through military means. When one mixes
the humanitarian with the need for public security, then one inevitably tars the
humanitarian with the security brush. It must be recalled that the UN Charter obliges
states to intervene sometimes by force to stop threats to international peace and security.
There is no need, and indeed a danger, in using a humanitarian justification for this. In
Helsinki this weekend governments will sit down to establish the makings of a European
army, but to be available for humanitarian purposes. We appeal to governments to go no
further down this path of dangerous ambiguity. But we also encourage states to seek
ways to enforce public security so that international humanitarian and human rights law
can be respected.
The last objection may be: "My vote, being but a drop in the ocean, means
nothing." It does, however, mean everything to every responsible human being, for all
those who are powerless individually gain power beyond measure when they are united.
Many small rivulets make a great stream, the stream becomes a river and the river a great
sea, a pacific ocean around this world of ours.
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
In the Capitoline Museum in Rome is a sculpture in marble which, in its simple

pathos, seems to me to be a most beautiful creation. It is the statue of the "Dying
Gaul". He is lying on the battlefield, mortally wounded. The vigorous body, hardened
by work and combat, is sinking into death. The head, with its coarse hair, is bowed, the
strong neck bends, the rough powerful workman's hand, till recently wielding the sword,
now presses against the ground in a last effort to hold up the drooping body.
He was driven to fight for foreign gods whom he did not know, far from his own
country. And thus he met his fate. Now he lies there, dying in silence. The noise of the
fray no longer reaches his ear. His dimmed eyes are turned inward, perhaps on a final
vision of his childhood home where life was simple and happy, of his birthplace deep in
the forests of Gaul.
That is how I see mankind in its suffering; that is how I see the suffering people of
Europe, bleeding to death on deserted battlefields after conflicts which to a great extent
were not their own.
Fridtjof NANSEN
When one has stood face to face with famine, with death by starvation itself, then
surely one should have had one's eyes opened to the full extent of this misfortune. When
one has beheld the great beseeching eyes in the starved faces of children staring
hopelessly into the fading daylight, the eyes of agonized mothers while they press their
dying children to their empty breasts in silent despair, and the ghostlike men lying
exhausted on mats on cabin floors, with only the merciful release of death to wait for,
then surely one must understand where all this is leading, understand a little of the true
nature of the question.
Fridtjof NANSEN
……………..
E
Last March I attended a conference in Rio de Janeiro that took stock of what has
happened in the five years since the Earth Summit. There is very little to cheer.
Governments are in no hurry to implement even the modest pledges made in 1992, even
though the time we have to transform our way of living is quickly shrinking. Still, I
remain an optimist. I reject defeatism and frustration. But I also reject the view that
things will somehow work themselves out. I am convinced that mankind can meet the
environmental challenge if all of us join this cause, if all of us act.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
East Timor is a classic study of power versus principle, of morality versus

expediency, in international relations.
José RAMOS-HORTA
A second evil which plagues the modern world is that of poverty. Like a
monstrous octopus, it projects its nagging, prehensile tentacles in lands and villages all
over the world. Almost two-thirds of the peoples of the world go to bed hungry at night.
They are undernourished, ill-housed, and shabbily clad. Many of them have no houses or
beds to sleep in. Their only beds are the sidewalks of the cities and the dusty roads of the
villages. Most of these poverty-stricken children of God have never seen a physician or a
dentist. This problem of poverty is not only seen in the class division between the highly
developed industrial nations and the so-called underdeveloped nations; it is seen in the
great economic gaps within the rich nations themselves.
Martin Luther KING
Jr.
My country is no longer a ‘great’ power, nor can it be. But it is definitely an

economic and scientific power, and I feel I can say that we are all prepared for
such co-operation, at any time and at any place, however much Government and
Opposition may otherwise be in dispute over this question.
Willy BRANDT
The end of the cold war has been represented as a signal for shifting the emphasis
of national and international concern from ideology and politics to economics and trade.
But it is open to debate whether policies heavily, if not wholly, influenced by economic
considerations will make of the much bruited "New World Order" an era of progress
and harmony such as is longed for by peoples and nations weary of conflict and suffering.
As the twentieth century draws to a close, it has become obvious that material
yardsticks alone cannot serve as an adequate measure of human well-being. Even as basic
an issue as poverty has to be re-examined to take into account the psychological sense of
deprivation that makes people feel poor. Such a "modern" concept of poverty is nothing
new to the Burmese who have always used the word hsinye to indicate not only an
insufficiency of material goods but also physical discomfort and distress of mind -- to be
poor is to suffer from a paucity of those mental and spiritual as well as material resources
that make a human being feel fulfilled and give life a meaning beyond mere existence. It
follows as a matter of course that chantha, the converse of hsinye, denotes not only
material prosperity but also bodily ease and general felicity. One speaks of chantha of the
mind and of the body and one would wish to be possessed of both.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
However, in spite of these openings, repression and violation of human rights

persist in the middle of an economic crisis, that is becoming more and more acute, to
the extent that 84% of the population is today considered as poor, and some 60% are
considered as very poor. Impunity and terror continue to prevent people from freely
expressing their needs and vital demands. The internal armed conflict still exists.
The political life in my country has lately circled around the search for a political
solution to the global crisis and the armed conflict that has existed in Guatemala since
1962.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
That, then, is the situation which confronts all of us who would seek peace and
ensure it. I have tried to describe it without optimism or pessimism but in a spirit of sober
realism. The question is, what are we to do in order to consolidate peace on a universal
and durable foundation, and what are the essential elements of such a peace? This brings
me to the political aspect of the present situation. It is obviously not possible wholly to
separate its economic from its political features. On the contrary, the characteristic
element of the present situation is that economic questions have finally and irrevocably
invaded the domain of public life and politics. The drive toward economic nationalism is
only part of the general revival of nationalism. In some states militant nationalism has
gone to the lengths of dictatorship, the cult of the absolute or totalitarian state and the
glorification of war. In one case aggression and treaty breaking have actually taken place.
These developments in certain states have been possible only because of the failure to
carry out solemn promises and treaty obligations as regards both disarmament and joint
action against war. This failure in turn is due to the fact that the revival of nationalism is
not confined to one or two countries but has become fairly general. The years of the
economic depression have been years of political reaction, and that is why the
economic crisis has generated a world peace crisis.
Arthur HENDERSON
I would dare to say that if in East Asia, in Indonesia, we had a dynamic

independent media, maybe the economic and the financial crisis in East Asia
would not have taken place.
If there had been more debate by the public, if there had been more questioning on
the excessive borrowing, of the excessive lending, probably we would not have had this
catastrophic economic financial crisis that ruined the lives of the poorest in the region.
José RAMOS-HORTA
I've worked with wheat, but wheat is merely a catalyst, a part of the picture. I'm
interested in the total economic development in all countries. Only by attacking the
whole problem can we raise the standard of living for all people in all communities, so
that they will be able to live decent lives. This is something we wish for all people on this
planet.
Norman BORLAUG
Economic sanctions, that is, the boycott of an aggressor, were regarded as

obligatory, whereas military sanctions were considered optional. It is clear that a state
cannot continue normal commercial and financial relations with an aggressor with out
becoming an accessory after the fact to the crime of war. In our modern world of
interdependent nations, hardly any state can wage war successfully without raising loans
and buying war materials of every kind in the markets of other nations. That is why the
boycott of an aggressor is the minimum obligation below which states can hardly go
without conniving at the very evil they are supposed to be trying to suppress. But to cut
off relations with an aggressor may often invite retaliation by armed action, and this
would, in its turn, make necessary some form of collective self-defence by the loyal
members of the League. It is rather in these terms that the problem is being envisaged
today by those who are concerned with the question of sanctions. But, for the most part,
the view has gained ground that the sanctions provisions of the Covenant are vague and
unreliable and that when it comes to the point, states will not, in fact, act upon them.
Arthur HENDERSON
A German statesman of the post-war period has said that Napoleon's maxim that
"politics is our destiny" is no longer valid. He thought he could equate our destiny with
economics. I cannot agree, but I will admit that the policies of nations and groups have
perhaps never been as greatly influenced by economic tendencies and developments
as they are at present. And so I begin with economics, not because economics is of first
importance, but because the inborn drive of the Germans to work, to create, and to
rebuild, has been so apparent in this past decade. We did not, in accordance with the
doctrine of laissez-faire, bring all welfare programs to a halt. Indeed, we tried in every
way to reduce unemployment and its consequences. It may be that some individual
initiative has been stifled by this far-reaching social concern on the part of the state; but
taken overall, this policy points in the right direction.
Gustav STRESEMANN
To educate a man in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
The age of our race can perhaps be reckoned in millions of years. So it is probably
true that the human brain has now reached a state of high development and that after an
immeasurable process of evolution it is now biologically and physiologically similar in
all peoples and races.
Accepting this as a scientific fact, one necessarily comes to the conclusion that
every normal human being must be as susceptible to the light of knowledge as he is to the
light of the sun. It is in his nature to want peace rather than war. Education is the only
certain road to the final goal of peace. And there is no higher goal.
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
Thirty years of wrestling with the public mind has convinced me that this is
indeed the contribution which education must make to peace: a clearer understanding,
not so much of each nation's special problems by the others, for that, in the case of sixty
nations, would involve a degree of learning in history, political geography, ethnography
which the ordinary citizen simply could not acquire, but a clearer understanding of the
elementary, the rudimentary principles upon which all human society rests, by means of
which alone it can be made to work.
Norman ANGELL
Peace work of this first type relies mainly on education. The work done and
now being done to educate men's minds against war and for peace is colossal, and can
only be referred to.
Perhaps it is under this head that the Nobel Foundation and the work of Bertha
von Suttner should be listed; for this the world, and not alone the beneficiaries, must be
grateful.
Emily Greene BALCH
The current backlash against agricultural science and technology evident in some
industrialized countries is hard for me to comprehend. How quickly humankind becomes
detached from the soil and agricultural production! Less than 4 percent of the population
in the industrialized countries (less than 2 percent in the USA) is directly engaged in
agriculture. With a low-cost food supplies and urban bias, is it any wonder that
consumers don’t understand the complexities of re-producing the world food supply each
year in its entirely, and expanding it further for the nearly 85 million new mouths that are
born into this world each year. I believe we can help address this “educational gap”
in industrialized urban nations by making it compulsory in secondary schools and
universities for students to take courses on biology and science and technology policy.
Norman E. BORLAUG
September 8, 2000
If efforts toward peace are to get anywhere, they must be more realistic than
in the past. The question is not whether one is orthodox in conforming to some peace
formula or other, but whether one does something to promote peace. No road to peace
exists other than that of the narrow path whose name is conversion. All men of goodwill
ought to unite in perceiving this. We must not allow ourselves to be lulled into any
monistic peace dream. We must struggle to win peace, struggle against schism, against
the mad measures of fear, against the ruthlessness of Mammon, against hatred and
injustice. This fight must be directed primarily toward the primitive man within us.
Impatient minds may perhaps find such a concept hopeless, pessimistic, and old-
fashioned. But we must face reality. The noble and practical measures for world peace
will be realized only to the extent to which the supremacy of God conquers the hearts of
the people.
Nathan SODERLOM
I am here to speak in the name of the poets and of those who dreamed of an end to
war, like the Prophet Isaiah.
I am also here to speak in the names of sons of the Jewish people like Albert
Einstein and Baruch Spinoza, like Maimonides, Sigmund Freud and Franz Kafka.
And I am the emissary of millions who perished in the Holocaust, among whom
were surely many Einsteins and Freuds who were lost to us, and to humanity, in the
flames of the crematoria.
Yitzhak Rabin
Electronic mail has permitted the (ICBL)

International Campaign to Ban Landmines
to carry out its priority of frequent and timely internal communication to a greater degree
than ever before.
Jody WILLIAMS
I stand here mainly for the generations to come, so that we may all be deemed
worthy of the medal which you have bestowed on me and my colleagues today.
I stand here as the emissary today -- if they will allow me -- of our neighbours
who were our enemies. I stand here as the emissary of the soaring hopes of a people
which has endured the worst that history has to offer and nevertheless made its mark --
not just on the chronicles of the Jewish people but on all mankind.
Yitzhak Rabin
A powerful empire was founded on the debris of monarchies and peoples.

Would it now be possible to recuperate and take up again the thread of civilization which
had been broken for so many centuries by bloody struggles of no lasting consequence?
Élie DUCOMMUN
Another notable instance is afforded of the advantages of treaties of arbitration.

The two South American republics, Chile and Argentina, which had been frequently in
conflict, having solemnly bound themselves by treaty to settle their disputes by
arbitration, finding that they had no use for their ironclads and vessels of war, have been
disposing of them to Russia, Great Britain, and any other power that chooses to purchase
them.
The latter affords an excellent illustration of the wisdom of our policy in
advocating arbitration first, with the conviction on our part that disarmament would be
sure to follow. The one we have always regarded as the means; the other as the end to
be attained.
Amongst the advantages which we have contended that nations would reap from
entering into treaties of arbitration are, that when differences arose, the disputants would
have time for reflection, because, while the arbitrators were deliberating, the passions of
the contending parties would cool, and the chances of war be greatly diminished.
William Randal
CREMER
We are not there yet. We are still not organized for a war-free world. But in the
meantime, the human species may be brought to an end by the use of the tools of
destruction, themselves the product of science and technology.
Joseph ROTBLAT
I know, Mr. Chairman, that this highly indicative prize has not been granted to me
and my partners, Israel's Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Foreign Minister Shimon
Peres, to crown a mission that we have fulfilled, but to encourage us to complete a path
which we have started with larger strides, deeper awareness, and more honest intentions.
This is so we can transfer the option of peace, the peace of the brave, from words on
paper to practices on the ground, and so we will be worthy of carrying the message that
both our peoples and the world and human conscience have asked us to carry. Like their
Arab brethren, the Palestinians, whose cause is the guardian of the gate of the Arab-
Israeli peace, are looking forward to a comprehensive, just and durable peace on the basis
of land for peace and compliance with international legitimacy and its resolutions.
Yasser Arafat
We must ever bear in mind that the great end in view is righteousness, justice as
between man and man, nation and nation, the chance to lead our lives on some what
higher level, with a broader spirit of brotherly goodwill one for another.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
………………
In the name of God, the merciful, the compassionate. But if the enemy incline
toward peace, do thou also incline toward peace, and trust in God.
Yasser Arafat
I had the most extraordinary experience with a Hindu family who had eight
children. A gentleman came to our house and said: Mother Teresa, there is a family with
eight children, they had not eaten for so long - do something. So I took some rice and I
went there immediately. And I saw the children - their eyes shinning with hunger - I don't
know if you have ever seen hunger. But I have seen it very often. And she took the rice,
she divided the rice, and she went out. When she came back I asked her - where did you
go, what did you do? And she gave me a very simple answer: They are hungry also. What
struck me most was that she knew - and who are they, a Muslim family - and she knew. I
didn't bring more rice that evening becauyse I wanted them to enjoy the joy of sharing.
But there were those children, radiating joy, sharing the joy with their mother because she
had the love to give. And you see this is where love begins - at home.
Mother TERESA
We all owe a debt of gratitude to environmental movement in the

industrialized nations, which has led to legislation over the past 30 years to improve air
and water quality, protect wildlife, control the disposal of toxic wastes, protect the soils,
and reduce the loss of biodiversity.
Norman E. BORLAUG
September 8, 2000
By pointing out these difficulties I do not mean to condemn the system, but
merely to draw attention to their inescapable consequences and to the care which must be
taken to mitigate them. The equality of nations, except in matters of material
strength, is juridically incontrovertible, but this equality pushed to the last limits of
literalness becomes absurd. To give an example which should offend no one, Great
Britain and Luxembourg are two states equal before the law, yet would it not be
ridiculous if the voice of Luxembourg carried as much weight on a maritime issue as that
of Great Britain? The small nations have a most useful and honourable part to play in
these conferences; they are most frequently the true representatives of justice, precisely
because they do not have the strength to impose injustice. However, if they wish to see
maintained the tradition of these conferences to which they are invited, they would do
well to exercise a certain restraint and to avoid the fallacious belief that obstinacy, not to
say obstructionism, is the best way of asserting their independence.
Louis RENAULT
The politician who in the daily conflict of interests tries to serve the cause of
equitable peace draws his strength from the moral reserves that have been formed by
generations before him. Consciously or not he is guided by them.
Willy BRANDT
Today we are rightly in an era of disarmament and dismantlement of nuclear

weapons. But in some countries nuclear weapons development still continues. Whether
and when the Various Nations of the World can agree to stop this is uncertain. But
individual scientists can still influence this process by withholding their skills.
Joseph
ROTBLAT
The new era which is dawning in our country, beneath the great southern stars,
will lift us out of the silent grief of our past and into a future in which there will be
opportunity and space for joy and beauty - for real and lasting peace.
The stars of eternal truth and right have always shone in the firmament of
human understanding. The process of bringing them down to earth, remoulding them into
practical forms, imbuing them with vitality, and then making use of them, has been a long
one.
One of the eternal truths is that happiness is created and developed in peace,
and one of the eternal rights is the individual's right to live. The strongest of all instincts,
that of self-preservation, is an assertion of this right, affirmed and sanctified by the
ancient commandment "Thou shalt not kill."
Bertha von SUTTNER
The idea of eternity lives in all of us. We thirst to live in a belief which raises
our small personality to a higher coherence - a coherence which is human and yet
superhuman, absolute and yet steadily growing and developing, ideal and yet real.
Can this desire ever be fulfilled? It seems to be a contradiction in terms.
And yet there is a belief which satisfies this desire and resolves the contradiction.
It is the belief in the unity of mankind.
Yes, humanitarian action has limits. It also has responsibility. It is not only about
rules of right conduct and technical performance. It is at first an ethic framed in a
morality. The moral intention of the humanitarian act must be confronted with its actual
result. And it is here where any form of moral neutrality about what is good must be
rejected. …….Our humanitarian action must be given independently, with a freedom to
assess, to deliver and to monitor assistance so that the most vulnerable are assisted first.
Aid must not mask the causes of suffering, and it cannot be simply an internal or foreign
policy tool that creates rather than counters human suffering. If this is the case, we must
confront the dilemma and consider abstention as the least of bad options. As MSF
(Médecin sans Frontières), we constantly call into question the limits and ambiguities
of humanitarian action – particularly when it submits in silence to the interests of states
and armed forces.
How can we tackle this unevenness in the rate of progress of different areas of
science? Two ways come to mind: one, by accelerating the rate of progress in the social
sciences; two, by slowing down the rate of advancement of the natural sciences in some
areas, for example, by the imposition of ethical codes of conduct.
Joseph ROTBLAT
We should also borrow from medicine another practice, of more recent origin:
ethical committees to review research projects. In many countries, a research project
that involves patients has to be approved by the ethical committee of the hospital, to
ensure that the investigation will not put the patient's health and welfare at a significant
risk. This practice should be extended to research work in general, but in the first
instance, perhaps, to the area of research that has a direct impact on the health of the
population, namely, genetic engineering.
Joseph ROTBLAT
I know well that what I have just said on the problem of peace brings nothing
essentially new. My profound conviction is that the solution consists in the fact that we
should reject war for an ethical reason, because it makes us guilty of the crime of
inhumanity. Erasmus of Rotterdam already, and several others after him, have proclaimed
it as the truth around which it is necessary to rally.
The only originality I claim for myself is that for me this truth is accompanied by
the certainty, born of thought, that the spirit is capable, in our epoch, of creating a new
mentality, an ethical mentality.
It is only to the extent that an ideal of peace is born among peoples that the
institutions created for maintaining that peace can fulfil their mission as we expect it and
hope from them.
Albert SCHWEITZER
The ethical spirit alone has the power to generate peace.
Albert SCHWEITZER
I have said that my ethical principles have caused me to reach the conclusion
that the evil of war should be abolished; but my conclusion that war must be abolished if
the human race is to survive is based not on ethical principles but on my thorough and
careful analysis, in relation to international affairs, of the facts about the changes that
have taken place in the world during recent years, especially with respect to the nature of
war.
Linus Carl PAULING
Western scientists face no threat of prison or labour camp for public stands; they
cannot be bribed by an offer of foreign travel to forsake such activity. But this in no way
diminishes their responsibility. Some Western intellectuals warn against social
involvement as a form of politics. But I am not speaking about a struggle for power--it is
not politics. It is a struggle to preserve peace and those ethical values which have been
developed as our civilization evolved. By their example and by. their fate, prisoners of
conscience affirm that the defence of justice, the international defence of individual
victims of violence, the defence of mankind's lasting interests are the responsibility of
every scientist
Andrei
SAKHAROV
Our ethical and social concepts have been shaped by two thousand years of
Christianity. And this means that, in spite of many aberrations under the flag of ‘the just
war’, attempts have been made over and over again to achieve peace in this world, too.
Willy BRANDT
Who can predict what other great scientific conquests and developments these
people could have achieved, if they had not been conquered in blood and fire, and
subjected to an ethnocide that affected nearly 50 million people in the course of 500
years.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Through Europe, Germany returns to itself and to the constructive forces of its
history. Our Europe, born of the experience of suffering and failure, is the imperative
mission of reason.
Willy BRANDT
In my own work for peace, I was very strongly inspired by my European

experience. I always tell this story, and I do so because it is so simple yet so profound
and so applicable to conflict resolution anywhere in the world. On my first visit to
Strasbourg in 1979 as a member of the European Parliament. I went for a walk across the
bridge from Strasbourg to Kehl. Strasbourg is in France. Kehl is in Germany. They are
very close. I stopped in the middle of the bridge and I meditated. There is Germany.
There is France. If I had stood on this bridge 30 years ago after the end of the second
world war when 25 million people lay dead across our continent for the second time in
this century and if I had said: "Don’t worry. In 30 years’ time we will all be together in a
new Europe, our conflicts and wars will be ended and we will be working together in our
common interests", I would have been sent to a psychiatrist. But it has happened and it is
now clear that European Union is the best example in the history of the world of conflict
resolution and it is the duty of everyone, particularly those who live in areas of conflict to
study how it was done and to apply its principles to their own conflict resolution.
John HUME
Let us watch out tongues. We can hurt, we can extinguish a weak flickering light
by harsh words. . .It is easy to discourage, it is far too easy, all too easy to criticize, to
complain, to rebuke. Let us try instead to be more quick to see even a small amount
of good in a person and concentrate on that. Let us be more quick to praise than to find
fault. Let us be more quick to thank others than to complain-'Thank you' and 'Please' are
small words, but they are oh, so powerful. My dear Brothers, please be gentle with God's
people.
Desmond TUTU
In this era of globalisation, there is nothing that happens in one country that does
not affect the rest of the world. The events of September 11 have affected us all
profoundly. The citizens of East Timor have been deeply moved and shocked by the
events. We gather today, together - Catholics and Muslims, and others - to pray for those
who have lost life and family, and we pray that what we learn from this experience is
used to improve the lot of mankind.
Carlos Filipe Ximenes BELO

Again that's part of every individual's responsibility on this earth to stop
that from happening. It's very difficult in areas of the Amazon because we're losing our
forests at a vast rate, but the people of that area have got to eat, so they clear forests to
eat. Something else has got to be provided for these people.
People talk all of the time about birth control, particularly in the third world
countries. That makes me very angry and I'll tell you why: You can't talk to anybody
about birth control when they're starving. The only comfort man and woman have in
those third world areas are each other.
So do talk to me about birth control, but feed my belly so's I can hear what you're
saying!
The same is absolutely applicable where our forests and atmosphere is concerned.
If we're going to tell the people of the Amazon countries to stop destroying the
rainforests, we've got to provide something else for them, so's they don't have to destroy
the rainforest. It's the wrong end of the donkey one more time. We're all yelling at the
Amazon for doing what it's doing, yet we're not putting in the economic support to stop it
happening.
Betty WILLIAMS
The fact that I have given preference to the American Continent, and in particular
to my country, does not mean that I do not have an important place in my mind and in my
heart for the concern of other people of the world and their constant struggle for the
defence of peace, of the rights to a life and all its inalienable rights. The majority of us,
who are gathered here today, constitute an example of the above, and along these lines I
would humbly extend to you my gratitude.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
You have no option but to be involved in the struggle and I call on you to be
involved in the struggle for this new South Africa. I call on you to know that it is God's
struggle. you say: But you will get into trouble. Of course! Who ever saw powerful
people give up their power without doing anything? The powerful will get angry. So
what, what is new? Tell me something else. I invite you to come into this exhilarating
enterprise, God's enterprise, to change this country, to transfigure this country, to
make this country what it is going to become, a land where all, black, white, green,
whatever, will be able to hold hands together because they are then living as those whom
God has create in his image, as brothers and sisters, as members of one family.
Desmond TUTU
Among the most bitter dramas that a great percentage of the population has to
endure, is the forced exodus. Which means, to be forced by military units and
persecution to abandon their villages, their mother earth, where their ancestors rest, their
environment, the nature that gave them life and the growth of their communities, all of
which constitute a coherent system of social organization and functional democracy.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Not to transmit an experience is to betray it.
Elie WIESEL
The expulsion of the refugees is probably the most sordid chapter in their
story. For the most part guilty of no crime other than that of lacking the money to
establish a fixed abode - and that mainly because they are not allowed to look for work
and are therefore regarded as vagrants in the eyes of the law - they are driven out of one
country like infested animals only to be thrown back again from another in which they
had perforce to seek refuge. They are arrested once more, and this time for a more
heinous crime - the violation of the expulsion order! The hard hand of the law is laid
upon them. In some countries, mercifully, the ancient principle of justice still prevails: no
one shall be required to do the impossible. But other countries hold to the relentless letter
of the law and condemn to prison those whom the neighbouring state has forcibly pushed
back across the frontier. And so the game can go on inexorably year after year, the
helpless pawns being condemned to increasingly severe prison sentences until, overcome
by despair, they choose the road to eternal peace.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
What we need is a sense of proportion, resolution and endurance. And of course

we also need to have an eye for new dimensions and the energy to cope with them.
In view of the magnitude of the tasks facing us, we require a healthy mixture of faith in
the future and sober realism.
Willy
BRANDT
As the human family we need HOPE, and this can come from the people of the
World, when they rise above their immediate feelings of pain and anger at such
inhumanity, and in a calmer atmosphere allow reason to guide their decisions. In this way
'wisdom' can find a response to this terrible atrocity which does not add to the terrible
death and destruction already perpetrated on our fellow brothers and sister in the United
States.
In this the new millennium, the human family has an opportunity to move away
from the old responses of 'an eye for an eye' and deal with their problems in a
collective and civilised manner, befitted the great goodness that lives in every human
heart.
Mairead
CORRIGAN
(On the Events of September
11th )
……………..
F
……………..
Indeed, e-mail has been used relatively little for communications outside of the
campaign, and the much remarked upon close cooperation between governments and
NGOs during the Ottawa Process was more the result of face-to-face meetings than
anything else.
Jody WILLIAMS
It is not the facts which guide the conduct of men, but their opinions about facts;
which may be entirely wrong. We can only make them right by discussion
Norman ANGELL
There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must
never be a time when we fail to protest.
Elie WIESEL
Faith and moral vision can triumph over all adversity.
Shimon PERES
So you pray for our Sisters and for me and for our Brothers, and for our Co-
Workers that are around the world. That we may remain faithful to the gift of God, to
love Him and serve Him in the poor together with you. What we have done we should not
have been able to do if you did not share with your prayers, with your gifts, this continual
giving. But I don't want you to give me from your abundance, I want that you give me
until it hurts.
Mother TERESA
While thanking you, for the Prize, thanking the many people in uniform and civil
dress in many nations, for arriving to this moment of happiness and hope, I believe that
all of us remain committed to the process. I thank my family, that stood behind me for
such a long journey, and are convinced as I am that this is the best option.
Shimon PERES
A person is entitled to a stable community life, and the first of these communities
is the family.
Desmond TUTU
I wish to thank my family that supported me all the long way that I have passed.
Yitzhak Rabin
I was born on 21 May 1921. My father was a well-known teacher of physics and
the author of text books, set exercise books and works of popular science. I grew up in a
large communal apartment where most of the rooms were occupied by my family and
relations and only a few by outsiders. The house was pervaded by a strong traditional
family spirit - a vital enthusiasm for work and respect for professional competence.
Within the family we provided one another with mutual support, just as we shared a love
of literature and science. My father played the piano remarkably well, in particular
Chopin, Grieg, Beethoven and Scriabin. During the civil war he earned a living by
playing the accompaniment to silent films at the cinema.
….The influence of my home has meant a great deal to me, particularly because I
had my first lessons at home and later experienced the greatest difficulty in adapting
myself to my classmates. I took my final school examination with distinction in 1938 and
at once began to study at the Faculty of Physics in Moscow University. Here too I passed
my Finals with distinction, in 1942 when because of the war, we had been evacuated to
Ashkhabad.
Andrei SAKHAROV
We have a few fanatics who dream of forcing the Ulster British people into a
Utopian Irish state, more ideologically Irish than its own inhabitants actually want. We
also have fanatics who dream of permanently suppressing northern nationalists in a
state more supposedly British than its inhabitants actually want.
David TRIMBLE
I am now in my 56 th year of continuous involvement in agricultural research and

production in the low-income, food-deficit developing countries. I have worked with
many colleagues, political leaders, and farmers to transform food production systems.
Despite the successes of the Green Revolution, the battle to ensure food security for
hundreds of millions of miserably poor people is far from won.
Norman E. BORLAUG
………………
A child is born in an utterly undemocratic way. He cannot choose his father and
mother. He cannot pick his sex or colour, his religion, nationality or homeland. Whether
he is born in a manor or a manger, whether he lives under a despotic or democratic
regime is not his choice. From the moment he comes, close-fisted, into the world, his
fate -- to a large extent -- is decided by his nation's leaders. It is they who will decide
whether he lives in comfort or in despair, in security or in fear. His fate is given to us to
resolve -- to the governments of countries, democratic or otherwise.
Yitzhak Rabin
The most important one I believe was my father. I just lost my father in April.
I'm still trying to deal with that grief because I loved him a lot. He made the statement
once, "Betty, why did you do this-Northern Ireland has a problem for every solution." I
was cracking up laughing at him, but he was so right. But I never believed that things are
impossible.
Betty WILLIAMS
What yesterday meant to me was that it demonstrated to the whole world that
Germany has come to terms with itself, just like the German in exile was able to
rediscover the peaceful and human features of his fatherland….
Willy BRANDT
Within a system which denies the existence of basic human rights, fear tends to be
the order of the day. Fear of imprisonment, fear of torture, fear of death, fear of losing
friends, family, property or means of livelihood, fear of poverty, fear of isolation, fear
of failure. A most insidious form of fear is that which masquerades as common sense or
even wisdom, condemning as foolish, reckless, insignificant or futile the small, daily acts
of courage which help to preserve man's self-respect and inherent human dignity. It is not
easy for a people conditioned by fear under the iron rule of the principle that might is
right to free themselves from the enervating miasma of fear. Yet even under the most
crushing state machinery courage rises up again and again, for fear is not the natural state
of civilized man.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
As the pace of technological change has accelerated the past 50 years, the fear of
science has grown. Certainly, the breaking of the atom and the prospects of a nuclear
holocaust added to people’s fear, and drove a bigger wedge between the scientist and the
layman. Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring, published in 1962, which reported that
poisons were everywhere, also struck a very sensitive nerve. Of course, this perception
was not totally unfounded. By the mid 20th century, air and water quality had been
seriously damaged through wasteful industrial production systems that pushed effluents
often literally into “our own backyards.”
Norman E. BORLAUG
Special 30 th Anniversary Lecture, The Norwegian Nobel Institute, Oslo
September 8, 2000
A dark and terrible side of this sense of community of interests is the fear of a
horrible common destiny which in these days of atomic weapons darkens men’s minds all
around the globe. Men have a sense of being subject to the same fate, of being all in the
same boat. But fear is a poor motive to which to appeal, and I am sure that ‘peace
people’ are on the wrong path when they expatiate on the horrors of a new world war.
Fear weakens the nerves and distorts the judgment. It is not by fear that mankind must
exorcise the demon of destruction and cruelty, but by motives more reasonable, more
humane, and more heroic.
Emily Greene BALCH
It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who
wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it. Most
Burmese are familiar with the four a-gati, the four kinds of corruption. Chanda-gati,
corruption induced by desire, is deviation from the right path in pursuit of bribes or for
the sake of those one loves. Dosa-gati is taking the wrong path to spite those against
whom one bears ill will, and moga-gati is aberration due to ignorance. But perhaps the
worst of the four is bhaya-gati, for not only does bhaya, fear, stifle and slowly destroy
all sense of right and wrong, it so often lies at the root of the other three kinds of
corruption. Just as chanda-gati, when not the result of sheer avarice, can be caused by
fear of want or fear of losing the goodwill of those one loves, so fear of being surpassed,
humiliated or injured in some way can provide the impetus for ill will. And it would be
difficult to dispel ignorance unless there is freedom to pursue the truth unfettered by fear.
With so close a relationship between fear and corruption it is little wonder that in any
society where fear is rife corruption in all forms becomes deeply entrenched.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
Let it, however, be declared and known, stressed, and noted that fighters for
freedom hate war…. This is our common maxim and belief – that if through your
efforts and sacrifices you win liberty and with it the prospect of peace, then work for
peace because there is no mission in life more sacred.
Menachem BEGIN
The International Committee wishes to state publicly that the results it achieved
measured up to all its hopes; but it also realizes that what has been given it to do was, in
the final analysis, of little significance when compared to the sum total of suffering it
encountered in the course of its work. It strove to alleviate what misery it could; it tried to
raise its flag above the ruins of the world to show that human hope should never
falter.

Rouge
A Middle East of competition, not of domination. A Middle East in which men

are each other's hosts, not hostages. …
A Middle East that is not a killing field, but a field of creativity and growth. …
A Middle East which will serve as a spiritual and cultural focal point for the
entire world.
Shimon PERES
Standing here today, I wish to salute our loved ones -- and past foes. I wish to
salute all of them -- the fallen of all the countries in all the wars; the members of their
families who bear the enduring burden of bereavement; the disabled whose scars will
never heal. Tonight, I wish to pay tribute to each and every one of them, for this
important prize is theirs.
Yitzhak Rabin
Synagogues are still being desecrated. Gypsies are still discriminated. Indigenous
peoples continue to see their ancestral land taken over by developers, their culture and
beliefs, and their very existence reduced to a tourist commodity.
Like the Jews and Armenians in the past, like the Kurdish, Gypsies, Tibetans,
Aborigines of Australia, Maoris of Aotearoa (New Zealand), Kanakis of New Caledonia,
the people of Western Sahara, and the Indigenous peoples of the Americas, the East
Timorese are a mere footnote of history, an expendable people.
For the sake of all this, for the sake of protecting the lives of all our sons and
brothers:
For our societies to produce in security and confidence:
For the development of man, his well-being and his right to share in an
honourable life:
For our responsibility toward the coming generations:
For the smile of every child born on our land.
In accordance with the resolution of the League of Nations, the Nansen Office is
closing its door, literally, on December 31. It will take down the nameplate, it will change
the name, and it will move, but it will not die. It will merge with the League's other
refugee organization to form a larger unit. Its work will be continued and, it is to be
hoped, further extended. For political reasons and in spite of all our efforts to the
contrary, Nansen's name is to be relinquished, but it will obviously live on just the same;
it will always be associated with the work for refugees, it will continue to be blessed in
millions of homes all over the world. There was a time when the Nansen Office was
compared to a sinking ship hardly worth the effort of saving. Thanks to the energetic
support of both the Norwegian and many other governments, and also to the good and
powerful influence of public opinion and the press in a number of countries, the ship has
been brought safely into harbour, with Nansen's flag flying proudly from the mainmast.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
It is because I believe that it is in the power of such nations to lead the world back
into the paths of peace that I propose to devote myself to explaining what, in my opinion,
can and should be done to banish the fear of war that hangs so heavily over the world.
That is not an easy task. But we have set our hand to that task of organizing peace already
in subscribing to the Covenant of the League, and although its attainment is difficult, it is
not impossible. The forces that are driving mankind toward unity and peace are deep-
seated and powerful. They are material and natural, as well as moral and intellectual. We
have realism, common sense and the instinct of self-preservation on our side as well as
the noblest ideals and the loftiest aspirations. Therefore, let us not despair, but instead,
survey the position, consider carefully the action we must take, and then address
ourselves to our common task in a mood of sober resolution and quiet confidence,
without haste and without pause.
Arthur HENDERSON
But there is one doubt about the future of the League which may give pause even
to the most hopeful of observers. It is this: Will its institutions be given a real chance to
build up their strength before the catastrophe of a new world war sweeps them all away?
Will the forces of international cooperation and of mutual confidence
which the League is bringing into life be strong enough to hold in check the forces of
militarism, hatred, suspicion, and revenge?
Philip J. NOEL
-BAKER
And yet it is surely human to forget, even to want to forget. The Ancients saw
it as a divine gift. Indeed the memory helps us to survive, forgetting allows us to go on
living. How could we go on with our daily lives, if we remained constantly aware of the
dangers and ghost surrounding us? The Talmud tells us that without the ability to forget,
man would soon cease to learn. Without the ability to forget, man would live in a
permanent, paralysing fear of death. Only God and God alone can and must remember
everything.
Elie WIESEL
For us, forgetting was never an option.
Elie WIESEL
It is by forgiving that one is forgiven.

Mother Teresa
Let me say immediately that the extraordinary distinction that the Nobel
Committee has given Médecins Sans Frontières is one that we accept with sincere
gratitude. But also a profound discomfort in knowing that the dignity of the excluded is
assaulted daily. These are the forgotten populations in danger, like the street children
who struggle each grinding hour to live off the waste of those who are «included» in the
social and economic order. These too are the illegal refugees that we work with in
Europe, denied political status, and afraid to seek health care, lest this contact leads to
their expulsion.
Foresight has been a distinguishing characteristic of all truly great political,
religious, and social betterment leaders. Theodore Roosevelt had the one motto hanging
on his office wall which truly illustrated his life practice: "Nine tenths of wisdom is being
wise in time." You will recall that it was said of Cecil Rhodes, the great African
administrators6, that he was always planning what he would do year after next.
John Raleigh MOTT
The form of work for peace which has most obviously made history is the
long continued effort to create some form of world organization which should both
prevent wars and foster international cooperation.
Emily Greene BALCH
You don't choose your family. They are God's gift to you, as you are to them.
Perhaps if we could, we might have chosen different brothers and sisters. Fortunately
or unfortunately we can't. We have them as they have us. And no matter how your
brother may be, you can't renounce him. He may be a murderer or worse, but he remains
forever your brother.
Desmond TUTU
Let us also turn to the founders of the noble International of Intellect, the
scholars, philosophers, professors, and educators - the heirs of these proud martyrs of
independent thinking who once laid the foundations of modern knowledge... The Church
of Jesus Christ unanimously asserts that, though the methods may vary with the degree of
certainty in arriving at valid conclusions, a single spirit must still rule the realm of
knowledge - the spirit of humble acceptance of established facts and of loyal devotion to
truth, which alone enlightens and liberates.
Let us now turn to the International of Labour, organized in behalf of the
nameless workers who once included Jesus the carpenter... May they cease confusing the
eternal Gospel with the church which today strives, as did John the Baptist, to be only "a
voice", a voice testifying to the Saviour.
Let us turn League of Nations, this prodigious institution embodying only new
concept that has emerged from World War. It is still weak like the Infant in Bethlehem's
manger and Him threatened by Herod's assassins. But, Messiah, destined unfold banner
which will gather together all peoples earth, regardless race, colour, and religion...
Finally, let us turn to the governments. Without entering the political arena, the
Christian Church must assert itself as the indomitable prophet and interpreter here on
earth of the moral Law, which is imposed on national communities just as it is on
individual consciences...
Nathan SODERLOM
I also believe that this framework for peace will succeed if we can now establish
the frame of mind, to which I referred, which is necessary for peace - the frame of mind
which leads people to resolve differences through negotiation, compromise and
agreements, instead of through compulsion and violence.
I believe that such a frame of mind already exists in South Africa at the
moment, however fragile it might be. All our leaders, including Mr Mandela and I, will
have to lead by example in an effort to consolidate this frame of mind. We will need great
wisdom to counteract the strategies of minority elements, threatening with civil conflict.
We will have to be firm and resolute in defending the framework for peace which we
agreed upon.
MSF (Médecin sans Frontières) objects to the principle of military

intervention which do not stipulate clear frameworks of responsibility and
transparency. MSF does not want military forces to show that they can put up refugee
tents faster than NGOs. Armies should be at the service of governments and policies
which seek to protect the rights of victims.
The framework of law has only a limited value in itself since it must be fitted
with inner moral convictions for it to be effective. To create and foster such a state of
Christian brotherly love, self-discipline, and justice constitute the main duty of the church
in this field.
Nathan SODERLOM
Developed and developing nations alike suffer as a result of policies removed

from a framework of values which uphold minimum standards of justice and
tolerance. The rapidity with which the old Soviet Union splintered into new states, many
of them stamped with a fierce racial assertiveness, illustrates that decades of authoritarian
rule may have achieved uniformity and obedience but could not achieve long-term
harmony or stability. Nor did the material benefits enjoyed under the relatively successful
post-totalitarian states of Yugoslavia succeed in dissipating the psychological impress of
brooding historical experiences which have now led to some of the worst religious and
ethnic violence the Balkans has ever witnessed.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
"Fraternity among nations" is placed first. It sets forth the great goal itself. The
other points cover some of the prerequisites and methods of attaining this end, expressed
in the light of the striving and longing which prevailed at the time the testament was
drawn up. The formulation itself mirrors a particular epoch in history. Fraternity among
nations, however, touches the deepest desire of human nature. It has stood as an ideal for
some of the most highly developed minds for a millennium; yet in spite of all the
progress of civilization, nobody can step forward today and claim with any certainty that
this goal will be reached in the near future. However unnoticed before, the clefts and
gulfs lying between nations were fully exposed and deepened even further by the World
War. And the courageous work of bridging these gaps across the broken world has
scarcely been begun.
Karl Hjalmar BRANTING
By its action throughout this war has held aloft the fundamental conceptions of
the solidarity of the human race, and the identity of the vital interests of different nations
and of the need for true understanding and reconciliation, if peace is ever to be brought
about fraternity among nations.
Philip NOEL-BAKER
We shall be free, all of us, black and white. Let us sit down together, black and
white. I have said before and say again the minimum conditions for starting negotiations:
lift the state of emergency; release detainees and political prisoners and allow exiles to
return freely; unban political organizations; and then talk to those whom the people
identify as their representatives and leaders. We shall be free only together, black and
white. We shall survive only together, black and white. We can be human only together,
black and white.
Desmond TUTU
The Negro needs the white man to free him from his fears. The white man needs
the Negro to free him from his guilt.
Martin Luther KING
No doubt in the hands of an able man it may possibly be more efficient than a
democratic form of administration. But in the end, I am confident that a free
government is best for free people. The old phrase, "Government of the people, by
the people, for the people", represents a true ideal. It is best for the people as a whole. It
is even more clearly the best for the development of the individual man and woman. And
since in the end, the character and the prosperity of the nation depend on the character of
the individuals that compose it, the form of government which best promotes individual
development is the best for the people as a whole.
But the topic is building a free media and democracy in East Timor.
Let me start by saying that when I launched, inaugurated, a journalists association,
I said my policy is very basic: Let 1,000 newspapers blossom and bust. I don't care, set
up whatever newspapers you want, and television.
But I told the journalists, let me tell you one thing. One thing I love about the
American system is that if you tell lies, I'll sue you. I told the journalists, I'm saying it
because your training has to do also with integrity, ethics, facts.
José RAMOS-HORTA
The free trade movement in the middle of the last century represents the first
conscious recognition of these new circumstances and of the necessity to adapt to them.
Some years before the war, Norman Angell coined the word "interdependence" to denote
the situation that stamps the economic and spiritual culture of our time, and laid down a
program for internationalism on the political level.
Inherent in the very idea of politics is the notion that it must always "come after".
Its task is to find external organizational forms for what has already been developed as a
living reality in the economic, technical, and intellectual fields. In his telegram to the
Nobel Committee recently, Hjalmar Branting formulated the task of internationalism in
exactly the right words when he described it as "working toward a higher form of
development for world civilization".
Let there be freedom for the Indians, wherever they may be in the American
Continent or else in the world, because while they are alive, a glow of hope will be alive
as well as the real concept of life.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
The instinct for personal and national freedom cannot be destroyed, and the
attempt to do so by totalitarian and despotic governments will ultimately make not only
for internal trouble but for international conflict.
Lester B. PEARSON
People of different religions and cultures live side by side in almost every part of
the world, and most of us have overlapping identities which unite us with very different
groups. We can love what we are, without hating what - and who -- we are not. We can
thrive in our own tradition, even as we learn from others, and come to respect their
teachings.
This will not be possible, however, without freedom of religion, of expression,
of assembly, and basic equality under the law. Indeed, the lesson of the past century has
been that where the dignity of the individual has been trampled or threatened - where
citizens have not enjoyed the basic right to choose their government, or the right to
change it regularly - conflict has too often followed, with innocent civilians paying the
price, in lives cut short and communities destroyed.
Kofi ANNAN
We have sometimes given our white brothers the feeling that we liked the way we
were being treated. But we come here tonight to be saved from that patience that makes
us patient with anything less than freedom and Justice.
Martin Luther KING
The country received freedom, was liberated politically and spiritually, and
that's the most important achievement.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
The principles of the French Revolution would have forced their way into the
consciousness of nations more surely and more quickly during peace and prosperity than
they could ever have done in an atmosphere of hatred and defiance which encouraged
excesses of unwarranted violence.
Élie DUCOMMUN
I have seen the friendship of Irish and British people transcend, even in times
of misunderstanding and tensions, all narrower political differences. We are two
neighbouring islands whose destiny is to live in friendship and amity with each other.
We are friends and the achievement of peace will further strengthen that friendship
and, together, allow us to build on the countless ties that unite us in so many ways.
John HUME
Occasionally in life there are those moments of unutterable fulfilment which

cannot be completely explained by those symbols called words. Their meaning can only
be articulated by the inaudible language of the heart. Such is the moment I am presently
experiencing. I experience this high and joyous moment not for myself alone but for
those devotees of non-violence who have moved so courageously against the ramparts of
racial injustice and who in the process have acquired a new estimate of their own human
worth. Many of them are young and cultured. Others are middle aged and middle class.
The majority are poor and untutored. But they are all united in the quiet conviction that it
is better to suffer in dignity than to accept segregation in humiliation. These are the real
heroes of the freedom struggle: they are the noble people for whom I accept the Nobel
Peace Prize.
Martin Luther KING

Jr.
Yet, that there is this fundamental contradistinction in the way in which
force is used, public opinion as a whole certainly does not realize. Thirty years of
discussion of the matter has, I think, made me fairly familiar with the trend of the public
mind therein. Only the other day a young man, a graduate of one of our older universities,
thinking, I imagine, to put me in some logical dilemma, asked me whether I would take a
stick if a burglar entered my house. And he invited me to consider the political
significance of the fact that in old-fashioned bedsteads there was a place in which the
householder kept a gun wherewith to greet the robber. I replied, of course, that I would
take a stick to the burglar, and that I had considered the significance of the sixteenth
century firearm, which I thought was this: That in the days when every householder had
firearms as a matter of course, when the security of each household depended mainly
upon its own powers of defence, highwaymen and bandits were very much more common
than they are now when not one house in a thousand has any firearm at all. Plainly,
therefore, the relatively greater security of today is not due to the improvement of
household firearms because they do not exist. The improvement is due to the
development of the collective method of defence within the state.
Norman ANGELL
We, you and I, are privileged to be alive during this extraordinary age, this unique
epoch in the history of the world, the epoch of demarcation between the past millennia of
war and suffering, and the future, the great future of peace, justice, morality, and
human well-being
Linus Carl PAULING
The world has passed through a long night of tribulation and suffering, millions of
our fellow creatures have been sacrificed to the demon of war; their blood has saturated
every plain and dyed every ocean.
But courage, friends, courage ! The darkness is ending, a new day is dawning, and
the future is ours.
William Randal
CREMER
It is erroneous to believe that the future will of necessity continue the trends of
the past and the present. The past and present move away from us in the stream of time
like the passing landscape of the riverbanks, as the vessel carrying mankind is borne
inexorably by the current toward new shores.
That the future will always be one degree better than what is past and discarded
is the conviction of those who understand the laws of evolution and try to assist their
action. Only through the understanding and deliberate application of natural laws and
forces, in the material domain as well as in the moral, will the technical devices and the
social institutions be created which will make our lives easier, richer, and more noble.
These things are called ideals as long as they exist in the realm of ideas; they stand as
achievements of progress as soon as they are transformed into visible, living, and
effective forms.
Bertha von SUTTNER
No future, however, can be built on despair, distrust, hatred, and envy.
Fridtjof NANSEN
Endlessly our people gathered their strength to face another day and they never
stopped encouraging their leaders to find the courage to resolve this situation so that our
children could look to the future with a smile of hope. This is indeed their prize and
I am convinced that they understand it in that sense and would take strong encouragement
from today’s significance and it will powerfully strengthen our peace process.
John HUME
Looking back over the development of the concept of law and justice in
international affairs during the forty years of the Institute's existence, we have every
reason to be satisfied and to view the future with confidence.
Does this mean that we have had no disappointments?
Disappointments, yes, but no failures!
Our disappointments have sometimes been bitter ones indeed. And those to whom
any effort to establish a legal basis for international relations is but an object for scorn,
have never allowed us to forget them. Who has not heard remarks like this: Rulings of
international law have little value since they are broken like spider webs at the first
contact with conflicting interests? Even today, many still hold the view expressed by
Frederick the Great: "Treaties are like filigree, very pretty to look at but of little practical
use."
Institute of International Law
Among the qualities most needed among those who aspire to true leadership in the
fostering of peace and goodwill among the nations and in overcoming racial and religious
antagonism is the cooperative spirit and objective. Elihu Root who ever illustrated this
trait, emphasized the fact that you can measure the future greatness and influence
of a nation by its ability to cooperate with other nations.
John Raleigh MOTT
………………
G
……………..
My study of Gandhi convinced me that true pacifism is not non-resistance to

evil, but non-violent resistance to evil. Between the two positions, there is a world of
difference. Gandhi resisted evil with as much vigour and power as the violent resister, but
True pacifism is not unrealistic submission to evil power. It is rather a courageous
confrontation of evil by the power of love...
Martin Luther
KING
Gandhi was probably the first person in history to lift the love ethic of Jesus
above mere interaction between individuals to a powerful and effective social force...
Martin Luther
KING
Gandhi, that great apostle of non-violence, and Aung San, the founder of a
national army, were very different personalities, but as there is an inevitable sameness
about the challenges of authoritarian rule anywhere at any time, so there is a similarity in
the intrinsic qualities of those who rise up to meet the challenge. Nehru, who considered
the instillation of courage in the people of India one of Gandhi's greatest achievements,
was a political modernist, but as he assessed the needs for a twentieth-century movement
for independence, he found himself looking back to the philosophy of ancient India: 'The
greatest gift for an individual or a nation . .. was abhaya, fearlessness, not merely bodily
courage but absence of fear from the mind.'
AUNG SAN Suu
Kyi
The non-violent resisters can summarize their message in the following simple
terms: we will take direct action against injustice despite the failure of governmental and
other official agencies to act first. We will not obey unjust laws or submit to unjust
practices. We will do this peacefully, openly, cheerfully because our aim is to persuade.
We adopt the means of non-violence because our end is a community at peace with itself.
We will try to persuade with our words, but if our words fail, we will try to persuade with
our acts. We will always be willing to talk and seek fair compromise, but we are ready to
suffer when necessary and even risk our lives to become witnesses to truth as we see it.
This approach to the problem of racial injustice is not at all without successful
precedent. It was used in a magnificent way by Mohandas K. Gandhi to challenge the
might of the British Empire and free his people from the political domination and
economic exploitation inflicted upon them for centuries. He struggled only with the
weapons of truth, soul force, non-injury, and courage.
Martin Luther KING

Jr.
At a recent meeting of scientists with politicians and policy makers, convened to

explore ways of accelerating progress through the application of science to everyday
needs, a Christian minister from an African country brought the great men back to a
tragic and stark reality. "I come from a country", he said, "in which, while it is of great
interest and importance to talk about nuclear fission, solar energy, and all of these things,
it is of even greater interest to know how to save our babies... We cannot believe that
nature, God, call it what you like, loves children of other countries more than African
children. Is typhoid caused by drinking dirty water or by someone who has bewitched
you? Are babies dying because they are not fed properly or because your enemy put
sickness into them? Men of science, men of goodwill," he implored, "help the African
people to develop and understand." This simple, moving appeal is some indication of the
immense chasm that must be traversed before the gap of centuries, in terms of
civilization, can be successfully navigated. UNICEF is immensely challenged.
(UNICEF)
Garibaldi, who was the most sublime personification of Latin genius and
military valour of our day, won the battle of the Volturno at the end of September, 1860,
and on the following day, in his capacity as dictator of southern Italy, sent a message to
the powers of Europe, exhorting them to put an end to wars and armaments by uniting in
a European confederation.
With the same hand that had but a little earlier wielded the sword of liberation, he
wrote: "In waging war, we differ little from primitive men who killed one another to
snatch each other's prey. We spend our lives (today as then) continually threatening one
another while in Europe the large majority, not only of great minds but of all sensible
men, understand perfectly that we could easily go through life without this perpetual
menace and mutual hostility and without the necessity which seems to have been fatally
imposed on nations by some secret and invisible enemy of mankind of slaughtering each
other with such science and refinement."
……..
and this only a few years after Garibaldi had attended the first Congress for
Peace and Liberty in Geneva, which he opened with these words: "All nations are sisters
and war between them is therefore inconceivable. Italians as citizens of other countries,
men of other countries as citizens of Italy - that is the goal we should reach..."
………
On the contrary, because Garibaldi, having become universally known and
admired, said himself on several occasions that he had always drawn inspiration "from
the great qualities and magnanimous deeds of the Roman people", there arose in Italy a
generation of patriots who, dreaming of an impossible return of Roman splendour, would
have liked to make modern Italy a military power of the first rank rather than a nation
outstanding for its great freedom and advancement.
Ernesto Teodoro MONETA
In the final analysis, the rich must not ignore the poor because both rich and poor
are tied in a single garment of destiny. All life is interrelated, and all men are
interdependent. The agony of the poor diminishes the rich, and the salvation of the poor
enlarges the rich.
Martin Luther KING
Between progress made at an international level and the national situation still
present in many countries, especially in Latin America, there is a great gap which is
characterized by constant violation, non-acknowledgement and a lack of respect for our
rights.
If we take up the gauntlet of peace and justice and we take it up with a

mighty heart - there is nothing we cannot do. For those that say that non-violence will
not work, may I remind you that a government was brought down in Poland without a
shot being fired. May I remind you that we saw the Berlin Wall crumble without one shot
being fired although many people died on the way to getting that barrier dissolved. And if
we look at our brothers and sisters in the African Nations we must give every backing to
them to build something new on the Horn of Africa.
Betty WILLIAMS
Honest people, mistakenly believing in the justice of their cause, are led to
support injustice. To meet this tendency there should be not merely definite standards of
law to be applied to international relations, but there should be general public
understanding of what those standards are. Of course it is not possible that all the
people of any country can become familiar with international law, but there may be such
knowledge and leadership of opinion in every country on the part of the most intelligent
and best educated men that in every community mistaken conceptions can be corrected
and a true view of rights and obligations inculcated. To attain this end much has been
done and much is in contemplation. Societies of international law have been formed in
many countries for the discussion of international questions and the publication and
distribution of the results. Many journals of international law have been established and
are rapidly increasing their circulation and influence. More and more colleges and
universities are establishing chairs and giving instruction in international law to their
students. A further step is about to be taken at The Hague by the establishment there of an
international school of international law to which scholars from all over the civilized
world will come and in which the great masters of the science have undertaken to give
instruction.
Elihu ROOT
Today, in the capital of your country, I am happy to be allowed to express my

thanks for the honour which you have shown us. With my thanks I link the hope that the
ideals on which this honour is based may become the common property of dissenting
nations. That great German who perhaps more than any other extended his influence
beyond his own national boundaries said of his own times: "We belong to a generation
struggling out of the darkness into the light." (From Goethe ) May his words be true of
our own times.
Gustav STRESEMANN
Our generation has lived through not only a world catastrophe, but also
through a violent inner revolution. People with unshakable faith in progress, believing
that the world was on the road to Paradise, suddenly found themselves plunged into the
darkest hell of hatred and duplicity. Filled with anguish, we asked ourselves whether the
church, which had been called the Prince of Peace, had fulfilled its duty. Had we not sung
on every Sunday "Glory be to God on high, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men"?
Had we not pronounced on every Christmas Day "The boot and the bloodstained cloak
worn by the soldier in battle shall be burnt and destroyed by fire... Eternal peace must be
secured and sustained by law and justice"?
Nathan SODERLOM
It also represents a sign of the growing international interest for, and
understanding of the original Rights of the People, of the future of more than 60 million
Indians that live in our America, and their uproar because of the 500 years of oppression
that they have endured. For the genocides beyond comparison that they have had to
suffer all this time, and from which other countries and the elite of the Americas have
profited and taken advantage.
I say here what I say in Germany: A good German cannot be a nationalist. A

good German knows that he cannot refuse a European calling.
Willy BRANDT
Here in particular I owe a word of deep respect to those men and women who
joined the resistance against Hitler. I greet former members of the resistance movement
in all countries. The German resistance fought and made sacrifices for decency,
lawfulness and freedom. It preserved that Germany which I regard as my own and which
has again fully become my country after the re-establishment of law and freedom.
Willy BRANDT
Germany is often reproached with the fact that hundreds of thousands assemble
in organizations which keep alive the memory of the war, the spirit of military life at the
front, and the like. But I would like to put a question to everyone: Psychologically, could
it be otherwise? I was not at the front during the war; but if I had been, it would have
been for me the greatest and most moving experience of my life. The devotion of the
individual ego to the idea of the state, the risking of one's life, the straining of all one's
powers - is there any country in the world where those who have shared such experiences
do not talk about them with one another? We have no waters of Lethe which can wash
away man's memories or erase the pictures engraved in the mind's eye.
Gustav STRESEMANN
In the new Germany, the working class, regardless of the type of political
representation they were subject to, has been won over to empire and state. In spite of the
criticism which has so often been directed at the allegedly predominating influence of
this class, I want to stress that the resulting fusion of the whole nation with the state is to
be valued more highly than the one-sidedness or insufficiency of the legislation that
brought this about is to be disparaged. Today a whole nation shares responsibility for the
state and its future. In cities and communities throughout the country absolute opposition
and negativism have been stopped. In previous centuries the king could truthfully say that
he was the first servant of the state. But today all members of society are servants of the
state.
Gustav STRESEMANN
I must begin by saying something about the old Germany. That Germany, too,
suffered from superficial judgment, because appearances and reality were not always kept
apart in people's minds. True, it still preserved the spirit of paternalism imparted to it by
Frederick William I1 , but it was a paternalism administered with an iron loyalty and
sense of duty to the state and the people. It had officialdom disparaged in other countries
as a bureaucracy that knew only one ideal: service to the state. This old Germany was
partly defeated in its conflict with the progressive ideas of socialism, for it had given the
people nothing that could serve as a successful alternative to socialism. It was, however,
a land of social and political progress far less given to the philosophy of laissez-faire than
some other countries with other forms of government. It was a land of barracks, a land of
universal military conscription, and a land of strong sympathy for the military; but it was
also a land of technology, of chemistry, and in general of the most up-to-date research.
The old and the new struggled for control. Whoever writes its history must not merely
look at the surface of things but rather look into its depths.
This was the country in which most of us who today occupy responsible positions
in Germany spent the greater part of our lives. Just as the child is father to the man, so the
impressions of one's youth remain the most vivid in manhood. Just as a child respects his
father even when he perceives his weaknesses and faults, so a German will not despise
the old Germany which was once a symbol of greatness to him. The idea in the British
saying, "England, with all thy faults, I love thee still", applies also to all that was
creditable and worthy in the old Germany. Just as the British subject loves England
despite her faults, so we must insist that all Germans who were part of the old Germany
and helped shape her, recognize the greatness and worthiness of present-day Germany.
Gustav STRESEMANN
So when we discuss Germany's state of mind, let us not be unjust. All the
speeches by French statesmen declare that France stands for peace and that she sees
peace as the great ideal of all mankind. And yet this France has her Arc de Triomphe and
so honours the memory of Napoleon I in a magnificent monument. Why then do people
object when we lay wreaths at the monument of Frederick the Great and when we honour
the patriotism which has defended house and home, wife and child, on the blood-soaked
German soil which, more than any other, has been trampled by war? In every country the
memory of the defeats of her would-be conquerors lives on Here in Norway people sing
of the death of the powerful man who sought to destroy the independence of their land. In
every man the memory of the struggles and the heroes of the past is alive. But these
memories are not incompatible with the desire for peace in the future. Just as a person
appreciates peace and relaxation the more after a life of action and strife, so the calm of
the sea is truly appreciated only after a storm. We do not want to deceive ourselves by
thinking that the world is a paradise. What we do want is the firm hope that the future
bring a new era, built on those ideals which have sprung from the blood of battle. Where
should this aspiration be stronger than in Europe, and where else in Europe than in those
countries which suffered most from the war?
Gustav STRESEMANN
In September, Germany was admitted to the League of Nations. On that occasion

Mr. Briand said in a speech, which was heard in all parts of the world, that the era of
cannons and machine guns must end. He uttered words which should endure for the rest
of this century, declaring that the two great nations, the German and the French, had
won so many laurels from each other on the battlefields of war that the future should see
them contending only for the great idealistic goals of mankind.
Gustav STRESEMANN
The germs of conflict are contained in any new structure following a war
which does not take account of historical facts and which does not tend to a just and
objective solution of the problem in the light of these facts. Only such a solution can have
any lasting guarantee.
Albert SCHWEITZER
Permit me to say that I am deeply moved.

I wish to thank each and every one of you, who have come here today to take a
stand against violence and for peace. This government, which I am privileged to head,
together with my friend Shimon Peres, decided to give peace a chance -- a peace that
will solve most of Israel's problems.
I was a military man for 27 years. I fought as long as there was no chance for
peace. I believe that there is now a chance for peace, a great chance. We must take
advantage of it for the sake of those standing here, and for those who are not here -- and
they are many.
I have always believed that the majority of the people want peace and are ready to
take risks for peace. In coming here today, you demonstrate, together with many others
who did not come, that the people truly desire peace and oppose violence.
Yitzhak RABIN (Last Speech)
The new era of glasnost and free speech brought people's concerns out into the
open. Protests led to the emergence of a grass-roots environmental movement, which
made us review a number of decisions taken previously-not just on constructing new
nuclear power plants but also on other projects that threatened the environment. In the
late 1980s, the reformist government agreed to close hundreds of industrial facilities,
despite the impact on the economy.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
The conflicts shaping up as our century nears its close will be over the content of
civilization, not over territory. Jewish culture has lived over many centuries; now it has
taken root again in its own soil. For the first time in our history, some five million people
speak Hebrew as their native language. That is both a lot and a little: a lot, because there
have never been so many Hebrew-speaking people; but a little, because a culture based
on five million people can hardly withstand the pervasive, corrosive effect of the global
television culture.
Shimon PERES
We must do everything we can to be worthy of our time, to prove that we are a
mature society, able to assess our situation and act wisely and responsibly in the interests
of the present and future generations.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
Let us thank God for the opportunity that we all have together today, for this gift
of peace that reminds us that we have been created to live that peace, and Jesus became
man to bring that good news to the poor. He being God became man in all things like us
except sin, and he proclaimed very clearly that he had come to give the good news. The
news was peace to all of good will and this is something that we all want – the peace of
heart.
Mother TERESA
The global economy must be open to all people if it is to endure
KIM Dae Jung
Today, we are truly a global family. What happens in one part of the world
may affect us. This, of course, is not only true of the negative things that happen, but is
equally valid for the positive developments. We not only know what happens elsewhere,
thanks to the extraordinary modern communications technology. We are also directly
affected by events that occur far away. We feel a sense of sadness when children are
starving in Eastern Africa. Similarly, we feel a sense of joy when a family is reunited
after decades of separation by the Berlin Wall. Our crops and livestock are contaminated
and our health and livelihood threatened when a nuclear accident happens miles away in
another country. Our own security is enhanced when peace breaks out between warring
parties in other continents.

Lama
Because there is global insecurity, nations are engaged in a mad arms race,
spending billions of dollars wastefully on instruments of destruction, when millions are
starving. And yet, just a fraction of what is expended so obscenely on defence budgets
would make the difference in enabling God's children to fill their stomachs, be educated
and given the chance to lead fulfilled and happy lives. We have the capacity to feed
ourselves several times over but we are daily haunted by the spectacle of the gaunt dregs
of humanity shuffling along in endless queues, with bowls to collect what the charity of
the world has provided, too little too late. When will we learn, when will the people of
the world get up and say, enough is enough? God created us for fellowship. God created
us so that we should form the human family, existing together because we were made for
one another. We are not made for an exclusive self-sufficiency but for interdependence,
and we break that law of our being at our peril. When will we learn that an escalating
arms race merely escalates global insecurity? We are now much closer to a nuclear
holocaust than when our technology and our spending were less.
Desmond TUTU
The world has moved beyond this dismal attempt to deal with the global
landmine problem, and it is beyond time for the recalcitrant governments to realize
that.
Jody WILLIAMS
Unfortunately, that is only a relative handful of countries. The rest of the

developing world, and especially the least developed countries, is almost entirely missing
out -- in spite of the fact that many of them have put in place highly welcoming
regulatory frameworks for foreign investment, and are making extra efforts to attract it.
If they have not succeeded, it is often because they lack the necessary
infrastructure, or because their market is too small and too isolated to be of interest.
Local markets have to compete in the global market, and it is unforgiving.
Here, too, international companies could help change this, by working together,
and working with governments, to reduce the risks and costs of doing business in the
least developed countries, and to disseminate information about the investment
opportunities there.
Kofi ANNAN
……………..
In the world of today, Europe, like the rest of the West, is confronted with the
urgent necessity of a new orientation – a global orientation…
Ralph J. BUNCHE
Thus, in evaluating my essay of 1968 you must understand this and take into
account the route I followed from work on thermonuclear weapons to my concern about
the results of nuclear tests - the destruction of people, genetic consequences, and all these
things. My life has been such that I began by confronting global problems and only
later on more concrete, personal, and human ones.
Andrei SAKHAROV
We should also heed those who have pointed out the negative
consequences of globalisation for hundreds of millions of people.
Globalisation cannot be stopped, but it can be made more humane and more
balanced for those it affects.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
You in this hall may take for granted that it can and will. But it is a much tougher
sell out there, in a world where half of our fellow human beings struggle to survive on
less than $2 a day; where less than 10 per cent of the global health research budget is
aimed at the health problems afflicting 90 per cent of the world’s population.
Try to imagine what globalisation can possibly mean to the half of humanity
that has never made or received a telephone call; to the people of sub-Saharan Africa,
who have less Internet access than the inhabitants of the borough of Manhattan.
And how do you explain, especially to our young people, why the global system
of rules, at the dawn of the twenty-first century, is tougher in protecting intellectual
property rights than in protecting fundamental human rights?
Kofi ANNAN
Glory to God in the highest, and on Earth peace, and good will toward men.
Yasser Arafat
God doesn't start wars. That's the greatest load of nonsense. Mankind starts wars.
But then we bless armies to go and kill in God's name. Somebody's got to blow that myth
out of the water. Could you picture Jesus of Nazareth strapping somebody into the
electric chair and throwing the switch? Because if you could, then you're doing His work-
but that's not His work, that's not what He said. Thou shalt not kill. That's what was said.
Betty WILLIAMS
I rarely speak about God. To God, yes. I protest against Him. I shout at Him.
But to open a discourse about the qualities of God, about the problems that God
imposes, theodicy, no. And yet He is there, in silence, in filigree.
Elie WIESEL
except sin, and he proclaimed very clearly that he had come to give the good news.
Mother TERESA
The achievement of peace could not have been won without this good will and
generosity of spirit.
John HUME
As Alfred Nobel recognised, peace cannot be achieved by one man or one nation.
It results from the efforts of men of broad vision and goodwill throughout the world, for
if lasting peace is to come it will be the accomplishment of all mankind.
Henry KISSINGER
I shall continue to live in the hope that goodness will finally triumph.
Andrei SAKHAROV
I have lived, and continue to live, in the belief that God is always with me. I
know this from experience. In August of 1973, while exiled in Japan, I was kidnapped
from my hotel room in Tokyo by intelligence agents of the then military government of
South Korea. The news of the incident startled the world. The agents took me to their
boat at anchor along the seashore. They tied me up, blinded me, and stuffed my mouth.
Just when they were about to throw me overboard, Jesus Christ appeared before me with
such clarity. I clung to him and begged him to save me. At that very moment, an airplane
came down from the sky to rescue me from the moment of death.
KIM Dae Jung
The gold medal which formed part of the prize I shall always keep, and I shall
hand it on to my children as a precious heirloom. The sum of money provided as part of
the prize by the wise generosity of the illustrious founder of this world-famous prize
system, I did not, under the peculiar circumstances of the case, feel at liberty to keep. I
think it eminently just and proper that in most cases the recipient of the prize should keep
for his own use the prize in its entirety. But in this case, while I did not act officially as
President of the United States, it was nevertheless only because I was President that I was
enabled to act at all; and I felt that the money must be considered as having been given
me in trust for the United States. I therefore used it as a nucleus for a foundation to
forward the cause of industrial peace, as being well within the general purpose of your
Committee; for in our complex industrial civilization of today the peace of righteousness
and justice, the only kind of peace worth having, is at least as necessary in the industrial
world as it is among nations.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
It was not only in the early days of the Society that women showed the strength
that can overcome fear. In recent history, at the time of the entrance of an occupying
army into one of the cities of Europe, a woman Friend believed that good lay even in the
hearts of plundering troops. Although her young daughter was in the house, she trusted in
beautiful music to draw out the best. She sat playing her piano whilst her neighbours
crouched in fear in cellars. Her faith was justified: the soldiers stood around the house
listening and, when they came to claim billets in her home, their rough manner had
departed. And even on subsequent occasions, when they returned drunk at night, she won
their respect and good behaviour by her music.
Quakers)
My father used to say 'Don't raise your voice. Improve your argument.' Good
sense does not always lie with the loudest shouters, nor can we say that a large unruly
crowd is always the best arbiter of what is right.
Desmond TUTU
I am especially grateful for the memory of my grandmother, Maria Petrovna,

who was the family's good spirit. She died before the war at the age of 79. My
grandmother brought up six children and when she was around 50 years old she taught
herself English all on her own. Right up to the time of her death she read English works
of fiction in the original. From when we were quite small she read aloud to us, her
grandchildren. I still have the most vivid memory of her reading to us those evenings. It
would be Pushkin, Dickens, Marlowe or Beecher-Stowe, and in Holy Week, the Gospel.
Andrei SAKHAROV
Of course, we could try to forget the past. Why not? Is it not natural for a human
being to repress what causes him pain, what causes him shame? Like the body, memory
protects its wounds. When day breaks after a sleepless night, one's ghosts must withdraw;
the dead are ordered back to their graves. But for the first time in history, we could not
bury our dead. We bear their graves within ourselves.
Elie WIESEL
In my current position, I have ample opportunity to fly over the State of Israel,
and lately over other parts of the Middle East as well. The view from the plane is
breathtaking; deep-blue seas and lakes, dark-green fields, dune-colored deserts, stone-
gray mountains, and the entire countryside peppered with white-washed, red-roofed
houses.
And also cemeteries. Graves as far as the eye can see.
Hundreds of cemeteries in our part of the world, in the Middle East -- in our home
in Israel, but also in Egypt, in Syria, Jordan, Lebanon. From the plane's window, from the
thousands of feet above them, the countless tombstones are silent. But the sound of their
outcry has carried from the Middle East throughout the world for decades.
Yitzhak Rabin
Everyone can be great, because everyone can serve.
Martin Luther KING Jr.

Many things have changed in these last years. There have been great changes
of world-wide character. The East-West confrontation has ceased to exist and the cold
war has come to an end. These changes, which exact forms cannot yet be predicted, have
left gaps that the people of the world have known how to make use in order to come
forward, struggle and win national terrain and international recognition.
A great crisis is produced for Christianity when it tries to legitimise and justify
violence. We understand and respect the decisions of the people when they resort to
violence because they cannot find nor can they identify other options, but we cannot
justify violence in the name of God.
Adolfo Pérez ESQUIVEL
If you will protest courageously and yet with dignity and Christian love, when the
history books are written in future generations, the historians will say: "There lived a
great people - a black people who injected new meaning and dignity into the veins of
civilization." This is our challenge and our overwhelming responsibility.
Martin Luther KING
The Green Revolution has an entirely different meaning to most people in the
affluent nations of the privileged world than to those in the developing nations of the
forgotten world.
Norman Ernest BORLAUG
Thirty years ago, in my acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize, I said that
the Green Revolution had won a temporary success in man’s war against hunger,
which if fully implemented, could provide sufficient food for humankind through the end
of the 20th century. But I warned that unless the frightening power of human
reproduction was curbed, the success of the Green Revolution would only be
ephemeral.
Norman Ernest BORLAUG
Special 30 th Anniversary Lecture, The Norwegian Nobel Institute, Oslo
September 8, 2000
Whenever peace - conceived as the avoidance of war - has been the primary
objective of a power or a group of powers, the international system has been at the
mercy of the most ruthless member of the international community.
Henry KISSINGER
What is important is that we should recognize jointly that we are guilty of

inhumanity. The horror of this experience should shake us out of our torpor, so that we
turn our will and our hopes toward the coming of an era in which war will be no more.
That will and that hope can have only one result: The attainment, by a new spirit, of that
higher reason which would deter us from making deadly use of the power which is at our
disposal.
Albert SCHWEITZER
H
The great significance of the first Hague Conference lies in the fact that, for
the first time in the history of mankind, the representatives of all the states of the civilized
world united to create an organization whose purpose was the maintenance of universal
peace and the settlement of international disputes. That was the beginning of world
international organization. I am convinced that when the history of international law
comes to be written centuries hence, it will be divided into two periods: the first being
from the earliest times to the end of the nineteenth century, and the second beginning
with the Hague Conference. Everything which has been achieved so far is based on the
ideas of this conference.
Ludwig QUIDDE
Today one thing is certain: thanks to the marvellous inventions and discoveries of
our era, the human spirit has finally awakened a social order long dormant: the solidarity
of nations. This solidarity, spurred on by an irrepressible force to assert itself, must be
protected in the exercise of its rights and duties. May the Hague Conference be its
instrument! May the Conference act as its shield against the modern barbarians who
would menace it. Civilization can justly rejoice in possessing in it an institution capable
of advancing the aspirations and ideals of mankind. Let us wish this important
Conference, so long and so impatiently awaited, every success and prosperity. May the
second assembly and those which follow - upholders of the law and custodians of man's
happiness - develop, perfect, and consummate the great work so auspiciously - begun!
The reward of which we have spoken will and must also be measured by the
happiness and welfare of the mothers and fathers of these children, who must walk
the earth without fear of being robbed, killed for political or material profit, or spat upon
because they are beggars.
They too must be relieved of the heavy burden of despair which they carry in their
hearts, born of hunger, homelessness and unemployment.
Nelson MANDELA
… One of the hardships in the life of the politician, especially the head of the
government, is that he cannot always say what he thinks, that for the sake of peace he
cannot always give vent to his feeling.
Willy BRANDT
So it is obvious that if man is to redeem his spiritual and moral "lag", he must go
all out to bridge the social and economic gulf between the "haves" and the "have
nots" of the world. Poverty is one of the most urgent items on the agenda of modern
life.
Martin Luther KING
The heart of our movement is the adoption group. There are now 2000 such
groups around the world. Comprised entirely of volunteers, it is these groups who
undertake the vital work of articulating on a personal basis international concern for the
protection of the basic human rights of individual men and women. ( in 1977 )
Numerous peoples of Africa literally agonise in a continent rich in natural

resources and culture. Hundreds of thousands of our contemporaries are forced to leave
their lands and their family to search for work, food, to educate their children and to stay
alive. Men and women risk their lives to embark on clandestine journeys only to end up
in a hellish immigration detention centre, or barely surviving on the periphery of
our so called civilised world.

In the work for international peace, as in other fields of human endeavour, there
must be a division of labour; among others, a division of labour between technicians and
educators. Mr. Arthur Henderson is one of the technicians, a statesman devising
plans for peace and leading the way for their acceptance.
I think it is necessary that the Indian people, of which I am a member, should

contribute with its science and its knowledge to human development because we have
enormous potentials and we could intercalate our very ancient heritage with the
achievements of the civilization in Europe as well as in other parts of the world.
But this contribution, that to our understanding is a recovery of the natural and
cultural heritage, must take place based on a rational and consensual planification in
respect of the right to make use of knowledge and natural resources, with guarantees as to
equality both towards Government and society.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
January 22, 1980 I was detained on the street and taken by force to the USSR
Procurator's Office. First Deputy Procurator General Alexander Rekunkov informed me
that a decree of the Presidium of the USSR Supreme Soviet had deprived me of the title
of Hero of Socialist Labour and of all other decorations and awards. I was asked to
return the medals, orders, and certificates, but I refused, believing I had been given them
for good reason. Rekunkov also informed me of the decision to banish me to the city of
Gorky which is off limits for foreigners.
I was taken that same day on a special flight to Gorky together with my wife,
Elena Bonner, who was allowed to accompany me. The Deputy Procurator of Gorky
explained the terms of the regimen decreed for me: overt surveillance, prohibition against
leaving the city limits, prohibition against meeting with foreigners and "criminal
elements", prohibition against correspondence and telephone conversations with
foreigners, including scientific and purely personal communications, even with my
children and grandchildren. I was instructed to report three times a month to the police,
and threatened that I would be taken there by force if I failed to obey.
Andrei SAKHAROV
Thirty-four years ago, when the organization of which I am secretary formulated a

plan for the establishment of a "High Court of Nations", we were laughed to scorn
as mere theorists and utopians, the scoffers emphatically declaring that no two countries
in the world would ever agree to take part in the establishment of such a court.
Today we proudly point to the fact that the Hague Tribunal has been established;
and notwithstanding the unfortunate blow it received in the early stages of its existence
by the Boer War, and the attempt on the part of some nations to boycott it, there is now a
general consensus of opinion that it has come to stay - and thanks to the munificence of
Mr. Carnegie, this high court of nations will be provided with a permanent home in a
Palace of Peace.
William Randal
CREMER
The practical release of nuclear energy was the outcome of many years of
experimental and theoretical research, It had great potential for the common good. But
the first the general public learned about this discovery was the news of the destruction of
Hiroshima by the atom bomb, A splendid achievement of science and technology had
turned malign. Science became identified with death and destruction.
Joseph ROTBLAT
The most flagrant violation of historical rights, and indeed simply of human
rights, consists in taking away from certain peoples their right to the land where they live
so that they are forced to change their home.
The victorious forces at the end of the second World War decided to impose this
fate on hundreds of thousands of human beings and this under the most severe
conditions--a fact by which we can measure how far they fell short of their task of
accomplishing a state of affairs which would be roughly equitable and which would
guarantee a prosperous outcome.
Albert SCHWEITZER
Our history is a live history, that has throbbed, withstood and survived many
centuries of sacrifice. Now it comes forward again with strength. The seeds, dormant for
such a long time, break out today with some uncertainty, although they germinate in a
world that is at present characterized by confusion and vagueness.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
History can only move towards liberty. History can only have justice at its
heart. To march in the opposite direction to history is to be on the road to shame, poverty
and oppression.
Oscar Arias SANCHEZ
The history of mankind rises and falls like the waves.
Fridtjof NANSEN
The history of nations shows that words are not always immediately followed
by action. History uses a unit of measure for time that is different from that of the
lifespan of the individual, whereas man is only too ready to measure the evolution of
history by his own yardstick. In the period that followed we climbed to the heights and
fell to the depths; we saw our budding confidence nipped by the frosts of suspicion and
war psychosis; and even now, instead of unanimous support for peace from all the people
of the world, we can observe a crisis of faith in its whole development.
Gustav STRESEMANN
Only through effective partnerships can we beat back endemic or epidemic

disease, which is such an unmerciful enemy of normal life in developing countries. I am
not sure that any of us has yet grasped the full horror of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in
Africa, either in its human or its economic dimensions. In some countries it has
devastated entire generations. That puts an overwhelming obligation on all of us to do
whatever we can to help those already infected, and above all to halt the spread of the
virus.
Kofi ANNAN
Everybody today seems to be in such a terrible rush, anxious for greater

developments and greater riches and so on, so that children have very little time for their
parents. Parents have very little time for each other, and in the home begins the
disruption of peace of the world.
Mother TERESA
I never forget some time ago about fourteen professors came from the United
States from different universities. And they came to Calcutta to our house. Then we were
talking about that they had been to the home for the dying. We have a home for the
dying in Calcutta, where we have picked up more than 36,000 people only from the
streets of Calcutta, and out of that big number more than 18,000 have died a beautiful
death. They have just gone home to God; and they came to our house and we talked of
love, of compassion, and then one of them asked me: Say, Mother, please tell us
something that we will remember, and I said to them: Smile at each other, make time for
each other in your family. Smile at each other. And then another one asked me: Are you
married, and I said: Yes, and I find it sometimes very difficult to smile at Jesus because
he can be very demanding sometimes. This is really something true, and there is where
love comes - when it is demanding, and yet we can give it to Him with joy.
Mother TERESA
The other side of the Nansen Office operation - that is, the protection of the
homeless - has been no less important; perhaps the very reverse. It has become more
and more obvious, to me at least, that the permanent insecurity in which the refugees live,
their constant fear of being driven away once again from the humble abodes they have
created, is perhaps the worst aspect of their plight. They have lost their homes, their
country, their possessions. They have been deprived of their nationality and forced to
seek asylum in a foreign country. And even when they are allowed to settle, it is by mere
charity, charity which can be withdrawn at any time. Political upheavals, economic
difficulties, crimes to which some refugees may be driven in their wretchedness, not to
mention political assassination committed in the insanity of desperation - any of these can
put the welfare of all in jeopardy. "Away with the refugees!" soon becomes the cry, one
that the authorities frequently seem only too anxious to hear. And even when there is no
such public outcry, we see the refugees hounded from country to country, for those who
stand outside the law have not acquired the firm right either to live in a foreign country or
to benefit from diplomatic or consular protection.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
Just as man cannot live without dreams, he cannot live without hope. If dreams
reflect the past, hope summons the future. Does this mean that our future can be built on
a rejection of the past? Surely such a choice is not necessary. The two are incompatible.
The opposite of the past is not the future but the absence of future; the opposite of the
future is not the past but the absence of past. The loss of one is equivalent to the sacrifice
of the other.
Elie WIESEL
We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.
Martin Luther KING
The need for simple human-to-human relationships is becoming

increasingly urgent . . . Today the world is smaller and more interdependent. One nation's
problems can no longer be solved by itself completely. Thus, without a sense of universal
responsibility, our very survival becomes threatened. Basically, universal responsibility is
feeling for other people's suffering just as we feel our own. It is the realization that even
our enemy is entirely motivated by the quest for happiness. We must recognize that all
beings want the same thing that we want. This is the way to achieve a true understanding,
unfettered by artificial consideration.
Lama
been created in the image of God, and that it is a blasphemy to treat them as if they were
less than this and to do so ultimately recoils on those who do this? In dehumanising
others, they are themselves dehumanised. Perhaps oppression dehumanises the oppressor
as much as, if not more than, the oppressed. They need each other to become truly free, to
become human. We can be human only in fellowship, in community, in koinonia, in
peace.
Desmond TUTU
When I meet people in different parts of the world, I am always reminded that we
are all basically alike: we are all human beings. Maybe we have different clothes, our
skin is of a different colour, or we speak different languages. That is on the surface. But
basically, we are the same human beings. That is what binds us to each other. That is
what makes it possible for us to understand each other and to develop friendship and
closeness.

Lama
In this land throughout the centuries the Polish and Jewish people lived together
through good and evil. The will of the oppressor ended this. The human conscience
must never forget.
Lech WALESA
The idea that there is one people in possession of the truth, one answer to the
world's ills, or one solution to humanity's needs, has done untold harm throughout history
--- especially in the last century. Today, however, even amidst continuing ethnic conflict
around the world, there is a growing understanding that human diversity is both the
reality that makes dialogue necessary, and the very basis for that dialogue.
Kofi ANNAN
This year, I want to challenge you to join me in taking our relationship to a still
higher level. I propose that you, the business leaders gathered in Davos, and we, the
United Nations, initiate a global compact of shared values and principles, which will give
a human face to the global market.
Globalisation is a fact of life. But I believe we have underestimated its fragility.
The problem is this. The spread of markets outpaces the ability of societies and their
political systems to adjust to them, let alone to guide the course they take. History teaches
us that such an imbalance between the economic, social and political realms can never be
sustained for very long.
Kofi ANNAN
Unless we work assiduously so that all of God's children, our brothers and sisters,
members of one human family, all will enjoy basic human rights, the right to a
fulfilled life, the right of movement, the freedom to be fully human, within a humanity
measured by nothing less than the humanity of Jesus Christ Himself, then we are on the
road inexorably to self-destruction, we are not far from global suicide - and yet it could
be so difference.
Desmond TUTU
Thinking over what I might say today, I decided to share with you some of my
thoughts concerning the common problems all of us face as members of the human
family. Because we all share this small planet earth, we have to learn to live in harmony
and peace with each other and with nature. That is not just a dream, but a necessity. We
are dependent on each other in so many ways, that we can no longer live in isolated
communities and ignore what is happening outside those communities, and we must
share the good fortune that we enjoy. I speak to you as just another human being; as a
simple monk. If you find what I say useful, then I hope you will try to practise it.
Lama
There is one thing though of which I'm absolutely certain. Everything else is up
for question but the one thing that I have come to know is that human life is sacred. It's
precious. It's a gift from God. I have a right to this gift from God and I give thanks for it
and I rejoice in it and it's painful and it's hard but it's also joyous and it's also great fun.
As I have my right to life then I acknowledge that in all justice that you too have your
right to life and I have no right to take your life and I will live by that principle today.
Máiread CORRIGAN
The attractive idea that we can now have a parliament of man with authority to
control the conduct of nations by legislation or an international police force with power to
enforce national conformity to rules of right conduct is a counsel of perfection. The world
is not ready for any such thing, and it cannot be made ready except by the practical
surrender of the independence of nations, which lies at the basis of the present social
organization of the civilized world. Such a system would mean that each nation was
liable to be lawfully controlled and coerced by a majority of alien powers. That majority
alone could determine when and for what causes and to what ends the control and
coercion should be exercised. Human nature must have come much nearer perfection
than it is now, or will be in many generations, to exclude from such a control prejudice,
selfishness, ambition, and injustice. An attempt to prevent war in this way would breed
war, for it would destroy local self-government and drive nations to war for liberty. There
is no nation in the world which would seriously consider a proposal so shocking to the
national pride and patriotism of its people.
Elihu ROOT
"You cannot change human nature " has become a sort of incantation with
those critics. Perhaps you cannot "change human nature" - I don't indeed know what
the phrase means. But you can certainly change human behaviour, which is what matters,
as the whole panorama of history shows.
Panic and other forms of folly are "natural" but not inevitable, and because they
are natural we need discipline. Once in an American theatre one of the audience cried
"Fire". The audience obeyed their "natural instinct", rushed for the doors in a panic mass.
Several people were trampled to death. There was no fire. It was a false alarm. A few
days later in another theatre the same cry was raised; the manager happening to be
present jumped upon the stage and cried out in a commanding voice "Keep your seats.
There is plenty of time and you all know what you must do. Rise, look to the nearest exit,
walk; no one runs." That theatre was emptied in perfect order; no one was hurt although
this time there was a fire and the place was burned to the ground.
Was there not the same human nature in both cases? But you got a very different
result in conduct, behaviour, because in the latter case the first destructive impulse was
made subject to the second more civilized thought. The more it is true to say that certain
impulses, like those of certain forms of nationalism, are destructive, the greater is the
obligation to subject them to the direction of conscious intelligence and of social
organization.
Norman ANGELL
Laws and conditions that tend to debase human personality - a God-given

force - be they brought by the State or individuals, must be relentlessly opposed in the
spirit of defiance shown by St. Peter when he said to the rulers of his day: 'Shall we obey
God or man?'
Albert Luthuli
Actually time itself is neutral... Human progress never rolls in on wheels of

inevitability. It comes through the tireless efforts of men, willing to be co-workers with
God, and without this hard work time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social
stagnation.
Martin Luther
KING
Where human rights are violated, there are threats to peace...
Mümtaz SOYSAL, Amnesty International
Human rights are ends, rather than means. In the world of international
politics it is a perennial temptation to use human rights as a weapon, to ignore the
deficiences at home and exploit those elsewhere as points to be scored in the international
power game. To use human rights as a means to some other end is perilous. Only when
human rights are seen as ends will the violation of human rights be approached
universally, impartially, constructively. Only when they are seen as ends will adequate
attention be given to violations of human rights wherever they occur, within the borders
of one's own country or in remote corners of the world.
I firmly believe that I am here essentially as the voice of the voiceless people of
East Timor.... And what the people want is peace, an end to violence and the respect for
their human rights.
José RAMOS-HORTA
But I think of the countless people and colleagues in Korea, who have given
themselves willingly to democracy and human rights and the dream of national
unification. And I must conclude that the honour should go to them.
KIM Dae Jung
After my essay was published abroad in July 1968, I was barred from secret work
and excommunicated from many privileges of the Soviet establishment. The pressure on
me, my family, and my friends increased in 1972, but as I came to learn more about the
spreading repressions, I felt obliged to speak out almost daily in defence of one victim or
another. In recent years I have continued to speak out as well on peace and disarmament,
on freedom of association, movement, information, and opinion, against capital
punishment, on protection of the environment, and on nuclear power plants.
In 1975, I was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. This was a great honour for me, as
well as recognition for the entire human rights movement in the USSR.
Andrei SAKHAROV
Democracy in Guatemala must be built-up as soon as at all possible. It is
necessary that the Human Rights be fully complied with, i.e.: put an end to racism;
guarantee freedom to organize and to move within all sectors of the country. In short, it is
imperative to open the fields to the multiethnic civil society with all its rights, to
demilitarise the country and establish the basis for its development, so that it can be
pulled out of today's underdevelopment and poverty.
A new hope has been kindled in the breast of the millions who are voiceless,
oppressed, dispossessed, tortured by the powerful tyrants; lacking elementary human
rights in Latin America, in South East Asia, the Far East, in many parts of Africa and
behind the Iron Curtain, who have their noses rubbed in the dust. How wonderful, how
appropriate that this award is made today - December 10, Human Rights Day.
Desmond TUTU
The future prospect of truly peaceful global politics lies in the creation through
joint efforts of a single international democratic space in which states shall be guided by
the priority of human rights and welfare for their own citizens and the promotion
of the same rights and similar welfare elsewhere. This is an imperative of the growing
integrity of the modern world and of the interdependence of its components.
Mikhail S. GORBACHEV
It is not, however, only the development of novel forms of warfare that has
aroused indignation in the human mind.
Man has shown that a human society cannot be an animal society. A human
society obeys the dictates of reason and is guided and governed by a respect for justice.
Ferdinand BUISSON
I wish that a conscious sense of peace and a feeling of human solidarity
would develop in all the people, which could open for new relationships of respect and
equality for the next millennium, ruled by fraternity and not by cruel conflicts.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Slings, arrows, gas chambers can annihilate man, but they cannot destroy
human values, the dignity and freedom of the human being.
Shimon PERES
I am only too well aware of the human weaknesses and failures which exist,
the doubts about the efficacy of non-violence, and the open advocacy of violence by
some. But I am still convinced that non-violence is both the most practically sound and
morally excellent way to grapple with the age-old problem of racial injustice.
Martin Luther KING

Jr.
Our second source of strength is humanism and classical philosophy. Immanuel

Kant postulated his idea of a constitutional confederation of states in words that pose a
very distinct question to today’s generations: Man, he said, will one day be faced with the
choice of either uniting under a true law of nations or destroying with a few blows the
civilisation he has built up over thousands of years: then, necessity will compel him to do
what he ought better to have done long ago of his own free reason.
Willy BRANDT
Humanitarian action takes place in the short term, for limited groups and for
limited objectives. This is at the same time both its strength and its limitation. The
political can only be conceived in the long term, which itself is the movement of
societies. Humanitarian action is by definition universal, or it is not. Humanitarian
responsibility has no frontiers. Wherever in the world there is manifest distress, the
Humanitarian by vocation must respond. By contrast, the political knows borders,
and where crisis occurs, political response will vary because historical relations, balance
of power, and the interests of one or the other must be considered. The time and space of
the humanitarian are not those of the political. These vary in opposing ways, and this is
another way to locate the founding principles of humanitarian action: the refusal of all
forms of problem solving through sacrifice of the weak and vulnerable. No victim can be
intentionally discriminated against, OR neglected to the advantage of another. One life
today cannot be measured by its value tomorrow: and the relief of suffering «here»,
cannot legitimise the abandoning of relief «over there».
Humanitarian action comes with limitations. It cannot be a substitute for

political action.
Humanitarian action is more than simple generosity, simple charity. It aims

to build spaces of normalcy in the midst of what is abnormal. More than offering material
assistance, we aim to enable individuals to regain their rights and dignity as human
beings. As an independent volunteer association, we are committed to bringing direct
medical aid to people in need. But we act not in a vacuum, and we speak not into the
wind, but with a clear intent to assist, to provoke change, or to reveal injustice. Our action
and our voice is an act of indignation, a refusal to accept an active or passive assault on
the other.
In every war which has occurred since the great humanitarian flag was first
unfurled, the red cross could be seen soaring above the battlefields.

Rouge
The Nansen Office has tried, to the best of its ability, to give weight to these
socio-economic points of view along with the strictly humanitarian principle which
must insist that, in the face of distress and misfortune, there can be no consideration of
race or nationality. In such a situation, there is only one race, the human race, and those
who are suffering must be helped no matter what their origin. But the Nansen Office has
also attacked the problem on the international plane. It has tried to remind nations of what
Fridtjof Nansen said, that if intelligent human beings are left to brood so long upon
conditions so incompatible with their ambitions and capabilities that they come to regard
themselves as victims of injustice, and if they are denied even the most elementary form
of protection, then there is always the danger that their physical and intellectual energy,
instead of being channelled into constructive work, may through sheer desperation be
used in ways that will cost society infinitely more than the modest assistance which they
now require in their hour of need. In order to avert the consequences of such desperation,
the Nansen Office has tried to carry on the work of peace on as large a scale as possible.
It has set out to disarm the minds of the refugees, if I may use the expression, by
mitigating conditions for the most wretched, by helping them to find their way in their
new community, and by protecting them against persecution.
That is how Fridtjof Nansen understood the situation. He saw his work as a real
contribution to peace. So too did the League of Nations, and when Fridtjof Nansen was
dead, the Assembly paid solemn tribute to his memory for his efforts "to unite the
nations in work for the cause of peace".
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
I believe that there is a greater power in the world than the evil power of military
force, of nuclear bombs - there is the power of good, of morality, of
humanitarianism.
Linus Carl Pauling

Humanitarianism occurs where the political has failed or is in crisis. We act
not to assume political responsibility, but firstly to relieve the inhuman suffering of
failure. The act must be free of political influence, and the political must recognize its
responsibility to ensure that the humanitarian can exist. Humanitarian action requires a
framework in which to act.
The limitation of means naturally must mean the making of choice, but the
context and the constraints of action do not alter the fundamentals of this
humanitarian vision. It is a vision that by definition must ignore political choices.
The value of our shared reward will and must be measured by the joyful peace
which will triumph, because the common humanity that bonds both black and white
into one human race will have said to each one of us that we shall all live like the
children of paradise.
Nelson R. MANDELA
The value of our shared reward will and must be measured by the joyful peace
which will triumph, because the common humanity that bonds both black and white
into one human race, will have said to each one of us that we shall all live like the
children of paradise.
Nelson MANDELA
One could believe also that the evils caused by a future war would be relatively
less because one expected progressive humanization of its methods. The starting point
of this supposition was the obligations assumed by the peoples in the Geneva Convention
of 1864 as the result of the efforts of the Red Cross. These mutually guaranteed the care
of the wounded and the humane treatment of prisoners of war, as well as great respect
toward the civilian population.
This convention obtained in effect considerable results, from which hundreds of
thousands of combatants and civilians were to profit in the wars to come. But compared
with all the miseries of war, added to beyond all measure by modern means of death and
destruction, they are very slight. Indeed, there can be no question of the humanization
of war.
Since we now know what a horrible evil war is, we must not neglect any effort to
prevent its return. There is additionally an ethical reason. In the course of the two last
wars we were guilty of inhuman acts which make one tremble and in a future war we
should go further still. This must not be.
Albert SCHWEITZER
Above all, I don't want to sound sexist because that's another kind of violence.
Everybody has their own ideas on violence. I thought hunger striking was an act of
violence against your body, but that's my opinion, which doesn't have to be everyone
else's.
Betty WILLIAMS
This hydrogen bomb may have a destructive effect, a hundred, a thousand,

nay ten thousand times greater than that of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and
Nagasaki. Its effect will depend on how great the bomb is and at what height above the
earth it is exploded.
Linus Carl PAULING
……………..
I
If you want to get across an idea, wrap it up in a person.
Ralph BUNCHE
The time came in 1968 for the more detailed, public, and candid statement of my
views contained in the essay "Thoughts on Progress, Peaceful Coexistence, and
Intellectual Freedom." These same ideas were echoed seven years later in the title of my
Nobel lecture: "Peace, Progress, and Human Rights." I consider these themes of
fundamental importance and closely interconnected. My 196~ essay was a turning point
in my life. It quickly gained worldwide publicity. The Soviet press was silent for some
time, and then began to refer to the essay very negatively. Many critics, even sympathetic
ones, considered my ideas naive and impractical. But it seems to me, thirteen years later,
that these ideas foreshadowed important new directions in world and Soviet politics.
Andrei SAKHAROV
The establishment of an ethical code of conduct for scientists is an idea whose

time has come.
Joseph ROTBLAT
The idea that a few nations are entitled to retain nuclear weapons for "deterrent"
purposes indefinitely, while all other nations are expected to refrain from acquiring this
ostensible benefit, is untenable in the long run. In the meantime, every statement or
action by a nuclear-weapon state reinforcing the idea that nuclear weapons might have
military utility will provoke interest on the part of other countries in acquiring them; and
states that are thus provoked but lack the means to acquire nuclear weapons are likely to
try to acquire instead the "poor man's" weapons of mass destruction -- chemical and
biological weapons.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
The Nansen Office, perhaps more than any other institution, has had the good
fortune to be able to work for a better understanding of the League of Nations, itself
founded upon the idea of peace.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
Practically no existing the idea of pacifism movement enjoys such popularity

and has such a wide following as the movement for peace in international relations. The
undertakings inspired by this aim are numerous and of varied nature. In many civilized
countries, societies have been formed to propagate among the people of the world, and
great international meetings are held at frequent intervals. The parliaments of the
majority of nations have founded an Inter-parliamentary Union in order to work together
to assure peace, and the same idea has prompted governments to send their
representatives to various great conferences.
Ferdinand BUISSON
Here we encounter the idea of sanctions in an acutely sharp form. Article 16

of the Covenant fortunately contains a considerably toned down version of it. Last year,
the Assembly of the League, as a result of the initiative taken by the Scandinavian
nations, further limited and clarified all the provisions of the clause prescribing the duty
of states to participate in sanctions. But Nobel's basic idea has been realized. The whole
collective force of the League is to be turned against the aggressor, with more or less
pressure according to the need. Without envisaging any supranational organization, for
which the time is not yet ripe, the present approach is as analogous as circumstances
permit to that of an earlier age when the state first exercised authority over individual
leaders unaccustomed to recognizing any curbs on their own wills.
Karl Hjalmar
BRANTING
I feel ashamed. I should have written to you long ago to thank you with all my
heart for your coming to Geneva and for the splendid help you gave me. You know well
enough what it means for me, but it was always like that. I do not know how I could have
got on without you. Of course, all I have done in the League has been done with you, and
could not have been done without you, at least not in the manner it was achieved. And so
it has been from the very beginning and till now. Oh dear friend, how much you have
done for me and for the League during many years and how much time you have given to
it. I only wish this work for others could give you more personal satisfaction. It is well
enough to work unselfishly for high ideals, but still, as we live in this world, it would be
gratifying, at least to others, to see the workers get their due.
Fridtjof NANSEN (Letter to Noel-Baker)
My ideal is an open pluralistic society which safeguards fundamental civil and

political rights, a society with a mixed economy which would permit scientifically-
regulated, balanced progress. I have expressed the view that such a society ought to come
about as a result of the peaceful convergence of the socialist and capitalist systems and
that this is the main condition for saving the world from thermonuclear catastrophe.
Andrei SAKHAROV
The Declaration sets up an ideal for us to follow, and it lays down guidelines for
our actions. Yet a glance at the world of today is sufficient to show that we still have a
long way to go before we can achieve this ideal. Not a single country, even the most
advanced, can pride itself on fulfilling all the articles of the declaration.
We witness violations of the right to live. Murder and massacre are allowed to
pass unpunished. Women are exploited, there is widespread famine, contempt for
freedom of conscience and freedom of speech, widespread racial discrimination - all
these evils are far too widespread to be overlooked.
René CASSIN
People say I'm an idealist, but what about Lech Walesa and his movement in
Poland, what about Gandhi in India, Martin Luther King in the United States and let us
never forget the last few years and the change in South Africa with the abolishment of
apartheid. Let's not forget the leadership of the formerly oppressed Nelson Mandela and
the currently oppressed Aung San Suu Kyi of Burma.
Betty WILLIAMS
An ever increasing volume of intercourse is occurring between the various nations

through their representatives in science and art, health care and education,
communications, trade and industry, and all other cultural fields. The human feeling of
spiritual affinity is the fundamental motivation of all these international congresses and
conferences. This idealistic impulse shared by all peoples is leading to real
agreements and to laws which are incompatible with war and militarism.
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
There is and will continue to be the delimitation through ideological differences.

But it means progress if we speak more of interests than ideology, it is encouraging
when dialogue takes the place of monologue in East-West relations in the search for
solutions to those problems which in spite of continuing differences affect common
interest.
Willy BRANDT
Long before the terrifying potential of the arms race was recognized, there was a
widespread instinctive abhorrence of nuclear weapons, and a strong desire to get rid of
them. Indeed, the very first resolution of the General Assembly of the United Nations –
adopted unanimously - called for the elimination of nuclear weapons, But the world was
then polarized by the bitter ideological struggle between East and West. There was
no chance to meet this call. The chief task was to stop the arms race before it Pought utter
disaster. However, after the collapse of communism and the disintegration of the Soviet
Union, any rationale for having nuclear weapons disappeared. The quest for their total
elimination could be resumed, but the nuclear powers still cling tenaciously to their
weapons.
Joseph ROTBLAT
At the same time there is extraordinarily bitter ideological and nationalistic

opposition between the Soviet Union, with its friends, and the Western democracies, so
that two great powers, or blocs of powers, face one another in mutual suspicion and fear.
Emily Greene BALCH
The moral significance of the human rights movement, which arose in the middle
of the 1960s has been enormous, although the movement itself is small in number and
deliberately apolitical. It has changed the moral climate and created the spiritual
preconditions needed for democratic changes in the USSR and for the formulation of an
ideology of human rights throughout the world. Dangerous illusions about the nature
of our system, which used to be almost universal among Western intellectuals, have
become much less prevalent and, in fact, have almost disappeared. I myself felt the
attraction of the human rights movement in the mid-1960s. It deeply affected my attitudes
and my public activities.
I do not think that many human rights advocates expected that the regime would
recognize the justice of our appeals. The fact that we addressed the authorities was
simply a natural reflection of our aspiration for a rule of law, of our loyalty to the state, of
our confidence that we were in the right legally as well as ethically. People perhaps
hoped there might be some results in particular cases for specific individuals. That is
different from change in the regime's policies.
Andrei SAKHAROV
Has this theory of internationalism any relevance to our religious needs, to the
claim to eternity that irresistibly arises in the soul of every thinking and feeling person?
There are surely many of us who can only regard the belief in personal
immortality as a claim which must remain unproved - a projection of the eternity
concept onto the personal level.
Should we then be compelled to believe that the theory of materialism expressed
in the old Arab parable of the bush whose leaves fall withered to the ground and die
without leaving a trace behind, truly applies to the family of man?
It seems to me that the theory of mankind's organic unity and eternal continuity
raises the materialistic view to a higher level.
In this field the greatest advance is being made towards reducing and preventing
in a practical and effective way the causes of war, and this advance is proceeding along
several different lines. First, by providing for the peaceable settlement of such
controversies by submission to an impartial tribunal. Up to this time that provision
has taken the form of arbitration, with which we are all familiar. There have been
occasional international arbitrations from very early times, but arbitration as a system, a
recognized and customary method of diplomatic procedure rather than an exceptional
expedient, had its origin in the Hague Conference of 1899. It is interesting to recall the
rather contemptuous reception accorded to the Convention for the Pacific Settlement of
International Disputes concluded at that conference, and to the Permanent Court at The
Hague which it created. The convention was not obligatory. No power was bound to
comply with it. The cynicism with which the practical diplomatist naturally regards the
idealist pronounced it a dead letter. But the convention expressed, and, by expressing,
established a new standard of international conduct which practical idealism had long
been gradually approaching, for which thoughtful men and women in all civilized lands
had been vaguely groping, which the more advanced nations welcomed and the more
backward nations were ashamed to reject.
Elihu ROOT
When Nansen began his great task, he believed that the refugee problem could be
solved within a period of ten years. The work advanced rapidly for several years, not only
because understanding was so great and pity for the refugees' fate at first so warm, but
also because several countries short of labour gladly opened their doors to them. Even the
very early period after the founding of the Nansen Office was a favourable one for the
refugees, thanks to the general prosperity. But then came the change: the economic crisis
hit everyone. Restrictive policies were inaugurated on all sides, and every country
surrounded itself with practically impenetrable barriers. Now nobody wanted to
accept refugees; on the contrary, everybody suddenly wanted them to leave, and therefore
often deprived them of the right to work. The national labour force had to be protected
against unemployment, the extent and importance of which have frequently been
exaggerated.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
The dream of a society ruled by loving kindness, reason and justice is a dream as
old as civilized man. Does it have to be an impossible dream? Karl Popper,
explaining his abiding optimism in so troubled a world as ours, said that the darkness had
always been there but the light was new. Because it is new it has to be tended with care
and diligence. It is true that even the smallest light cannot be extinguished by all the
darkness in the world because darkness is wholly negative. It is merely an absence of
light. But a small light cannot dispel acres of encircling gloom. It needs to grow stronger,
to shed its brightness further and further. And people need to accustom their eyes to the
light to see it as a benediction rather than a pain, to learn to love it. We are so much in
need of a brighter world which will offer adequate refuge to all its inhabitants.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
There is still another aspect – that of impotence disguised by verbalism: taking

a stand on legal positions which cannot become a reality and planning counter-measures
for contingencies that always differ from the one at hand. At critical times we were left to
our own devices; the verbalists had nothing to offer. Passionate protests were justified
and necessary, but they did not alter the situation. The Wall remained; we had to learn to
live with it, and I had to call in the police to prevent young demonstrators from running to
their ruin.
Willy BRANDT
Each of us has the right to take pride in our particular faith or heritage. But the
notion that what is ours is necessarily in conflict with what is theirs is both false and
dangerous. It has resulted in endless enmity and conflict, leading men to commit the
greatest of crimes in the name of a higher power.
Kofi ANNAN
Occasionally in life there are those moments of unutterable fulfilment which
cannot be completely explained by those symbols called words. Their meanings can only
be articulated by the inaudible language of the heart.
Martin Luther KING
The independence is all we have in a flag, a national anthem, annual parades

by the military.
José RAMOS-HORTA
Fortunately, some significant strides have been made in the struggle to end the
long night of racial injustice. We have seen the magnificent drama of independence
unfold in Asia and Africa. Just thirty years ago there were only three independent nations
in the whole of Africa. But today thirty-five African nations have risen from colonial
bondage. In the United States we have witnessed the gradual demise of the system of
racial segregation. The Supreme Court's decision of 1954 outlawing segregation in the
public schools gave a legal and constitutional deathblow to the whole doctrine of separate
but equal.
Martin Luther KING
Independent humanitarianism is a daily struggle to assist and protect.

If the Indian civilizations and the European civilizations could have made
exchanges in a peaceful and harmonious manner, without destruction, exploitation,
discrimination and poverty, they could, no doubt, have achieved greater and more
valuable conquests for Humanity.
Let us not forget that when the Europeans came to America, there were
flourishing and strong civilizations there. One cannot talk about a discovery of America,
because one discovers that which one does not know about, or that which is hidden. But
America and its native civilizations had discovered themselves long before the fall of the
Roman Empire and the Medieval Europe. The significance of its cultures form part of the
heritage of humanity and continue to astonish the learned ones.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
This must never be allowed to start. And the place to stop it is at the level of the
individual. Therefore, the protection of the rights of the individual to think freely, to
express himself freely, to associate freely with others and to disseminate his thoughts is
essential to the preservation of world peace. This is equally so with the right to live in
decent social and economic conditions, to have a job, to get an education.
Human rights will not be protected if left solely to the governments.
Individuals of good will must everywhere concern themselves with and act to curb
repression, and to defend human rights. The ordinary individual can make a difference.
This is the experience of Amnesty International. An aroused public opinion is a powerful
weapon. Important as bills of rights and legal mechanisms are, still more important is the
concern of one individual of public opinion is everywhere of help. But nowhere is it more
essential than when an individual human being remains helpless before a repressive
regime, a frightened national community, and an inadequate international machinery for
redress.
Human rights are indivisible. The temptation to oppose civil and political
rights, on the one hand, to economic, social and cultural rights, on the other, must be
resisted. The conflict is a false conflict, manufactured and propagated for reasons alien to
human rights. Both categories are needed. Often these rights complement one another.
When those deprived of their socio-economic rights cannot make their voices heard, they
are even less likely to have their needs met. If a person is deprived of one right, his
chance of securing the other rights is usually endangered. The right to education and the
right of freedom of information and open debate on official of social and economic
development. The freedom of the human mind and the welfare of the human being are
inextricably linked.
In spite of the brutal Indonesian colonisation and cultural repression

of the past 21 years that attempt to eradicate a language and culture that reached our
region almost 500 centuries ago, in East Timor this rich centuries-old language survives
stubbornly.
Being the second East Timorese of Portuguese nationality to be honoured with the
Nobel Peace Prize (the first is our respected and revered Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes
Belo), I would be failing my own historical heritage and conscience if I were to start this
Nobel lecture in another language other than in the language that unites more that 200
million people in the five regions of the world.
….
I pay tribute to the many tens of thousands of Indonesians who died in their own
struggle for freedom and democracy, who languished in the jails of the New Order, or
were forced into exile in China, Albania, USSR and Western Europe. I met many of them
over the years and shared long hours of conversation about our two peoples' suffering and
dreams.
As a former military man, I will also forever remember the silence of the moment
before: the hush when the hands of the clock seem to be spinning forward, when time is
running out and in another hour, another minute, the inferno will erupt.
Yitzhak Rabin
The value of that gift to all who have suffered will and must be measured by the
happiness and welfare of all the people of our country, who will have torn down the
inhuman walls that divide them.
Nelson R. MANDELA
Where there is injustice, there is the seed of conflict.
………
Inner peace is the key: if you have inner peace, the external problems do not
affect your deep sense of peace and tranquillity. In that state of mind you can deal with
situations with calmness and reason, while keeping your inner happiness. That is very
important. Without this inner peace, no matter how comfortable your life is materially,
you may still be worried, disturbed or unhappy because of circumstances.

Lama
We need to strengthen our institutions of peace like the United Nations,

making certain they are fully used by the weak as well the strong….
Oscar Arias SANCHEZ
The attempt to put an end to war is a special and urgent task which we must solve
and solve soon. It is a necessary complement to the forces that are bringing men closer
together if these are to prevail over those that divide men into hostile camps.
The ideas that men share and the needs that they all feel, need a suitable organ.
They need an institutional body to make them effective. The nation created the
national state. The world community must create a political expression for itself.
Emily Greene BALCH
There is a third line of progress, little, if any, less important than the two already
mentioned, and that is the instruction of students and of the great bodies of the people
of civilized countries in the knowledge of international law. Under the modern
development of constitutional governments, with varying degrees of extension of
suffrage, more and more the people who cast the ballots determine the issues of peace
and war. No government now embarks in war without the assurance of popular support. It
is not uncommon in modern times to see governments straining every nerve to keep the
peace, and the people whom they represent, with patriotic enthusiasm and resentment
over real or fancied wrongs, urging them forward to war. Nothing is more important in
the preservation of peace than to secure among the great mass of the people living under
constitutional government a just conception of the rights which their nation has against
others and of the duties their nation owes to others. The popular tendency is to listen
approvingly to the most extreme statements and claims of politicians and orators who
seek popularity by declaring their own country right in everything and other countries
wrong in everything.
Elihu ROOT
Only when an ideal of peace is born in the minds of the peoples will the
institutions set up to maintain this peace effectively fulfil the function expected of them.
Albert SCHWEITZER
Let it never be said by future generations that indifference, cynicism or selfishness

made us fail to live up to the ideals of humanism which the Nobel Peace Prize
encapsulates.
Nelson MANDELA
During my life I have seen many illusions develop and disappear; much
confusion, escapism and simplification. In one place a sense of responsibility was
lacking, in another imagination. I have also experienced what faith in one’s conviction,
steadfastness and solidarity can mean. I know how moral strength can develop and
emerge especially in times of great affliction. Many things declared dead have proved to
be alive.
Willy BRANDT
No matter how far off this high goal may appear to be, no matter how violently
shattered may be the illusion entertained at times by many of us that any future war
between highly civilized nations is as inconceivable as one between the Scandinavian
brothers, we may be certain of one thing: that for those who cherish humanity, even after
its relapse into barbarism these past years, the only road to follow is that of the
imperishable ideal of the fraternity of nations.
Karl Hjalmar
BRANTING
If the attainment of peace is the ultimate objective of all statesman, it is, at the
same time, something very ordinary, closely tied to the daily life of each individual. In
familiar terms, it is the condition that allows each individual and his family to pursue,
without fear, the purpose of their lives. It is only in such circumstances that each
individual will be able to devote himself, without the loss of hope for the future of
mankind, to the education of his children, to an attempt to leave upon the history of
mankind the imprint of his own creative and constructive achievements in the arts,
culture, religion, and other activities fulfilling social aspirations. This is the peace which
is essential for all individuals, peoples, nations, and thus for the whole of humanity.
Eisaku SATO
We affirm the independence of the humanitarian from the political, but this is
not to polarize the «good» NGO against «bad» governments, or the «virtue» of civil
society against the «vice» of political power. Such a polemic is false and dangerous. As
with slavery and welfare rights, history has shown that humanitarian preoccupations born
in civil society have gained influence until they reach the political agenda. But these
convergences should not mask the distinctions that exist between the political and the
humanitarian.
A comparison of China and India – the world’s two most populous countries –
which both have achieved remarkable progress in food production – is illustrative of the
point that increased food production, while necessary, is not sufficient alone to achieve
food security. Huge stocks of grain have accumulated in India, while tens of millions
need more food but do not have the purchasing power to buy it.
Norman E. BORLAUG
Oslo
September 8, 2000
I would describe the meaning of this Nobel Prize, in the first place as a tribute to
the Indian people who have been sacrificed and have disappeared because they aimed
at a more dignified and just life with fraternity and understanding among the human
beings. To those who are no longer alive to keep up the hope for a change in the situation
in respect of poverty and marginalisation of the Indians, of those who have been
banished, of the helpless in Guatemala as well as in the entire American Continent….
From these basic features derive behaviour, rights and obligations in the American
Continent, for Indians as well as for non-Indians, whether they be racially mixed, blacks,
whites or Asian. The whole society has the obligation to show mutual respect, to learn
from each other and to share material and scientific achievements, in the most convenient
way. The Indians have never had, and they do not have, the place that they should have
occupied in the progress and benefits of science and technology, although they have
represented an important basis.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not
ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And
the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference.
Elie WIESEL
In every area of human creativity, indifference is the enemy; indifference of

evil is worse than evil, because it is also sterile.
Elie WIESEL
indifference, then, is not only a sin, it is a punishment. And this is one of the
most important lessons of this outgoing century's wide-ranging experiments in good and
evil.
Elie WIESEL
What is indifference? Etymologically, the word means "no difference." A

strange and unnatural state in which the lines blur between light and darkness, dusk and
dawn, crime and punishment, cruelty and compassion, good and evil.
Of course, indifference can be tempting -- more than that, seductive. It is so

much easier to look away from victims. It is so much easier to avoid such rude
interruptions to our work, our dreams, our hopes. It is, after all, awkward, troublesome, to
be involved in another person's pain and despair. Yet, for the person who is indifferent,
his or her neighbour are of no consequence. And, therefore, their lives are meaningless.
Their hidden or even visible anguish is of no interest. indifference reduces the other to
an abstraction.
Elie WIESEL
Just as peace is indivisible, so also is justice.
????? Amnesty International
Since the important thing is to secure delay and open discussion - that is to say,
time to enable public opinion to act, and information to instruct it - this is not a
serious objection to the proposal.
I am not an authority in genetics, but from my readings and life-long observation I

do not see any evidence that we are genetically condemned to commit evil. On the
contrary, on very general grounds I would say that genetically we are destined to do
things that are of benefit to the human species, and that the negative aspects are mistakes,
transient errors in the process of evolution. In other words, I believe in the inherent
goodness of Man.
Joseph ROTBLAT
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

Martin Luther
KING
An injustice is an injustice and it comes in all languages. It has no boundaries-it

doesn't begin or end in one specific part of the world - it's all over the world.
Betty WILLIAMS
As always, it is the innocent - and particularly the children - who are the main
victims of these conflicts.
Above all, we owe it to the children of the world to stop the conflicts and to create
new horizons for them. They deserve peace and decent opportunities in life. I should like
to dedicate this address to them and to all those - such as UNICEF, the United Nations
Children's Fund - who are working to alleviate their plight.
David A. Morse, International Labour Organisation

Moved by that appeal and inspired by the eminence you have thrust upon us,
we undertake that we too will do what we can to contribute to the renewal of our world so
that none should, in future, be described as the "wretched of the earth"
Nelson
MANDELA
The Intellectual Relief Service also undertook to aid the many artists
deprived of their freedom, sending them musical instruments, paintbrushes, et cetera.
There is nothing more moving than to hear from behind barbed wire, occasional strains of
music freeing the hearts of unhappy prisoners from their misery for a few moments of
escape into a world where art triumphs over cruelty.
Rouge
Every man lives in two realms, the internal and the external. The internal is
that realm of spiritual ends expressed in art, literature, morals, and religion. The external
is that complex of devices, techniques, mechanisms, and instrumentalities by means of
which we live. Our problem today is that we have allowed the internal to become lost in
the external. We have allowed the means by which we live to outdistance the ends for
which we live. So much of modern life can be summarized in that arresting dictum of the
poet Thoreau: "Improved means to an unimproved end".
This is the serious predicament, the deep and haunting problem confronting
modern man. If we are to survive today, our moral and spiritual "lag" must be eliminated.
Enlarged material powers spell enlarged peril if there is not proportionate growth of the
soul. When the "without" of man's nature subjugates the "within", dark storm clouds
begin to form in the world.
This problem of spiritual and moral lag, which constitutes modern man's chief
dilemma, expresses itself in three larger problems which grow out of man's ethical
infantilism. Each of these problems, while appearing to be separate and isolated, is
inextricably bound to the other. I refer to racial injustice, poverty, and war.
Martin Luther KING
Jr.
I recognize that many physicists are smarter than I am--most of them theoretical
physicists. A lot of smart people have gone into theoretical physics, therefore the field is
extremely competitive. I console myself with the thought that although they may be
smarter and may be deeper thinkers than I am, I have broader interests than they have.
Linus PAULING
The inevitable result was the balance of power, the arms race, the dividing up of
the world into rival alliances, and ultimately, war. This condition of affairs had deep roots
in the economic system which led to competition for foreign trade, markets, and sources
of raw material that was one of the major causes of the conflict. Four years of world war,
at a cost in human suffering which our minds are mercifully too limited to imagine, led to
the very clear realization that international anarchy must be abandoned if
civilization was to survive.
Arthur
HENDERSON
Now it is not difficult to see what causes that tragic seesaw. We use power, of
course, in the international fields in a way which is the exact contrary to the way in
which we use it within the state. In the international field, force is the instrument of the
rival litigants, each attempting to impose his judgment upon the other. Within the state,
force is the instrument of the community, the law, primarily used to prevent either of the
litigants imposing by force his view upon the other. The normal purpose of police - to
prevent the litigant taking the law into his own hands, being his own judge - is the precise
contrary of the normal purpose in the past of armies and navies, which has been to enable
the litigant to be his own judge of his own rights when in conflict about them with
another.
Norman ANGELL
When I came to the United Nations in October 1988, I brought a package of

environmental initiatives. One of them called for creating a global nongovernmental
organization to help save the environment. Named the International Green Cross,
at my suggestion, it is based near Geneva and has affiliates in dozens of countries. Our
main goal is to help set in motion a value shift in people's minds. Our environmental
education programs, in cooperation with the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization and several governments, aim at helping people understand a simple truth:
man is not the master of nature but just a part of it. After all, the environment has existed
for billions of years without man and could, in extremis, do so again. So this is the
challenge: we need environmentally sustainable development if new generations are to
succeed us on earth.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
Those who believe that international institutions can be made and have
been made to work, want now to go forward. Those who doubt it, hesitate.
Philip J. NOEL
-BAKER
Our Institute of International Law can justly claim the distinction of being the first
international association to base its work on recognition of the fundamental truth that the
advance of international law is the basis necessary to all efforts for peace and justice
in international relations. It is only right that I recall at this point the name of the man to
whom credit for this distinction is primarily due, the man who first took the initiative in
bringing about the realization of the idea, the leading founder of our Institute, the eminent
Belgian scholar and statesman Rolin-Jaequemyns.
I am not saying that the application of these truths would solve every political -
and social problem, any more than the prevention of bubonic plague solves the whole
problem of health, but that the application of these simple social truths would have
enabled us to avoid such political pestilences as war, and so to have reduced enormously
the scale of our problem.
We fail, not from lack of knowledge in the sense that we lack the knowledge to
cure cancer or communicate with Mars. Our evils are due mainly to the failure to apply to
our international relationships knowledge which is of practically universal
possession, often self-evident in the facts of daily life and experience.
Norman ANGELL
And are there not new overriding interests, which, for all Governments, now that
a great new international policy is by their common consent to be adopted, should
come before the old shibboleths of freedom and secrecy in military preparation-
shibboleths which, so far, be it noted, have failed to bring us security from war?
Philip J. NOEL
-BAKER
In present-day international politics the problems of security and

disarmament are more intimately intertwined than in the theoretical treatment.
Ludwig QUIDDE
Economically, the consequences of internationalism are obvious and have already

been hinted at. The main concept is that of an international solidarity expressed in
practice through worldwide division of labour: free trade is the principal point in the
program of internationalism. This also agrees with the latest ideas and theories in the
field of natural science. Concord, solidarity, and mutual help are the most important
means of enabling animal species to survive. All species capable of grasping this fact
manage better in the struggle for existence than those which rely upon their own strength
alone: the wolf, which hunts in a pack, has a greater chance of survival than the lion,
which hunts alone.
I am sure that I do not, in this connection, have to deal in any detail with the
subject of nationalism and internationalism. The sort of internationalism which
rejects the sovereignty of a nation within its own borders and which aims ultimately at its
complete obliteration in favour of a cosmopolitan unity, has never been other than a
caricature of the true international spirit.
Karl Hjalmar
BRANTING
In exercising our intellectual powers we have to be responsible for the social

impact of our work. Responsibility for one's actions, is of course, a basic requirement of
every citizen, not just of scientists. Each of us must be accountable for our deeds. But the
need for such responsibility is particularly imperative for scientists, if only because
scientists understand the technical problems better than the average citizen or politician.
And knowledge brings responsibility.
Joseph ROTBLAT
In the study of matter we can be honest, impartial, true. That is why we succeed in
dealing with it. But about the things we care for - which are ourselves, our desires and
lusts, our patriotisms and hates - we find a harder test of thinking straight and truly. Yet
there is the greater need. Only by intellectual rectitude and in that field shall we be
saved. There is no refuge but in truth, in human intelligence, in the unconquerable mind
of man.
Norman ANGELL
I made it clear not long ago that I believe that the time is here for the
international community to make a collective effort to try and break the impasse,
stop the killing and bring the parties to the table. I am reasonably confident that we will
see some activities on that front.
Kofi ANNAN
Here we encounter two conflicting concepts with which we must come to grips in
our time: the idea of national solidarity and the idea of international
cooperation. The superficial view is that the intellectual, spiritual, and emotional
faculties of a nation are bounded by geographic, linguistic, and ethnic barriers. To
contrast national solidarity and international cooperation as two opposites seems foolish
to me. As Germany's representative in Geneva, I tried to discuss this particular point. I
expressed the belief that it cannot have been intended in the divine plan that man's
noblest abilities should be working in opposition to one another. I tried to make the point
that the man who cultivates to the highest degree the qualities inherent in his national
culture will gain insight into universal knowledge and feeling which transcend the
limitations of his own heritage; and he will create works which, like cathedrals, although
built upon the soil of his native land, will soar into the heaven of all mankind. A
Shakespeare could have arisen only on English soil. In the same way, your great
dramatists and poets express the nature and essence of the Norwegian people, but they
also express that which is universally valid for all mankind. Dante can be understood
only within the context of Italian thought, and Faust would be unthinkable if divorced
from its German background; but both are part of our common cultural heritage. They
break the bonds which bind them to their own nations, yet they are great only because
their inspiration is so firmly rooted in their own countries. National culture can act as a
bridge, instead of an obstacle, to mutual spiritual and intellectual understanding. The
great men of a nation reach out to all mankind. They are unifying, not divisive;
internationally conciliating and still great nationally. The French Minister Herriot
expressed this well at the international music festival at Frankfurt am Main when he said,
"A worker for internationalism must first have a sense of nationalism." He also said, "To
work effectively for peace, a man must first know peace within himself."
Gustav STRESEMANN
I call upon serenity and wise judgment to avoid a rushed and insensate response
that could only result in an offensive revenge that only would feed an escalation of
violence, that although knowing how and where it begins, nobody could predict when it
is going to end. I call upon the use of all available resources leading to a dialogue in order
to build a world based on a common understanding, a fair acknowledgement of the
problems that the international community faces, the existence of international law
and an institutional framework, and the way the existing-selective and unilateral-
hegemonic system affects a peaceful cohabitation.
Rigoberta Menchú TUM

It was upon this commitment of individual human beings to each other's welfare
that Amnesty International was founded. It began as the idea of an international
movement of concerned individuals working to secure for all people the freedom to
hold and express their convictions. It began with the outrage of one man who, when
confronted with the plight of unjustly detained individuals, called on others to join with
him to rouse international public opinion, to do something concrete, to end the feeling of
solitary impotence in the face of persecution, and, where human beings are at stake, to
break down all barriers.
At the Congress in Rome on November 13, 1891, an International Peace

Bureau was set up. This bureau was, in my mind, originally intended as a sort of focus
for the whole peace movement, forming a bond of association between all institutions and
individuals who desired to cooperate for peace, and serving as a source of information.
But it soon developed that the Inter-parliamentary Conference, which was held
immediately afterward, would not agree to anything of this kind. In the following year,
however, in 1892 in Bern, the conference explored the setting up of an inter-
parliamentary bureau. Since that time small rifts have appeared; a kind of dualism has
asserted itself between the international and the inter-parliamentary work for peace. I
believe that this dualism is in the process of being smoothed out, and the trend should
rapidly gather momentum. The proposals which are adopted at [peace] congresses should
be referred to the [inter-parliamentary] conferences, and in turn the congresses should
strive to influence the people and to implement the decisions which are taken at the inter-
parliamentary conferences. It would, moreover, be desirable for some persons to be
members both of the Inter-parliamentary Council and of the Board of the World Peace
Bureau (just as I am myself).
Fredrik BAJER
For too long the diplomats and the theorists of international law ignored each
other and disdained each other; as a result of this mutual scorn, now fortunately ended,
both theoretical studies and diplomatic agreements have suffered. International
relations have become so complex that, if they are to be regulated effectively in view of
the many interests at stake, the co-operation of various jurisdictions. is indispensable.
This is especially true now that the scope of conventional law has been extended to
include almost all aspects of political, economic, juridical, and administrative affairs. As
we have found in recent conferences, we must now call upon experts in all categories. By
doing so we create a climate for the successful collaboration that is so necessary.
Louis RENAULT
There is at least as much need to curb the cruel greed and arrogance of part of the
world of capital, to curb the cruel greed and violence of part of the world of labour, as to
check a cruel and unhealthy militarism in international relationships.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
I, the undersigned, desire peace on earth. I want all armed forces to be abolished. I
want a joint police force to be created, to which each nation should contribute according
to the size of its population. I want that force to be subject to an International
Supreme Court. I want all states to be in duty bound to refer any kind of international
controversy to this court, and subject themselves to the judgments of the court
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
The tragic events of Black Tuesday, with the horrendous loss of so many
innocent lives, is a shocking reminder of how far we still are from the goal of a
peaceful world. The existence of a powerful group of terrorists capable of
executing such a dastardly act, with the likely support of some States, is a
reflection of the lack of respect for accepted norms of morality.
There is the need for a universal convention to ban the harbouring of terrorist
groups within a State. But in the first instance, all States should adhere to
international treaties and fulfil commitments, even if they transcend national
interests.
Joseph ROTBLAT
11th )
Internationalism is a community theory of society which is founded on

economic, spiritual, and biological facts. It maintains that respect for a healthy
development of human society and of world civilization requires that mankind be
organized internationally. Nationalities should form the constitutive links in a great world
alliance, and must be guaranteed an independent life in the realm of the spiritual and for
locally delimited tasks, while economic and political objectives must be guided
internationally in a spirit of peaceful cooperation for the promotion of mankind's
common interests.
Internationalism is a social and political theory, a certain concept of how

human society ought to be organized, and in particular a concept of how the nations
ought to organize their mutual relations.
The two theories, nationalism and internationalism, stand in opposition to each
other because they emphasize different aspects of this question. Thus, they often oppose
each other on the use of principles in everyday politics, which for the most part involve
decisions on individual cases. But there is nothing to hinder their final synthesis in a
higher union - one might say in accordance with Hegel's dialectic. On the contrary.
Internationalism also recognizes, by its very name, that nations do exist. It simply limits
their scope more than one-sided nationalism does.
On the other hand, there is an absolute conflict between nationalism and
cosmopolitanism. The latter looks away from and wants to remove national conflicts and
differences, even in those fields where internationalism accepts, and even supports, the
fact that nations should develop their own ways of life.
It will not pay to fight wars, because technology such as the Internet and
computers will be the assets to obtain resources.
Lech WALESA
If Friends are to enter into the condition of others, it will be seen that, when
undertaking relief work, they are not satisfied when only administering large impersonal
schemes of feeding, clothing, and housing, but naturally desire to have personal contact
with those in need. If this work is to be done abroad, there is always a danger that
foreigners entering a country intent on helping may by their enthusiasm impose methods
that are alien to the tradition and background of the people. Friends have aimed at
entering into the life of the people. Often they have lamentably failed, but we rejoice to
know of one of our workers who, feeling estranged from the working people of Germany
by reason of her relief-team status, served as a tram conductress for a week, living,
eating, and sharing the problems of her comrades. Or of another English girl, a midwife,
who has donned a sari and is living with her students in the slums of Calcutta, quietly
living down bitterness and racial animosity, with the result that at a meeting of Hindu
men a shy young Indian student-midwife faced the group and condemned the method of
retaliation, pleading for forgiveness and tolerance.
The same principle of belief in others that leads to this intimate sharing of
life for the sake of understanding and better cooperation also forms the basis of the
democratic methods of the Society of Friends. We strive to find corporately the right
course to take, and as true progress is the result of man falling in with the will of the
Creator, thus the periods of worship are the centre of all the work. Here in silent waning
upon God we seek for direction and, in fellowship with each other, try to interpret His
will, whether it be in the conduct of business, the planning of a relief project, or the
unravelling of difficult problems of personal relationship. Even when our work lies with
peoples of different or of no faith, we invite them to share this search for divine direction,
and many find themselves thus strengthened.

Quakers)
Each man is seen as having intrinsic value, and Christ is equally concerned for
the other man as for me. We all become part of the divine family, and as such we are all
responsible for one another, carrying our share of the shame when wrong is done and of
the burden of suffering. In this way a brotherhood is founded which renders impossible a
lack of regard for others, and, as in a family circle, it is the weakest or the most in need
that calls out the greatest desire to help; so the forgotten and suffering people of the world
appeal to the hearts of Friends. It must not be thought that we flatter ourselves that we
have this sense of oneness with humanity to such an extent that we are always alert to the
needs of the situation, or that we have power to meet all the needs that we recognize. We
do however believe that, in responding to the call of God by using the little sympathy that
we have got, more will be given us. The great American Quaker, John Woolman, who
worked untiringly for the freedom of slaves, speaks of training oneself to "enter into the
condition of others". For this reason Friends have been prominent in social reform and in
relief in times of special emergencies.

Quakers)
I want to see Ireland - North and South - the wounds of violence healed,
play its rightful role in a Europe that will, for all Irish people, be a shared bond of
patriotism and new endeavour.
I want to see Ireland as an example to men and women everywhere of what can
be achieved by living for ideals, rather than fighting for them, and by viewing each and
every person as worthy of respect and honour.
I want to see an Ireland of partnership where we wage war on want and poverty,
where we reach out to the marginalized and dispossessed, where we build together a
future that can be as great as our dreams allow.
John HUME
But the idea of an irreconcilable struggle between the old Germany and the
new was confronted by the concept of a synthesis of old and new. Nobody in Germany is
fighting for the reestablishment of the past. Its weaknesses and faults are obvious. What
many do wish to have recognized in the new Germany is respect for what was great and
worthy in the old. All events are linked with personalities that become their symbols. For
the German people, this synthesis of old and new is embodied in the person of their
president. He came as the successor to the first president of the Reich, who rose from the
opposition and with great tact, political wisdom, and patriotism, smoothed the road from
chaos to order and from order to reconstruction. In President von Hindenburg, elected by
the people, the nation sees a unity which transcends parties and a personality which
commands respect, reverence, and affection. Raised in the traditions of the old monarchy
he now fulfils his duties to the young republic during the most difficult and trying times.
The President of the Reich personifies the idea of national unity. On the occasion of his
eightieth birthday which will soon be here, all will join to show that for the
overwhelming majority the concept of Germany itself comes before loyalty to political
parties and ideologies.
Gustav STRESEMANN
National markets are held together by shared values. In the face of economic
transition and insecurity, people know that if the worst comes to the worst, they can rely
on the expectation that certain minimum standards will prevail. But in the global market,
people do not yet have that confidence. Until they do have it, the global economy will be
fragile and vulnerable -- vulnerable to backlash from all the "isms" of our post-cold-
war world: protectionism; populism, nationalism, ethnic chauvinism, fanaticism and
terrorism.
What all those "isms" have in common is that they exploit the insecurity and
misery of people who feel threatened or victimized by the global market. The more
wretched and insecure people there are, the more those "isms" will continue to gain
ground. What we have to do is find a way of embedding the global market in a network
of shared values. I hope I have suggested some practical ways for us to set about doing
just that.
Kofi ANNAN
I have been isolated in Gorky and deprived of my constitutional right to a fair

trial (if grounds for a trial exist). I have also been deprived of: the inviolability of my
home; my freedom of thought and expression; unhindered correspondence and telephone
conversations; treatment by a doctor of my choice; my right to rest; even my right to
leave this city. I refuse to believe that the Presidium issued such a decree. I believe that
Perelygin is in fact blackmailing me with the implicit threat of harsher repression and
new crimes. My banishment from Moscow, my isolation, the simple burglaries followed
by the theft involving drugs were all illegal, but they have happened. What is to prevent
the use of drugs again and some terrible new crime?
I have been forced to live away from my home and under restraint for almost
three years, a period more than sufficient for any investigation and exceeding the terms of
punishment specified for many offences by the Criminal Code. The Soviet press and
official Soviet representatives in their contacts with my colleagues abroad and Western
statesmen and public personalities portray my illegitimate and arbitrary treatment as
stemming from humanitarian motives. But humane law cannot be the source of tyrannical
acts.
Andrei
SAKHAROV
I was isolated from the people.
Andrei
SAKHAROV
I was born in a small Jewish town in White Russia. Nothing Jewish remains of it.
From my youngest childhood, I related to my place of birth as a mere way station. My
family's dream, and my own, was to live in Israel, and our voyage to the port of Jaffa
was a dream that came true. Had it not been for this dream and this voyage, I would
probably have perished in the flames, as did so many of my people, among them most of
my own family.
Shimon PERES
The Italian Revolution was fought first of all to obtain the liberty and unity of
the nation, and then, with that achieved, to join the freest and most advanced nations in
inaugurating a new era of peace, justice, and joint cooperation in the work of civilization.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
Italy, the youngest and the smallest among the great powers, has contributed to
international life her fair share of political ideas, juridical concepts, and moral ideals
which have been both sound and productive and which have served as her compass in
dark and stormy days; they will be her strength, her glory, and her driving spirit in times
to come.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
Unfortunately, like all other nations, Italy has had to yield to the hard necessity
of armaments which from time to time must be increased because they are considered
essential for the conservation of peace in the present state of world turmoil.
The situation is so strangely anomalous that we see even allies fortifying and
arming themselves one against the other; we cannot, however, blame Italy for this.
Of the many examples I could cite to show how strongly the Italian soul is
opposed to the idea of war, I will be content to give you two of the most eloquent ones.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
Indeed, these very characteristics of the physical sciences have led to the "ivory
tower" mentality of the natural scientists, to their assertions that science is neutral, that
it has nothing to do with politics, and should be allowed to be undertaken for its own
sake, without regard to the ways it may be applied. In its extreme form, it was this
attitude that enabled the scientists in the military establishments on both sides of the iron
curtain, in Los Alamos and Livermore, in Chelyabinsk-65 and Arzamas-16, to use their
ingenuity to keep on inventing new, or improving old, instruments of destruction, during
the Cold War. It is this frame of mind that currently enables scientists working in genetic
engineering to propose experiments that could damage our genetic make up
Joseph ROTBLAT
……………..
J
As for Jerusalem, it is the spiritual home of Christians, Muslims and Jews. To
Palestinians, it is the city of cities. The Jewish shrines in the city are our shrines, the same
as the Islamic and Christian shrines. So let us make Jerusalem an international symbol of
this spiritual harmony, this cultural brightness, and this religious heritage of humanity as
a whole.
Yasser Arafat
Jewish history presents an encouraging lesson for mankind. For nearly four
thousand years, a small nation carried a great message. Initially, the nation dwelt in its
own land; later, it wandered in exile. This small nation swam against the tide and was
repeatedly persecuted, banished, downtrodden. There is no other example in all history --
neither among the great empires nor among their colonies and dependencies -- of a
nation, after so long a saga of tragedy and misfortune, rising up again, shaking itself free,
gathering together its dispersed remnants, and setting out anew on its national adventure.
Defeating doubters within and enemies without. Reviving its land and its language.
Rebuilding its identity, and reaching toward new heights of distinction and excellence.
The message of the Jewish people to mankind is that faith and moral vision can
triumph over all adversity.
Shimon
PERES
Let us remember Job who, having lost everything - his children, his friends, his
possessions, and even his argument with God - still found the strength to begin again, to
rebuild his life. Job was determined not to repudiate the creation, however imperfect,
that God had entrusted to him.
Job, our ancestor. Job, our contemporary. His ordeal concerns all humanity. Did
he ever lose his faith? Is so, he rediscovered it within his rebellion. He demonstrated that
faith is essential to rebellion, and that hope is possible beyond despair.
The source of his hope was memory, as it must be ours. Because I remember, I
despair. Because I remember, I have the duty to reject despair.
Elie WIESEL
The other day I received 15 dollars from a man who has been on his back for
twenty years, and the only part that he can move is his right hand. And the only
companion that he enjoys is smoking. And he said to me: I do not smoke for one week,
and I send you this money. It must have been a terrible sacrifice for him, but see how
beautiful, how he shared, and with that money I bought bread and I gave to those who are
hungry with a joy on both sides, he was giving and the poor were receiving. This is
something that you and I - it is a gift of God to us to be able to share our love with others.
Mother TERESA
I firmly believe that none of the objections is truly fundamental and that the
principle must therefore triumph in the end. Jurists and diplomats will do well to devote
some careful study to these lively, sometimes impassioned, but always courteous
discussions of 1907. They will gain a clearer insight into the difficulties that must be
overcome and so be better able to work out the proper solutions.
Louis RENAULT
With the passage of time, the vision of the just society as a precondition for a
peaceful world has grown dim. The vision must not be lost.
That is why no nation, however big or small, invests the individuals of which it is
composed with the right to mete out their own forms of justice by force. In any
nation, whatever dissension arises, whatever quarrel breaks out, society sends the parties
in the dispute to a court of justice, categorically forbidding them to resort to arms in order
to settle their claims. To disobey this law is to join the ranks of felons and criminals.
Ferdinand BUISSON
In general, one can say that it is through its professional approach to very difficult,
often arduous, and consequently rather slow work that the Institute strives to achieve its
aim. According to the first article of its statutes, this aim is to "encourage progress in
international law", by trying to formulate the general principles of the science so as to
meet the standard of the judicial conscience of the civilized world, and by actively
supporting every serious effort made toward the gradual and progressive codification of
international law.
….
]ustitia et pace is the motto of the Institute. It means we cannot hope to achieve
peace until law and justice regulate international as well as national relations. It means
eliminating, as far as possible, the sources of international friction which result from
uncertainties and differences of opinion in the interpretation of the law. It means
constructing by unremitting and patient work, block by block, the foundation that will
support the rule of law over nations and peoples.
Another faith is my belief in the justice of history. In 1980, I was sentenced to

death by the military regime. For six months in prison, I awaited the execution day.
Often, I shuddered with fear of death. But I would find calm in the fact of history that
justice ultimately prevails. I was then, and am still, an avid reader of history. And I knew
that in all ages, in all places, he who lives a righteous life dedicated to his people and
humanity may not be victorious, may meet a gruesome end in his lifetime, but will be
triumphant and honored in history; he who wins by injustice may dominate the present
day, but history will always judge him to be a shameful loser. There can be no exception.
KIM Dae Jung

K
To keep the peace! What a noble and magnificent idea! How many hopes are
stirred by the thought that this greatest of all ideals - the maintenance of peace - should be
the objective of an international convention bearing the signatures of most of the nations
of the world! How sad to relate, then, that it is precisely this part of the Hague
Convention of July 29, 1899, which to date has been applied least. For it has averted
neither the Boer War nor the Russo-Japanese Wars, not to speak of colonial wars.
The Kellogg Pact is a solemn declaration, invaluable if life is brought into

conformity with its words, delusory if actions contradict its great and noble sentiments.
Lars Olof Nathan SOEDERBLOM
The Court decreed that separate facilities are inherently unequal and that to
segregate a child on the basis of race is to deny that child equal protection of the law.
This decision came as a beacon light of hope to millions of disinherited people. Then
came that glowing day a few months ago when a strong Civil Rights Bill became the law
of our land. This bill, which was first recommended and promoted by President
Kennedy, was passed because of the overwhelming support and perseverance of
millions of Americans, Negro and white. It came as a bright interlude in the long and
sometimes turbulent struggle for civil rights: the beginning of a second emancipation
proclamation providing a comprehensive legal basis for equality of opportunity. Since the
passage of this bill we have seen some encouraging and surprising signs of compliance. I
am happy to report that, by and large, communities all over the southern part of the
United States are obeying the Civil Rights Law and showing remarkable good sense in
the process.
Martin Luther KING
Jr.
Let us hope that this spirit will become the order of the day. As Arnold Toynbee
says: "Love is the ultimate force that makes for the saving choice of life and good against
the damning choice of death and evil. Therefore the first hope in our inventory must be
the hope that love is going to have the last word." We can no longer afford to worship the
God of hate or bow before the altar of retaliation. The oceans of history are made
turbulent by the ever-rising tides of hate. History is cluttered with the wreckage of
nations and individuals that pursued this self-defeating path of hate. Love is the key to
the solution of the problems of the world.
Martin Luther KING

Jr.
It will not be presumptuous of us if we also add, among our predecessors, the

name of another outstanding Nobel Peace Prize winner, the late Rev Martin Luther King
Jr.
He, too, grappled with and died in the effort to make a contribution to the just
solution of the same great issues of the day which we have had to face as South Africans.
Let the strivings of us all, prove Martin Luther King Jr. to have been correct,
when he said that humanity can no longer be tragically bound to the starless midnight of
racism and war.
Let the efforts of us all, prove that he was not a mere dreamer when he spoke of
the beauty of genuine brotherhood and peace being more precious than diamonds or
silver or gold.
Nelson
MANDELA
It remains now to realize the second ideal.

If King Victor Emmanuel III (who deserves recognition from civilization
for founding the International Institute of Agriculture which will certainly yield benefits
useful to all in the future world economy) will lend his support to the fulfilment of the
Italian Revolution with respect to Italy's place in the world, he will gain added renown
for himself and his subjects and at the same time strengthen the bond of affection
between himself and his people.
"Courage ever high and ever for liberty, for justice, and for peace among
peoples." This is the motto with which both people and sovereigns can face all obstacles
and strive to reach the highest goals.
I speak here without mandate, but I speak as a man who has followed closely
(sometimes as one of the lesser participants) every phase of the political renaissance of
his country and who has in the supreme moments of our national epic felt the stirrings of
the Italian soul.
I express to you my deepest gratitude. No one is as capable of gratitude as one

who has emerged from the kingdom of night. We know that every moment is a
moment of grace, every hour an offering; not to share them would mean to betray them.
Our lives no longer belong to us alone; they belong to all those who need us
desperately….
Elie WIESEL
The knowledge and information age of the 21st century promises to be an

age of enormous wealth. But it also presents the danger of hugely growing wealth gaps
between and within countries. The problem presents itself as a serious threat to human
rights and peace. In the new century, we must continue the fight against the forces that
suppress democracy and resort to violence. We must also strive to deal with the new
challenge to human rights and peace with steps to alleviate the information gap, to help
the developing countries and the marginalized sectors of society to catch up with the new
age.
KIM Dae Jung
The Korean peninsula is surrounded by the four powers of the United States,
Japan, China and Russia. Given the unique geopolitical location not to be found in any
other time or place, the continued US military presence on the Korean peninsula is
indispensable to our security and peace, not just for now but even after unification.
Look at Europe. NATO had been created and American troops stationed in
Europe so as to deter the Soviet Union and the East European bloc. But, now, after the
fall of the communist bloc, NATO and US troops are still there in Europe, because they
continue to be needed for peace and stability in Europe.
KIM Dae Jung
There is no direct evidence that nuclear weapons prevented a world war.

Conversely, it is known that they nearly caused one, The most terrifying moment in my
life was October 1962, during the Cuban Missile Crisis. I did not know all the facts - we
have learned only recently how close we were to war - but I knew enough to make me
tremble.
The lives of millions of people were about to end abruptly; millions of others
were to suffer a lingering death; much of our civilization was to be destroyed. It all hung
on the decision of one man, Nikita Krushchev: would he or would he not yield to the
US ultimatum? This is the reality of nuclear weapons: they may trigger a world war; a
war which, unlike previous ones, destroys all of civilization.
Joseph
ROTBLAT
L
The Burmese people can today hold their heads a little higher in the knowledge
that in this far distant land their suffering has been heard and heeded
AUNG SAN Suu

Kyi
Landmines distinguish themselves because once they have been sown, once the
soldier walks away from the weapon, the Landmines cannot tell the difference
between a soldier or a civilian -- a woman, a child, a grandmother going out to collect
firewood to make the family meal. The crux of the problem is that while the use of the
weapon might be militarily justifiable during the day of the battle, or even the two weeks
of the battle, or maybe even the two months of the battle, once peace is declared the
Landmines does not recognize that peace. ..
The Landmines is eternally prepared to take victims. In common parlance, it is
the perfect soldier, the "eternal sentry." The war ends, the Landmines goes on killing.
Jody WILLIAMS
The Palestinian people enjoy a rich cultural and literary tradition, and the Arabic
language is one of the major and most poetic languages in the world. As a people
whose language has frequently been placed under attack, we are committed to literary
freedoms, and to the free expression of all nations and states. language is the living
expression of a people’s heritage and cultural identity. The commitment to such human
and civilized values encourages a promising and peaceful future for us all.
Yasser ARAFAT
Man has the right not only to be equal but also to be different. By the same token, man
has the right not only to speak the language of the country in which he lives, but also
the l language of his personal heritage. A democratic community is measured not only
by its freedom of speech, but also by the freedom of its citizens to express themselves in
the language of their ancestors.
Shimon PERES
I believe it is the right of every person to be able to express themselves in the

language of their choice. …
In recognising the value of individual languages we acknowledge the dignity
and worth of our fellow human beings.
Archbishop Desmond TUTU
Language is determinant. It frames the problem and defines response, rights

and therefore responsibilities. It defines whether a medical or humanitarian response is
adequate. And it defines whether a political response is inadequate. No one calls a rape a
complex gynecologic emergency. A rape is a rape, just as a genocide is a genocide. And
both are a crime. For MSF, this is the humanitarian act: to seek to relieve suffering, to
seek to restore autonomy, to witness to the truth of injustice, and to insist on political
responsibility.
I am convinced that language is the vehicle that permits thought to be in

accordance with the knowledge and the world vision of a given culture, of a given
people, who have inherited this from their ancestors and which, at the same time, makes
it possible to pass it on to the new generations.
One serious obstacle to the smooth working of congresses is the language

barrier. At the first peace congress in Paris in 1889, only French was used. When the
initial session had ended, the Englishmen got together and asked that everything be
translated into their language. President Frédéric Passy, however, said that he could not
accede to this request because the Germans would then demand a German translation,
and so on. It has since been agreed that speeches given in English will be translated into
French and vice versa, and even into German and Italian when necessary. No doubt
translations into Esperanto will also soon be in demand. If everyone understood
Esperanto, this language could be used everywhere, but that is surely a long way off. I
would have thought it possible to choose delegates for these larger conferences who, even
if they could not speak the principal languages, could at least understand them or could
have friends seated beside them who could keep them informed on essential points.
Fredrik BAJER
Authority under law must, I know, be respected as the foundation of society and
as the protection of peace.
Lester B.
PEARSON
The effort necessary to remain uncorrupted in an environment where fear is an

integral part of everyday existence is not immediately apparent to those fortunate enough
to live in states governed by the rule of law. Just laws do not merely prevent corruption
by meting out impartial punishment to offenders. They also help to create a society in
which people can fulfil the basic requirements necessary for the preservation of human
dignity without recourse to corrupt practices. Where there are no such laws, the burden
of upholding the principles of justice and common decency falls on the ordinary people.
It is the cumulative effect on their sustained effort and steady endurance which will
change a nation where reason and conscience are warped by fear into one where legal
rules exist to promote man's desire for harmony and justice while restraining the less
desirable destructive traits in his nature.
AUNG SAN Suu

Kyi
All attempts to further human progress should have far-reaching aims, and those
who wish to take an active part in the effort should not lose patience if the progress
sometimes appears to be very slow or even to sustain interruptions and setbacks.
The goal, the undisputed and inviolable reign of law in international relations, is
most certainly still a long way off, and we must accept the probability that many
generations will perish in the desert before mankind reaches the promised land. But let us
take heart in the discerning words spoken by Mirabeau a century ago: " Law will one day
become the sovereign of the world."
Ferdinand
BUISSON
No man is above the law, and no man is below it.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
The solution of the world's problem - the problem of atomic war - is that we must
- we must bring law and order into the world as a whole...
Linus Carl
PAULING
That old law about "an eye for an eye" leaves everybody blind. The time is
always right to do the right thing.
Martin Luther
KING
The talks did have an incidental effect... but the substance of the negotiation was a
tour de force of effrontery by Le Duc Tho while I polished a few-one-liners.
Henry
KISSINGER
People ask the difference between a leader and a boss. The leader works in the
open, and the boss in covert. The leader leads, and the boss drives.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
Yet this is an aspect of the problem which is curiously neglected. We seem to

assume that if only someone could find the cure for our disease, some new plan, we
should at once see that it was the cure and apply it. We ask for leaders and leadership.
But if the right course, which the leader indicates, is regarded by the multitudes sincerely
as the wrong one, they will declare that he is no leaders but a misleaders. Inevitably in
a democracy the leader is he who expresses existing convictions in the most vivid way,
who possesses, as someone puts it, "the common mind to an uncommon degree".
Norman ANGELL
In closing, let me emphasize the all-important point that Jesus Christ summed up
the outstanding, unfailing, and abiding secret of all truly great and enduring leadership in
the Word: "He who would be greatest among you shall be the servant of all." He Himself
embodied this truth and became "the Prince Leader of the Faith", that is, the leader of
the leaders
John Raleigh MOTT
This is a time that the world should stand together in pursuit of those objectives.
Terrorism seeks to put itself above and outside of the law. Our steps against terrorism
should studiously be within international law and the charter of our world body.
We need wise leadership and statesmanship in this period of looming crisis.
The actions taken should not deepen tensions and further divide the world for it is in
those circumstances of strife and division that terrorism finds fertile ground.
Nelson MANDELA
Desmond TUTU
There is an irresistible demand to strengthen the leadership of the

constructive forces of the world at the present momentous time. This is true
because of stupendous, almost unbelievable changes which have taken place in recent
years on every continent. Extreme nationalism and Bolshevism have broken up the old
world, a new world is in the making. It is literally true that old things are passing away;
all things may become new, granted we have wise, unselfish, and determined guides.
John Raleigh MOTT
Moreover, we have come out into an age in which in every land the economic
facts and forces are matters of primary and grave concern. It finds us with twentieth-
century machinery but with antiquated and inadequate political, social, and religious
conceptions and programs. As a result literally millions of men are unemployed,
discontented, and embittered.
An insistent demand has come to augment the leadership of the forces of
righteousness and unselfishness in order to meet constructively the startling
development of divisive influences on every hand. Obviously these alarming
manifestations are in evidence in the economic realm. Here we have in mind not simply
the obvious - the age-long conflict between the rich and the poor, between the employed
and the unemployed - yes, something more alarming, something suggested by the phrases
economic imperialism, commercial exploitation, and the unjust use of the natural
resources and so-called open spaces of the world. Other of these alarming divisive forces
have been in evidence in the international realm and have been accomplishing their
deadly work on an overwhelmingly extensive scale in recent years in two world wars.
Still other of these divisive manifestations have been in the sphere of race relations. In
some respects this has become most serious because most neglected.
Above all, such strengthened leadership is essential and imperatively demanded if
the constructive forces of the world are to be ushered into a triumphant stage. Irresistible
is the demand on every hand and in every land for men to restudy, rethink, restate, revise
and, where necessary, revolutionize programs and plans, and then, at all costs, to put the
new and longer programs into effect.
John Raleigh
MOTT
Today we have at our disposal the experience of the League of Nations of

Geneva and of the organization of the United Nations to judge the efficacy of
international institutions. These will be able to render considerable service in putting
forward their mediation in conflicts at their birth, in taking the initiative in creating
common enterprises of the nations and by other actions of this nature, according to
circumstances.
Albert SCHWEITZER
I do not overlook the fact that the appearance of these new, free nations in the
European political community not only celebrates the return of the prodigal son but also
creates new sources of friction here and there. There is all the more reason, therefore, to
concentrate on the other great benefit which has resulted from the past years of darkness:
the beginning development of a League of Nations in which disputes between
members are to be solved by legal methods and not by the military superiority of the
stronger.
……..
Even with its faults, which can and must be remedied if our civilization is to
survive, the League of Nations is succeeding - for the first time after a huge military
catastrophe - in opening perspectives of a durable peace and of justice between the free
and independent nations of the world, both large and small.
Karl Hjalmar
BRANTING
Does it mean that we have learned from the past? Does it mean that society
has changed? Has the human being become less indifferent and more human? Have we
really learned from our experiences? Are we less insensitive to the plight of victims of
ethnic cleansing and other forms of injustices in places near and far?
Elie WIESEL
In our epoch the learned provide us with works that are outstanding for their
expertise and deep sincerity. They are no longer merely concerned with the differences
between ideologies and social systems, their concern now is the future of man and
whether he has any future at all. They are concerned with problems which extend beyond
the borders of individual states and beyond continents. They make a science of politics,
and this science is one in which the rich, the more advanced powers must jointly
participate. It is one which no country can any longer pursue for itself.
Willy BRANDT
Under modern conditions the spreading of ideas, of hard-won knowledge, of

achieved beauty goes on unceasingly and is largely spontaneous. There is also an endless
network of organized cooperation among specialists in every field, through learned
societies, technical journals, exhibitions, literary reviews, all of which tends to make
accessible to all whatever has been created or learned.
Emily Greene BALCH
Peace, like freedom, is no original state which existed from the start; we shall
have to make it, in the truest sense of the word.
To achieve this we shall have to know more about the origin of conflicts. This is
where the institutions of peace and conflict research are faced with huge tasks. As I see it,
next to reasonable politics, learning is in our world the true credible alternative to
force….
Willy BRANDT
It is my belief that "leaving ourselves in peace" with our self-conceit and

evil passions does not lead to real peace. Peace can be reached only through fighting
against the ancient Adam in ourselves and in others.
Nathan
SODERLOM
An International Bill of Rights came into being with the adoption in 1966 of the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, together with its Optional Protocol,
and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. In 1976, when
these covenants were ratified by the requisite number of states, they came into force. As
provided for by the first of these covenants, an 18-member Human Rights Committee has
now been created. Made up of independent experts, this committee holds out the promise
of an effective international human rights mechanism. Unfortunately, at present only a
few states are signatories to the Optional Protocol and therefore subject to the Human
Rights Committee. The strengthening of such legal machinery is, in the opinion of
Amnesty International, a key element in the struggle for human rights.
Let us consider the urge toward liberty. In the shape of revolt from alien
domination and of demand for independence this has been a major shaping force in
modern history. The desire for liberty has also made itself felt as struggle against
domestic tyranny or arbitrary rule.
At the same time, liberty, as a personal ideal, as a revolt against authority in the
realm of ideas, has enriched men's minds and strengthened their character and self-
dependence. It has been a great current of fresh air quickening the atmosphere. The sense
that freedom, in this sense, is a supreme value for the individual, a necessity for advance
and growth, is not shared by all peoples; the acceptance or refusal of this ideal of freedom
is perhaps the deepest cleft between the communist and non-communist worlds.
At the same time it is fair to realize that it is not easy to be consistent. "Founding
fathers" of the American Republic were able to say that men were born equal and at the
same time uphold Negro slavery. Men who are scandalized at the lack of freedom in
Russia do not ask themselves how real is liberty among the poor, the weak, and the
ignorant in capitalist society. In the same way men who are aghast at what they call
"wage slavery" tolerate in their social system the hideous infringement on human
personality of a totalitarian police state.
Emily Greene BALCH
Please forgive the great liberty I have taken in thus expressing myself; it is a
liberty taken by a jurist influenced by a sincere love for justice and not by any political
considerations. I am less concerned with criticizing the attitude of this or that delegation
than with paying homage to that of a delegation which has correctly understood the role it
should play.
Louis RENAULT
The all too frequent use of emergency regulations, preventive detention, and
martial law need to be considered in the light of the indivisibility of human rights rather
than in the context of so-called conflicting rights and liberties, or economic development
versus political freedom. Attempts to justify human rights violations through the concept
of the defence of human rights itself are common. Liberties are restricted in the name
of Liberty - with a capital "L". Countries call themselves "free" when their restrictions
on various freedoms are made in the name of Freedom. These same countries claim that
nations whose restrictions bear other labels are not free. It is often overlooked that human
dignity and the free mind presuppose a whole network of interconnected rights which
equally require protection, and the violation of any one of these, by implication, truncates
the whole. Attempts are made to justify curtailments of human rights on the ground that a
larger national interest is at stake. These are often the first step in a deliberate reduction
of the whole network of human rights, when these are perceived as a threat to established
interests.
We must create a life worthy of ourselves and of the goals we only dimly
perceive
Andrei SAKHAROV
The leaders of nations must provide their peoples with the conditions -- the
infrastructure, if you will -- which enables them to enjoy life: freedom of speech and
movement; food and shelter; and most important of all: life itself. A man cannot enjoy
his rights if he is not alive. And so every country must protect and preserve the key
element in its national ethos: the lives of its citizens.
Yitzhak Rabin
Some pacifists have carried the sound idea of the prime importance of security too
far, to the point of declaring that any consideration of disarmament is superfluous and
pointless as long as eternal peace has not been attained.
That is a doctrinaire view which does not take the facts into account. Limitation
of armaments in itself is economically and financially important quite apart from
security. This argument is so well known and so often discussed that there is no need to
linger over it. It will be sufficient to point to the enormous burdens which armaments
place on the economic, social, and intellectual resources of a nation, as well as on its
budget and taxes.
But that is not all. Disarmament or limitation of armaments, which depends
on the progress made on security, also contributes to the maintenance of peace. The
increase in armaments, the endless arms race - this in itself is a potential cause of war.
Influential military men want to demonstrate that their profession has some use. Many
people who are disturbed by the terrible growth of armaments become accustomed and
resigned to the belief that war is inevitable. They say, "Better a terrible end than an
endless terror." That is the greatest cause of war. Every success in limiting armaments is
a sign that the will to achieve mutual understanding exists, and every such success thus
supports the fight for international law and order.
Ludwig QUIDDE
There are limits to humanitarianism. No doctor can stop a genocide. No

humanitarian can stop ethnic cleansing, just as no humanitarian can make war. And no
humanitarian can make peace. These are political responsibilities, not humanitarian
imperatives. Let me say this very clearly: the humanitarian act is the most apolitical of all
acts, but if it actions and its morality are taken seriously, it has the most profound of
political implications. And the fight against impunity is one of these implications.
I hope that unlimited respect for linguistic rights becomes a reality for it is a
basis for coexistence and pacific cultural exchange between countries.
Adolfo PEREZ ESQUIVEL
We understand their call, that we devote what remains of our lives to the use of
our country's unique and painful experience to demonstrate, in practice, that the normal
condition for human existence is democracy, justice, peace, non-racism, non-sexism,
prosperity for everybody, a healthy environment and equality and solidarity among the
peoples.
Nelson MANDELA
The case of the displaced and refugees in Guatemala is heartbreaking; some of them are
condemned to live in exile in other countries, but the great majority live in exile in
their own country. They are forced to wander from place to place, to live in ravines
and inhospitable places, some not recognized as Guatemalan citizens, but all of them are
condemned to poverty and hunger. There cannot be a real democracy as long as this
problem is not satisfactorily solved and these people are reintegrated to their lands and
villages.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Just as I have said today, I have said that if I don't go to Heaven for anything else
I will be going to Heaven for all the publicity because it has purified me and sacrificed
me and made me really ready to go to Heaven. I think that this is something, that we must
live life beautifully, we have Jesus with us and He loves us.
Mother TERESA
For two decades, in the Ministry of Defence, I was privileged to work closely
with a man who was and remains, to my mind, the greatest Jew of our time. From him I
learned that the vision of the future should shape the agenda for the present; that you can
overcome obstacles by dint of faith; that you may feel disappointed -- but never despair.
And above all, I learned that the wisest consideration is the moral one. David Ben-Gurion
has passed away, yet his vision continues to flourish: to be a singular people, to live at
peace with our neighbours.
Shimon PERES
With the end of the Cold War and shifting centres of power, the world was
capable of looking at war and peace in terms other than simply avoiding nuclear
holocaust. Organizations and individuals began to look at how wars had actually been
fought during the Cold War and what weapons and methods of warfare had had the most
significant impact on the lives of civilians. Also, possible responses by governments
to issues of global concern were no longer as constrained as during the Cold War, when
the two major powers dominated diplomacy.
Jody WILLIAMS
Individuals need to be made aware of the rights which are theirs, and of the
national machinery which exists to protect these rights. The whole of mankind, from the
ordinary citizen to the statesman, needs to learn that real concern for human rights and
effective machinery for their protection is in the interest of all. This interest can be
summarized as living in freedom in a peaceful world.
With respect to the local conflicts raging day-in and day-out at all too many
locations around the world, a strategy for abatement begins with the recognition that
nearly all of the killing and maiming in these wars is being done by artillery, mortars,
small arms, and land mines, and that most of this equipment in most cases is imported. It
ought to be possible, therefore, to limit this violence by restricting international flows of
light weapons; doing so poses practical difficulties, but a determined effort including
strengthened export controls, scrapping stockpiles of surplus light weapons, and helping
governments improve their border and customs controls is well worth undertaking.
Adding a prohibition of anti-personnel land mines to the United Nations Inhumane
Weapons Convention would also be worthwhile.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
France's need for special security against the still so remote danger of a war of
retribution was satisfied in the fall of 1925 by the Locarno Pact. It is not necessary to
dwell on this at length. The guarantees of peace are reciprocal, and I think it is important
to emphasize this. But from the French point of view the most important result was that
Germany voluntarily recognized its western boundaries as those stipulated in the Treaty
of Versailles. Since Locarno the security of western and central Europe is provided for to
the extent that treaties are ever capable of guaranteeing security.
Ludwig QUIDDE
Those who strive for these ideals, however, cannot succeed in the long run when,
years after the war, foreign bayonets remain unsheathed in a nation which, although
defeated, rejects revenge and asks only for peace. The policy of Locarno is
incompatible with policies of distrust, violence, and oppression. Locarno is the policy
of understanding and free will. It is the policy of faith in a new future and, in contrast to
the policies of the past, it must become the policy of the future. Germany faces this future
with a stable nation which has been based upon hard work, upon an economy which will
give increasing millions income and security in our cramped territory, and upon a vital
spirit which strives for peace in accordance with the philosophies of Kant and Fichte.
Gustav STRESEMANN
I exhort the international community not to fall in a logic of war, seeking

retribution for old and new controversies among nations and justifying actions against
groups and sectors that have not found a pluralist disposition for the recognition and
respect of their individual expressions in the existing institutional frameworks.
Rigoberta Menchú
TUM
Hungry for our love, and this is the hunger of our poor people. This is the hunger
that you and I must find, it may be in our own home.
I never forget an opportunity I had in visiting a home where they had all these old
parents of sons and daughters who had just put them in an institution and forgotten
maybe. And I went there, and I saw in that home they had everything, beautiful things,
but everybody was looking towards the door. And I did not see a single one with
their smile on their face. And I turned to the Sister and I asked: How is that? How is it
that the people they have everything here, why are they all looking towards the
door, why are they not smiling? I am so used to see the smile on our people, even the
dying one smile, and she said: This is nearly every day, they are expecting, they are
hoping that a son or daughter will come to visit them. They are hurt because they are
forgotten, and see - this is where love comes.
Mother TERESA
Since my people entrusted me with the hard task of searching for our lost home,
I have been filled with warm faith that those who carried their keys in the diaspora as
they carry their own limbs, and that those who endured their wounds in the homeland and
maintained their identity will be rewarded by return and freedom for their sacrifices. I
have also been filled with faith that the arduous trek on the long path of pain will end in
our home's yard.
Yasser Arafat
Because I believe that love begins at home, and if we can create a home for the
poor - I think that more and more love will spread. And we will be able through this
understanding love to bring peace, be the good news to the poor. The poor in our own
family first, in our country and in the world.
Mother TERESA
Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend.
Martin Luther
KING
Love until it hurts
Mother TERESA
Love is the key to the solution of the problems of the world.

Martin Luther
KING
With love we will be able to overcome all the evil that is in the world.
Mother TERESA
History is being rewritten, and the progress of popular education is making men
familiar with it; and as the world, which worships strength and has most applauded
military glory, grows in knowledge, the great commanding figures rising far above the
common mass of mere fighters, the men who win the most imperishable fame have come
to be the strong, patient, great-hearted ones like Washington, and Lincoln, and William
the Silent, and Cavour, whose genius, inspired by love of country and their kind,
urges them to build up and not to destroy. The sweetest incense offered to the memory of
the soldier is not to the brutal qualities of war but to the serene courage ennobled by
sympathy and courtesy of a Bayard or a Sidney. The hero-worshipper is gradually
changing from the savage to the civilized conception of his divinities. Taken all in all, the
clear and persistent tendencies of a slowly developing civilization justify cheerful hope.
We may well turn from Tripoli and Mexico and the Balkans with the apocryphal
exclamation of Galilei, "And still the world moves."
Elihu ROOT
When I speak of love I am not speaking of some sentimental and weak response
which is little more than emotional bosh. I am speaking of that force which all of the
great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is some how the
key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality. This Hindu-Muslim-Christian-
Jewish-Buddhist belief about ultimate reality is beautifully summed up in the First Epistle
of Saint John:
Let us love one another: for love is of God; and everyone that loveth is born of
God, and knoweth God.
He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.
If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and His love is perfected in us.
Martin Luther
KING
War was the avenue to all that mankind desired. Food, wives, a place in the sun,
freedom from restraint and oppression, wealth of comfort, wealth of luxury, respect,
honour, power, control over others, were sought and attained by fighting. Nobody knows
through how many thousands of years fighting men have made a place for themselves
while the weak and peaceable have gone to the wall. Love of fighting was bred in the
blood of the race because those who did not love fighting were not suited to their
environment and perished. Grotius himself sets war first in the title of his great work, De
jure belli ac pacis, as if, in his mind, war was the general and usual condition with which
he was to deal, and peace the occasional and incidental field of international relations.
And indeed the work itself deals chiefly with war and only incidentally with peaceful
relations.
Elihu ROOT
I am a lover of peace and I try to work for justice because only thus do I
believe we can ever hope to establish durable peace. It is self-defeating to justify a truce
based on unstable foundations of oppression. Such a truce can only be inherently
unstable, requiring that it be maintained by institutional violence
Desmond TUTU
The fantastic advances in communication and transportation have shrunk our
globe. All nations of the world have become close neighbours. Modern information
techniques enable us to learn instantly about every event in every part of the globe. We
can talk to each other via the various networks.
This facility will improve enormously with time. because the achievements so far
have only scratched the surface, Technology is driving us together. In many ways we are
becoming like one family.
I'm advocating the new loyalty to mankind I am not suggesting that we give up
national loyalties. Each of us has loyalties to several groups - from the smallest, the
family, to the largest, at present, the nation. Many of these groups provide protection for
their members. With the global threats resulting from science and technology, the whole
of humankind now needs protection. We have to extend our loyalty to the whole of the
human race.
Joseph ROTBLAT
M
……………..
There are some very violent women in the world and I've met some of the most
peace loving, beautiful women in the form of Aung San Suu Kyi, Corazon Aquino. It's
not the Margaret Thatchers we want to be, if we're going to be a power for the good.
It has to be a power where we show how wrong sexism is by not being sexist ourselves.
Betty WILLIAMS
There is nothing new about poverty. What is new, however, is that we have the
resources to get rid of it. More than a century and a half ago people began to be disturbed
about the twin problems of population and production. A thoughtful Englishman named
Malthus wrote a book that set forth some rather frightening conclusions. He predicted
that the human family was gradually moving toward global starvation because the world
was producing people faster than it was producing food and material to support them.
Later scientists, however, disproved the conclusion of Malthus, and revealed that he
had vastly underestimated the resources of the world and the resourcefulness of man.
Martin Luther KING

Jr.
No man is worth calling a man who will not fight rather than submit to infamy or
see those that are dear to him suffer wrong.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
Without freedom, there is no revolution. All oppression runs counter to man’s

spirit.
Oscar Arias SANCHEZ
Five years ago people would have seriously questioned the sanity of anyone who
would have predicted that Mr Mandela and I would be joint recipients of the 1993
Nobel Peace Prize.
And yet both of us are here before you today. We are political opponents.
We disagree strongly on key issues and we will soon fight a strenuous election
campaign against one another. But we will do so, I believe, in the frame of mind and
within the framework of peace which has already been established.
We will do it - and many other leaders will do it with us - because there is no
other road to peace and prosperity for the people of our country. In the conflicts of the
past, there was no gain for anyone in our country. Through reconciliation all of us are
now becoming winners.
To Mr Mandela I sincerely say: Congratulations. And in accepting this Peace

Prize today I wish to pay tribute to all who are working for peace in our land. On behalf
of all South Africans who supported me, directly or indirectly, I accept it in humility,
deeply aware of my own shortcomings.
No man is worth calling a man who will not fight rather than submit to infamy
or see those that are dear to him suffer wrong. No nation deserves to exist if it permits
itself to lose the stern and virile virtues; and this without regard to whether the loss is due
to the growth of a heartless and all-absorbing commercialism, to prolonged indulgence in
luxury and soft, effortless ease, or to the deification of a warped and twisted
sentimentality.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
I am confident that we shall succeed in this great task; that the world community
will thereby be freed not only from the suffering caused by war but also, through the
better use of the earth's resources, of the discoveries of scientists, and of the efforts of
mankind, from hunger, disease, illiteracy , and fear; and that we shall in the course of
time be enabled to build a world characterised by economic, political, and social justice
for all human beings and a culture worthy of man's intelligence.
Linus Carl PAULING
I have entitled my subject today "Peace and the Public Mind", by which I mean
the part played by popular opinion, or popular opinions and feelings, in the policies
which lead to wars; a study of the nature of those opinions, of the fallacies which give
them birth.
It is, of course, merely a truism to say that war, like other social or political evils,
is the outcome of the bad management of human society, which is, in its turn, due
to certain errors or deficiencies. But our task is to discern the sort of error or deficiency.
Often efforts towards the preparation of the world for peace are vitiated at the start
because the problem is conceived as one mainly of creating a will-to-peace, of
intensifying the sense of the miseries and horrors of war. That does not get us very far.
For that will and that sense exist. Men honestly want peace (subject to wanting certain
other things, like national defence). The problem is, not so much to create or intensify the
will to peace, which exists, as to find out why that will is frustrated; why policies, the
intention of which is peace, produce war; why men don't see that that will be the
outcome.
Norman ANGELL
Mankind needs peace more than ever, for our entire planet, threatened by
nuclear war, is in danger of total destruction. A destruction only man can provoke, only
man can prevent.
Elie WIESEL
Mankind advances only through struggle.
Gustav STRESEMANN
A force exists which is far greater than France, far greater than Germany, far
greater than any nation, and that is mankind. But above mankind itself stands justice,
which finds its most perfect expression in human brotherhood.
Ferdinand BUISSON
Another irony often mentioned by our members is that at times they have gained
more from the prisoner they sought to help than the prisoner has of the durability of the
human spirit. It is for this reason that our last word should belong to a prisoner.
Some time ago, one of them, now dead, was able to send a letter from prison in which she
wrote:
"They are envious of us. They will envy us all.
For it is an enviable but very difficult task to live through a history as a human
being, to complete a life as a human being.
Soon the night will fall and they will close the doors of the cell.
I feel lonely.
No... I am with the whole of mankind.
And the whole of mankind is with me."
It is mankind's deep tragedy that it so rarely sees reality. We all have in our
eyes «the splint of the goblin looking glass» (as Sigrid UNDSET has called one of her
books). We see what we desire to see, not naked reality. Or we have before our eyes
mists, stereotypes inherited from our parents, from our grandparents, even from our
great-grandparents. Intellectually we are wearing the cast-off clothes of our ancestors,
and we do not see, we do not understand that they no longer fit us.
….
Few people, if any, have done as much as Sir Norman to remove «the splint of the
goblin looking glass» in our eyes, to clear away the mists which prevent us from seeing
the road we should travel. He has done it, and he goes on doing it, because he has a
profound and warm belief in what he calls in one of his books «the potential rationalism
of mankind».
Let us hope that his optimism may be vindicated.

It is a well-known fact that, for centuries, the rights of native peoples have been
negated and violated; they are neither acknowledged nor respected. It is also known that
these peoples have not remained passive in the face of the discrimination and racism on
which their exploitation is based. They have always found the strength to resist
oppression and marginalisation. They have played a main role not only in their
history but in the very same history of the countries where they live and, thus, they have
contributed to the universal historical process.
At the turn of the XXI century, it is extremely painful and immoral that the
situation of many peoples is still a situation of discrimination, marginalisation and
exploitation. So runs the life of native peoples. Their rights are neither acknowledged nor
respected. This cannot go on. It is necessary to construct new spaces and mechanisms for
intercultural relation on the basis of absolute respect among cultures and peoples.
Without democracy the market economy cannot blossom, and without market
economics, economic competitiveness and growth cannot be achieved.
KIM Dae Jung
I have no idea of making a comprehensive list of unifying tendencies and can
barely refer to one of the master qualities of our common human
endowment, desire for beauty - desire to perceive and, above all, to create beauty. Art
in its myriad forms - music, literature, architecture, sculpture, painting, and handicraft -
endows mankind, at least potentially, with common treasures in words or colour or
harmonies, which modern technical inventions, from photography to radio, tend to spread
without limit.
Emily Greene BALCH
Material progress is of course important for human advancement. In Tibet,

we paid much too little attention to technological and economic development, and today
we realise that this was a mistake. At the same time, material development without
spiritual development can also cause serious problems, In some countries too much
attention is paid to external things and very little importance is given to inner
development. I believe both are important and must be developed side by side so as to
achieve a good balance between them. Tibetans are always described by foreign visitors
as being a happy, jovial people. This is part of our national character, formed by cultural
and religious values that stress the importance of mental peace through the generation of
love and kindness to all other living sentient beings, both human and animal.
Lama
An abundance of maternal love is wanted to shield and guide the whole of

humanity
Baroness Bertha von
SUTTNER
The work that MSF (Médecin sans Frontières) chooses does not occur in
a vacuum, but in a social order that both includes and excludes, that both affirms and
denies, and that both protects and attacks. Our daily work is a struggle, and it is intensely
medical, and it is intensely personal. MSF is not a formal institution, and with any luck at
all, it never will be. It is a civil society organization, and today civil society has a new
global role, a new informal legitimacy that is rooted in its action and in its support from
public opinion. It is also rooted in the maturity of its intent, in for example the human
rights, the environmental and the humanitarian movements, and of course, the movement
for equitable trade. Conflict and violence are not the only subjects of concern. We, as
members of civil society, will maintain our role and our power if we remain lucid in our
intent and independence.
……….
It is likely that the fourteenth Inter-parliamentary Conference, which is to meet

next week in London, will express this opinion (The Conference adopted a model
arbitration treaty for powers that did not consider themselves in a position to submit all
international disputes to arbitration). Under such circumstances, military powers will still
have too many opportunities and too many pretexts to unleash the horrors of war. This is
what compulsory mediation could prevent. And even if this very simple and logical
method were not accepted, then another possibility would still remain: compulsory
contractual mediation, whereby nations having incomplete treaties of arbitration would
be compelled to insert into these treaties the following clause which the United States and
Great Britain had adopted in their draft treaty of 1897: "In the event a dispute arises
which is not subject to arbitration under the terms of the present treaty, the contracting
parties undertake to request the mediation of one or several friendly powers." This
formula would make an outbreak of war impossible without some attempt at conciliation
having been made first. Now this is crucial. For it is hardly tenable that, once mediation
has been accepted, agreement should not finally be reached. Peace negotiations between
Japan and Russia were fraught with so many difficulties that success appeared to be out
of the question; yet the voice of President Roosevelt prevailed in the end.
I must say a few words about mediation. It has been gradually realized that it is
not possible to entrust the maintenance of peace to the jurisdiction of arbitration courts
alone. Arbitration courts can be used for those cases which are suitable for litigation. But
the most serious and dangerous disputes arise over conflicts of interest which are not
subject to the rules of legal process. In such cases, mediation is needed to decide what is
equitable and fair, taking into consideration the interests at stake. A parallel can be found
in the social sphere. Dangerous disputes between employers and employees, which can
lead to great strikes, are settled by mediation rather than by the courts. It is the same in
the international sphere. International mediation needs to be organized just as much as
does arbitration.
Ludwig QUIDDE
Without memory, our existence would be barren and opaque, like a prison cell
into which no light penetrates; like a tomb which rejects the living….. For me, hope
without memory is like memory without hope.
Elie WIESEL
Do not let us shrink from even strong measures of pacification and

reconciliation. Believe me, they will justify themselves in the future. I will say to this
Assembly with all the emphasis at my command, let their motto be: ‹Be just and fear
not.›
I call upon the media to avoid alarmist sensationalism based on interpretations of

strong ideological bias that only increases the confusion and feeds the ghosts of
intolerance. …
Rigoberta Menchú Tum
If the battle against terrorism is limited to military operations, the world

could be the loser. But if it becomes an integral part of common efforts to build a
more just world order, everyone would win - including those who now do not
support American actions or the antiterrorism coalition. Those people, and they
are many, should not all be branded as enemies.
……
Finally, it would be wrong to use the battle against terrorism in order to
establish control over countries or regions. This would discredit the coalition and
close off the prospect of transforming it into a mechanism for building a peaceful
world. Turning the coalition against terror into an alliance that works to achieve a
peaceful and just world order would be a lasting memorial to the thousands of
victims of the Sept. 11 tragedy.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
I believe in this method because I think it is the only way to re-establish a broken
community. It is the method which seeks to implement the just law by appealing to the
conscience of the great decent majority who through blindness, fear, pride, and
irrationality have allowed their consciences to sleep.
Martin Luther KING
Jr.
A Middle East without wars, without enemies, without ballistic missiles,

without nuclear warheads.
Shimon PERES
I think my land became a land of a gun culture. A land that used to be called the
Land of Saints and Scholars flipped. There's never a happy medium anywhere-it's either
right or wrong. That's what gets the human race in so much trouble-because they're never
looking for the middle road-that Buddhism talks about. You have to walk that middle
road.
In Ireland probably the hardest thing was not to be a Catholic or a Protestant not
to have my own bigotries because of what happened to me as a Catholic in Ireland-to
forgive that-to understand that people in Northern Ireland have a lot more to unite them
than they ever had to divide them and that God should never be used as a device of force.
Betty WILLIAMS
In conflict, this framework is international humanitarian law. It establishes rights

for victims and humanitarian organisations and fixes the responsibility of states to ensure
respect of these rights and to sanction their violation as war crimes. Today this
framework is clearly dysfuntional. Access to victims of conflict is often refused.
Humanitarian assistance is even used as a tool of war by belligerents. And more
seriously, we are seeing the militarisation of humanitarian action by the
international community. In this dysfunction, we will speak-out to push the political to
assume its inescapable responsibility. Humanitarianism is not a tool to end war or to
create peace. It is a citizen's response to political failure. It is an immediate, short term act
that cannot erase the long term necessity of political responsibility.
Our generation must get rid of the militarisation of the world, and above all
of Europe, which the preceding generation thrust upon it. It is a deep-rooted and
malignant disease for which palliatives do not suffice, and of which civilized society may
die if it be not ended.
Philip J. NOEL
-BAKER
Militarism had been stunned by the disasters which had been brought upon the
world in the Great War. One saw not only the terrible suffering the war had caused, but
also the fact that even the victors had gained little or no advantage; and, as has often
happened before, the overwhelming feeling amongst the peoples of the world was that
whatever happened we must never again allow the structure of human society to be so
imperilled. But militarism, though stunned, was not dead; it was bound to revive, and it
has revived. Its immense traditions, its picturesque features, the attraction of military
ritual and even military music and all that goes with it, besides the illusion of strength
which military preparations give to those who indulge in them - all these things appeal to
great elements of human nature which, I suppose, will always exist and which it is our
business to keep in check. Then I must add, myself, that these natural tendencies to
glorify material power and strength have been greatly helped by the existence of gigantic
organizations in many countries commanding vast financial strength and having at their
disposal all the means of modern propaganda. I mean the great armaments undertakings
of the world.
At last, however, it has dawned on many people in all countries that militarism
lies like a heavy curse over the land. Perhaps, though, the reason for this does not lie
entirely in the unutterable woe of war - woe which defies description. Unfortunately we
have not yet reached the stage where militarism is condemned on these grounds.
We do not yet consider it beneath ourselves to invent and develop tools of
destruction. We have not yet been seized with a holy wrath against evil, against
militarism 's coarsening influence on our inner selves, an influence which darkens our
view of life and nurtures that frightened and insidious distrust which beguiles us into
inflicting on each other so much suffering, so much wrong and sorrow.
……..
The relation between the pressures of militarism and the deterioration of social
conditions becomes more and more apparent. Vast resources are absorbed by militarism,
without benefit to anyone. If these were set free, we could double the harvests of the
nourishing earth, harness the power of roaring rivers for mills and factories, and open up
undreamt of opportunities to challenge the finest talents possessed by man.
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
One thing, however, is certain, and that is that they have contributed appreciably
to the discrediting of war. I leave to the militarists the difficult task of trying to explain
to us how these wars have served to shape character or to promote the progress of
civilization, or to achieve the reign of justice on earth. So far, they have not come
forward with the explanation.
Élie DUCOMMUN
Today there is a confusion and inherent ambiguity in the development of so-called

'military humanitarian operations'. We must reaffirm with vigor and clarity the
principle of an independent civilian humanitarianism. And we must criticize those
interventions called «military-humanitarian». Humanitarian action exists only to preserve
life, not to eliminate it. Our weapons are our transparency, the clarity of our intentions, as
much as our medicines and our surgical instruments. Our weapons cannot be fighter jets
and tanks, even if sometimes we think their use may respond to a necessity. We are not
the same, we cannot be seen to be the same, and we cannot be made to be the same.
Concretely, this is why we refused any funding from NATO member states for our work
in Kosovo. And this is why we were critical then and are critical now of the humanitarian
discourse of NATO. It is also why on the ground, we can work side by side with the
presence of armed forces, but certainly not under their authority.
And so, once again, I think of the young Jewish boy from the Carpathian
Mountains. He has accompanied the old man I have become throughout these years of
quest and struggle. And together we walk towards the new millennium, carried by
profound fear and extraordinary hope.
Elie WIESEL
In conclusion, let me share with you a short prayer which gives me great
inspiration and determination:
For as long as space endures,
And for as long as living beings remain,
Until then may I, too, abide
To dispel the misery of the world.

Lama
Insofar as we are dealing here with misconceptions, they do not arise from the
misinterpretation of a mass of elaborate and difficult data; they arise from the
misinterpretation of a few everyday facts known to everyone. Some of our most
mischievous economic policies arise from similar failure to apply the knowledge we
already possess.
Norman ANGELL
Nothing in the reporting of a nation's history could so mislead the younger

generation as to represent great events in such a way that they appear to have happened
as a matter of course. Nothing is more misleading to the youth of a nation than to
state the outcome immediately after the beginning as if nothing could have taken place in
between. Mankind advances only through struggle. The life of the individual is a
continuous combat with errors and obstacles, and no victory is more satisfying than the
one achieved against opposition. The life of man is not a level plane on which he moves
ahead at will unopposed. A man should not end his days as a pessimist just because his
short span of years has not brought fulfilment of his ideals. The complete realization of
the ideal would remove the life-force which drives each of us forward, for human life
would lose its meaning if there were nothing left for man to envision and strive for.
Therefore, in this account of the difficulties, I do not address myself to the pessimists; I
want to turn to those who ask why we have not made greater progress. I want to show
them that in such times it is unreasonable to suppose that universal distrust and outdated
attitudes will give way at one stroke to a new enlightenment.
Gustav STRESEMANN
You will recall that I began my address with a reference to the girl born in
Afghanistan today. Even though her mother will do all in her power to protect and sustain
her, there is a one-in-four risk that she will not live to see her fifth birthday. Whether she
does is just one test of our common humanity - of our belief in our individual
responsibility for our fellow men and women. But it is the only test that matters.
Remember this girl and then our larger aims - to fight poverty, prevent conflict, or cure disease -
will not seem distant, or impossible. Indeed, those aims will seem very near, and very achievable -- as they
should. Because beneath the surface of states and nations, ideas and language, lies the fate of individual
human beings in need. Answering their needs will be the mission of the United Nations in the
century to come.
Kofi ANNAN
This book endeavours to clear away the mists which prevent so many from
seeing the road.
Norman ANGELL
The man who makes no mistakes does not usually make anything
Theodore ROOSEVELT
Modern civilization has given decent living standards to people in advanced

Western nations. But how do we assure economic well-being and human dignity for the
rest of mankind without ruining the environment? This problem has no purely
technological solution. A political and moral choice will have to be made.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
Indeed, "the means of destruction placed by modern science at the disposal of

modern warfare" possess a power surpassing anything that humanity has so far been
able to conceive. It was not enough for war to take possession of the seas with torpedo
boats and submarines, depriving whole countries of their commerce and even halting the
supply of the most essential foods. There was more to come.
From the day war conquered the skies, nothing could check its progress. It is now
possible to drop from un-measurable heights which defy any defence tons of chemical
products, some capable of destroying the largest cities in the world in a matter of hours,
others of spreading terrible diseases over vast areas, making resistance totally impossible.
Thus, war has put an end to itself. It has put itself in the position of executioner of
the whole earth. (Ever since 1921, the League of Nations has devoted much attention to
the question of chemical warfare. …
We must not forget that chemical warfare will sooner or later bring in its wake
bacteriological warfare, pest propagation, typhus and other serious diseases. The means
of defence against such dangers are as yet totally in adequate.)
Ferdinand
BUISSON
Modern techniques have torn down state frontiers, both economical and
intellectual. The growth of means of transport has created a world market and an
opportunity for division of labour embracing all the developed and most of the
undeveloped states. Thus there has arisen a "mutual dependence" between the world's
different peoples, which is the most striking feature of present-day economic life. Just as
characteristic, perhaps, is the intellectual interdependence created through the
development of the modern media of communication: post, telegraph, telephone, and
popular press. The simultaneous reactions elicited all over the world by the reading of
newspaper dispatches about the same events create, as it were, a common mental pulse
beat for the whole of civilized mankind.
In that moment of great tension just before the finger pulls the trigger, just
before the fuse begins to burn; in the terrible quiet of the moment, there is still time to
wonder, to wonder alone: Is it really imperative to act? Is there no other choice? No other
way?
Yitzhak Rabin
And as the din of battle fades away, the work of civilization must start all over
again in a world of physical and moral chaos. This, then, is what is known as the
ennobling and civilizing influence of war through the ages!
No sooner had the human family begun to recover its balance, to emerge timidly
from the ruins, than new wars came to plunge it back into the morass.
Élie DUCOMMUN
Nevertheless, it is the social issues which unremittingly demand that I make a

responsible personal effort and which also lay increasing claims on my physical and
mental powers. For me, the moral difficulties lie in the continual pressure brought to bear
on my friends and immediate family, pressure which is not directed against me personally
but which at the same time is all around me. I have written about this on many occasions
but, sad to report, all that I said before applies equally today. I am no professional
politician - which is perhaps why I am continually obsessed by the question as to the
purpose served by the work done by my friends and myself, as well as its final result. I
tend to believe that only moral criteria, coupled with mental objectivity, can serve as
a sort of compass in the cross-currents of these complex problems.
Andrei SAKHAROV
In short, sometimes, instead of laying down a hard-and-fast rule, we must limit

ourselves to a recommendation, indeed to a kind of prayer. The resolution is binding
"insofar as is possible", "insofar as circumstances permit", etc. Then, you will say, it is no
longer a legal obligation, but merely a moral duty. True, but it is no small matter that a
moral duty be recognized by the majority of nations. By force of circumstance, it
eventually becomes a part of custom and compels as much acknowledgment as if it had
constituted a strict obligation in the first place. Assistance to enemy wounded was a
charitable duty generally recognized even before the Geneva Convention of 1864 made it
a legal responsibility.
Louis RENAULT
More than ever before, my friends, men of all races and nations are today
challenged to be neighbourly... No longer can we afford the luxury of passing by on the
other side. Such folly was once called moral failure; today it will lead to universal
suicide...
If we assume that mankind has a right to survive, then we must find an alternative
to war and destruction. In our days of space vehicles and guided ballistic missiles, the
choice is either non-violence or non-existence...
Martin Luther KING
In a real sense non-violence seeks to redeem the spiritual and moral lag that I
spoke of earlier as the chief dilemma of modern man. It seeks to secure moral ends
through moral means. Non-violence is a powerful and just weapon. Indeed, it is a
weapon unique in history, which cuts without wounding and ennobles the man who
wields it.
Martin Luther KING

Jr.
The solution of the problems of racial injustice, poverty, and war is in turn
dependent upon man squaring his moral progress with his scientific progress, and
learning the practical art of living in harmony
Martin Luther KING

The old colonies of refugees must continue to live where they are at present, and it
ought to be obvious to every civilized nation that, after some twenty years of uncertain
existence, these poor people should have acquired at least a moral right to live in
peace and security. There must be no more talk of driving them out. They must be helped
to gain a firm foothold and to become useful citizens of their country of residence, in
short to become assimilated in the new relationship. This has been the main task of the
Nansen Office for some years. The High Commission which will take over at the end of
this year must continue this policy, a policy which has won open recognition in those
countries where the number of refugees is greatest.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
International unity is not in itself a solution. Unless this international unity has a
moral quality, accepts the discipline of moral standards, and possesses the quality
of humanity, it will not be the unity we are interested in.
Emily BALCH
The award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Carl von Ossietzky during that evil era of
the Hitler regime meant a great deal. Like Luwig Quidde he had played an active part in
the work of the German Peace Society. In his writings he was strongly critical of
militarism and nationalism. In 1921, he wrote: ‘Many nations have fought against each
other, but the blood that has flowed is of only one kind: the blood of Europe’s citizens.’
That era demanded more from him than civil courage, it demanded his life.
Shortly before the presentation was made, one of those in power tried to exact
from this embarrassing prisoner an assurance that he would refuse the Prize. In return he
was to be set free, given financial security, and not to be bothered again in the future.
Ossietzky refused and went back to prison. At that time I was 22 years old and ‘illegally’
in Berlin, and as I had been directly involved in the ‘campaign’ I was deeply moved by
his decision.
In Carl von Ossietzky the Nobel Committee had honoured a man who had been
persecuted and who could not come here to receive the Prize. That award was a moral
victory over the ruling powers of barbarism.
Willy BRANDT
Science must be learned; it cannot be conquered. An army that can occupy

knowledge has yet to be built. And that is why armies of occupation are passe. Indeed,
even for the defence of the country you cannot rely on the army alone. Territorial
frontiers are no obstacle to ballistic missiles, and no weapon can shield a nation from a
nuclear device. Today, the battle for survival must be based on political wisdom and
moral vision no less than on military might.
Shimon PERES
Moreover, time and again, history has succumbed to the Bible's immortal ideas.
The message that the one, invisible God created man in His image, and hence there are no
higher and lower orders of man, has fused with the realization that morality is the
highest form of wisdom and, perhaps, of beauty and courage, too.
Shimon PERES
The love that infuses the mother-child relationship is the most positive
expression of human hope; it is the wellspring of human life. Baroness Bertha von
Suttner, the great woman who influenced Nobel's thinking, said, "An abundance of
maternal love is wanted to shield and guide the whole of humanity." There is no dearth of
maternal love, no lack of tenderness for the young, only a great yearning for a better
future. Would that there were in equal measure food and clothing, shelter, medicines and
doctors, schools and teachers.

(UNICEF)
The peculiarities of the vision of the indian people are expressed according to the
way in which they relate. First of all, between human being, through communication.
Second, with the earth, as with our Mother, because she gives us our lives and is not
a mere merchandise. Third, with nature, because we are integral parts of it, and not its
owners.
To us Mother Earth is not only a source of economic riches that give us the
maize, which is our life, but she also provides so many other things that the privileged
ones of today strive after. The Earth is the root and the source of our culture. She keeps
our memories, she receives our ancestors and she therefore demands that we honour her
and return to her, with tenderness and respect, those goods that she gives us. We have to
take care of her and look after mother earth so that our children and grandchildren may
continue to benefit from her. If the world does not learn now to show respect to nature,
what kind of future will the new generations have?
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Besides, Mother Nature has crossed species barriers, sometimes even between
species. Wheat, for instance, is the result of a natural cross long before man knew about
cross breeding. What we are doing is only to facilitate this.
Take today's modern red wheat. This is made up of three groups of seven
chromosomes, and each of those three groups of seven chromosomes came from a
different wild grass. So the modern bread that we eat, the wheat for it comes from nature
itself crossing three species barriers, a kind of natural genetic engineering.
Norman E. BORLAUG
Oslo
September 8, 2000
The force which makes for war does not derive its strength from the interested
motives of evil men; it derives its strength from the disinterested motives of good men.
Pacifists have sometimes evaded that truth as making too great a concession to Mars, as
seeming to imply (which it does not in fact) that in order to abolish war, men must cease
to be noble.
Base motives are, of course, among those which make up the forces that produce
war. Base motives are among those which get great cathedrals built and hospitals
constructed-contractors' profit-seeking, the vested interests of doctors and clergy. But
Europe has not been covered by cathedrals because contractors wanted to make money,
or priests wanted jobs. The ordinary man does not face a twenty-five percent income tax,
expose himself to death and mutilation, for the beaux yeux of armament makers. What is
it that induces him thus to hand over his money and his life, or that of his son, as
sacrifices to the God of War?
Norman ANGELL
We have a simple message for the world from this movement for peace.
We want to live and love and build a just and peaceful society.
We want for our children, as we want for ourselves, our lives at home, at work
and at play, to be lives of joy and peace.
We recognize that there are many problems in society which are a source of
conflict and violence.
We recognize that every bullet fired and every exploding bomb makes that work
more difficult.
We reject the use of the bomb and the bullet and all the techniques of violence.
Máiread
CORRIGAN
If there were any need between these two great democracies [the United States
and France] to testify more convincingly in favour of peace and to present to the peoples
a more solemn example, France would be ready publicly to subscribe, with the United
States, to any mutual engagement tending, as between those two countries, to
‹outlaw war›, to use an American expression.
Aristide BRIAND
It is not necessary that the social and economic systems in Russia be identical
with that in the United States, in order that these two great nations can be at peace with
one another. It is only necessary that the people of the United States and the people of
Russia have respect for one another, a deep desire to work for progress, a mutual
recognition that war has finally ruled itself out as the arbiter of the destiny of
humanity. Once the people of the world express these feelings, the East and the West can
reach a reasonable and equitable decision about all world affairs and can march together
side by side, towards a more and more glorious future."
Linus Carl
PAULING
We understand, as never before, that each of us is fully worthy of the respect and
dignity essential to our common humanity. We recognize that we are the products of
many cultures, traditions and memories; that mutual respect allows us to study and
learn from other cultures; and that we gain strength by combining the foreign with the
familiar.
Kofi ANNAN
I was brought up from my earliest youth to believe in the enormous importance of
peace. I have often heard my father, the late Lord Salisbury, say that, though he did not
see how it was possible under the then existing circumstances to avoid wars altogether,
yet he had never been able to satisfy himself that they were in principle morally
defensible.
Indeed, particularly in the latter part of his life, he made more than one speech in
which he expressed the hope that, by some international combination, wars could in the
future be prevented. He did not hesitate to express his belief that some such organization
as we have since then attempted and erected in the League of Nations might furnish the
solution of what he conceived to be the terrific evil of war. For instance, in 1897, in a
speech in which he had been defending the concert or, as he preferred to call it, the
Federation of Europe, he went on to say: “This Federation of Europe is the embryo of the
only possible structure of Europe which can save civilization from the desolating effects
of a disastrous war. You notice that on all sides the instruments of destruction, the piling
up of arms, is becoming greater; the instruments of death are more active and more
numerous, and they are improved with every year; and each nation is bound for its own
safety's sake to take part in this competition. The one hope that we have to prevent this
competition from ending in a terrible effort of mutual destruction which will be fatal to
Christian civilization - the only hope we have is that the Powers may gradually be
brought together in a friendly spirit on all questions of difference which may arise, until
at last they shall be welded in some international constitution which shall give to the
world, as a result of their great strength, a long spell of unfettered and prosperous trade
and continued peace."
The other person who was a great influence in my life was my mother. She was
not an educated person, she did not go beyond the first few years of elementary school.
She ended up working as a domestic servant. I resemble her physically, she was stumpy,
had a big nose like mine but I hope I also inherited some of her other characteristics. My
wife called her the Comforter of the Afflicted because she almost instinctively had a way
of comforting whoever was getting the worst side of the argument. I resemble her a little
bit in that.
DESMOND TUTU
What does mysticism really mean? It means the way to attain knowledge. It's
close to philosophy, except in philosophy you go horizontally while in mysticism you
go vertically.
Elie WIESEL
……………..
N
……….
Bertha von Suttner, who was awarded the Prize in 1905, overestimated the
favourable response to her book Lay Down Your Arm. I am still one of those who were
deeply impressed by the book, and after all else I gladly identify myself with the naïve
humanism of my youth.
Willy BRANDT
And this is by no means the first occurrence for which I owe a debt of gratitude to
the Norwegian people. Indeed, it was my good fortune, during the early stages of the
League of Nations, to cooperate closely with one of the greatest Norwegians of modern
times - I mean, of course, Dr. Nansen . Many are the occasions on which his clear-
sighted courage pointed the way by which the Geneva institution might best achieve
peace. Indeed, his influence on the Assembly of the League was very remarkable.
Representing, as he did, a state which, though it had very many claims to the respect of
mankind, yet certainly was not militarily one of the most powerful nations in Europe, he
nevertheless had far more influence than some of those who represented more powerful
countries. I have felt, during the last few years, how deeply we have missed his inspiring
leadership.
Nor did he stand alone. During the earlier years of the League we were fortunate
in having many statesmen of outstanding ability who were convinced supporters of
international cooperation under the League Covenant. In my own country there was the
late Lord Balfour, who was at the zenith of his reputation as a national and international
statesman and whose singularly acute intellect enabled him, on many occasions, to
perceive the practical way of advance. Then there was Aristide Briand - a man of
immense personal charm and eloquence, profoundly devoted to peace, who at the end of
his life achieved in his own country a position of unrivalled authority in foreign affairs.
Nor must I forget Dr. Stresemann who, though he was not long at Geneva, yet
impressed his personality very remarkably on his colleagues in that institution. Then, too,
there was your neighbour, Dr. Branting - a solid pillar for peace, who had that most
valuable of all gifts, that of inspiring confidence.
It was in 1930 after the death of Fridtjof Nansen during that same year that the
League of Nations decided to establish the Nansen Office. I have on numerous
occasions spoken publicly of the great achievements of Fridtjof Nansen's work for
prisoners of war and refugees. But much still remained to be done when he died. It was
estimated then that there were still 1.100.000 homeless. For the most part these were
Russians who had fled their country after the Revolution of 1917 and the so-called White
generals' revolt against the Soviets, but there were also several hundred thousand
Armenians. As everyone knows, the Armenian people had lost home and country as a
result of the deportations and massacres which they suffered both during and after the
war. In addition, the work of the Nansen Office has embraced a certain number of
Assyrians, Assyro-Chaldeans, and Turks, and since 1935 some thousands of Saarlanders
who had to leave their native land after the plebiscites of that year.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
Let no one refer to the sword of Napoleon I as the instrument of progress and
civilization!
Élie DUCOMMUN
It is precisely this deeply rooted feeling for the importance of the nation that
later becomes the basis and starting point for true internationalism, for a humanity built
not of stateless atoms but of sovereign nations in a free union.
Karl Hjalmar
BRANTING
A nationalism of the worst type has manifested itself in the course of two wars,
and it may be considered at this moment as the greatest obstacle to the entents which is
taking its first shape among the peoples. This nationalism can only be thrust aside by
the renaissance of a human ideal among mankind which will make their attachment to
their country natural and inspired by an ideal of good alloy.
nationalism of bad alloy itself also exists in the overseas countries, above all
among peoples who lived in other times under the guardianship of white people and who
have recently acquired their independence. They run the danger that nationalism may
be their unique ideal. As a result, in several regions, peace which has reigned there up to
the present is put in danger.
Albert SCHWEITZER
"Nationality" is nothing if not a spiritual phenomenon. Renan has given the

valid definition: "A nation is a part of mankind which expresses the will to be a nation; a
nation's existence is a continuous, daily plebiscite - un plébiscite de tous les jours." The
first clause is a circular definition. It is both sharply delimited and totally exhaustive
because it puts the emphasis on the will to be a nation. The concept of nationality thus
moves into the realm of the spiritual. There it belongs, and there it should stay.
We may ask what the next step in the search for an understanding of the nature
of life will be. I think that it will be the elucidation of the nature of the electromagnetic
phenomena involved in mental activity in relation to the molecular structure of brain
tissue. I believe that thinking, both conscious and unconscious, and short-term memory
involve electromagnetic phenomena in the brain, interacting with the molecular
(material) patterns of long-term memory, obtained from inheritance or experience.
Linus Carl
PAULING
I would like for a moment to acknowledge among our invited guests Chantal
Ndagijimana. She lost 40 members of her family in Rwanda's genocide in 1994.
Today she is a part of our team in Brussels. She survived the genocide, but like a million
others, her mother and father, brothers and sisters did not. And nor did many hundreds of
our national staff. I was Head of Mission in Kigali during that time. No words can
describe the sheer courage with which they worked. No words can describe the horror
that they died in. And no words can describe the deepest sorrow that I and all in MSF will
carry always.
At the southern tip of the continent of Africa, a rich reward is in the making, an
invaluable gift is in the preparation, for those who suffered in the name of all
humanity when they sacrified everything – for liberty, peace, human dignity and human
fulfilment …
Nelson R. MANDELA
Small differences often grow into great quarrels, and honest differences of opinion
frequently produce controversies in which national amour propre is involved and
national honour, dignity, and prestige are supposed to be at stake. Rival claimants to an
almost worthless strip of land along a disputed boundary, a few poor fishermen
contesting each others' rights to set nets in disputed waters, may break into violence
which will set whole nations aflame with partisanship upon either side. Reparation
demanded for injury to a citizen or an insult to a flag in foreign territory may symbolize
in the feeling of a great people their national right to independence, to respect, and to an
equal place in the community of nations. The people of a country, wholly mistaken as to
their national rights, honestly ignorant of their international obligations, may become
possessed of a real sense of injustice, of deep resentment, and of a sincere belief that the
supreme sacrifice of war is demanded by love of country, its liberty and independence,
when in fact their belief has no just foundation whatever.
Elihu ROOT
Closely allied to this question of equality of rights is that of national security.

Throughout the long drawn-out proceedings of the Conference, it has been made clear
that states are not prepared to reduce their armaments unless, at the same time, definite
undertakings are given to settle disputes without resort to force and to stand by each other
in upholding treaties against an aggressor or war maker.
Arthur
HENDERSON
The volume of armaments necessary to guarantee the military aspect of national

security is entirely dependent on the armaments of the other powers. It will be said that
national security calls for heavy armaments whenever the powers which must be
reckoned with in framing national policy are heavily armed. If these powers reduce their
armaments, national security will allow their example to be followed.
Ludwig QUIDDE
Hand in hand with nationalist economic isolationism, militarism struggles

to maintain the sovereign state against the forward march of internationalism. No state is
free from militarism, which is inherent in the very concept of the sovereign state. There
are merely differences of degree in the militarism of states. A state is more militaristic the
more it allows itself to be guided by considerations of military strategy in its external and
internal policies.
Of course, it is not a question of giving up one's national independence. We

hold on to that which is dear to our hearts, but we must see things in their true
perspective. Without peace there is no freedom, individual or national. War and
hostilities are a form of slavery. Under such conditions, the laws are silent. Without peace
there is nothing truly human. Peace is harmony. And harmony is the highest ideal of life.
For a long time this fact has been clear to seekers of the lost paradise, those thorn-
crowned servants of humanity. Unnoticed by the world, their work has persevered
through the ages, just as, slowly and quietly in a dark crevice of the earth, the forming of
a brilliant diamond goes on for thousands and thousands of years. No sound rises from
the silent depths while atom fuses with atom and the crystal slowly grows, finally to
gleam and glitter in a royal crown.
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
Nationalism of the worst sort was displayed in the last two wars, and it may be
regarded today as the greatest obstacle to mutual understanding between peoples.
Such nationalism can be repulsed only through the rebirth of a humanitarian
ideal among men which will make their allegiance to their country a natural one inspired
by genuine ideals.
Albert SCHWEITZER
Nationalism has proved excessively dangerous in its divisiveness and its self-
adulation. It has given us an anarchic world of powerful armed bodies, with traditions
steeped in conquest and military glory, and of competing commercial peoples as ruthless
in their economic self-seeking as in their wars.
Emily Greene BALCH
No doubt there is a good deal that is attractive about the nationalist idea. It has
a great history and it has a great deal of appeal to sentiment in itself admirable. But if we
examine what it leads to, I do not doubt that we shall all agree that it must be rejected as a
guiding principle of the nations of the world. For it necessarily leads to an exaggeration
of the authority and dignity of the state to an extent which practically destroys individual
action and individual responsibility. Nationalism leads to totalitarianism, and
totalitarianism leads to idolatry. It becomes not a principle of politics but a new religion
and, let me add, a false religion. It depends partly on a pseudoscientific doctrine of race
which leads inevitably to the antithesis of all that we value in Christian morality.
Without exaggerating our competence, we can perhaps say that the study we have
had to devote to the nature of law, to the conditions of its development, and to its
place in the progress of human civilization in general, gives us the necessary perspective
to judge which factors or events would be most likely to discourage the supporters of
international law and justice. We know that what is called the law of nations dates back
no further than to the beginning of the seventeenth century, and that this whole system of
international conventions which I have just spoken of and which today constitutes an
apparently indispensable basis for international relations has its roots only in the last fifty
or, at most, the last hundred years. What an infinitesimal fraction of time this is within
the entire span of the world's development, past and future! And, if we have managed to
achieve so much in so short a time, then what prospects are nor open to us for future
development?
Ferdinand
BUISSON
We must also consider the nature of peace. The greatest peace, I believe, is the
peace which we derive from our faith in God Almighty; from certainty about our
relationship with our Creator. Crises might beset us, battles might rage about us - but if
we have faith and the certainty it brings, we will enjoy peace - the peace that surpasses all
understanding.
We are the navigators of this space ship called Earth. We transport our conflicts
and happiness, our sadness and our struggle. Each passenger has a particular identity,
belongs to a group of people, to a culture, holds his or her own spiritual, philosophical,
and ethical values. Some and others, oppressed and oppressors, we navigate in the same
vessel. The sun, the moon, the energy of the universe is unavoidable for all of us. We
should face the temporal zone, lower our masts, hold tight to the steering wheel and
prepare ourselves for the arrival at port. The route depends on us.
Adolfo Pérez
ESQUIVEL
You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of
direct action. Non-violent direct action seeks to... foster such a tension that a community
which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue.
Martin Luther KING
And so here I am talking with you - I want you to find the poor here, right in your
own home first. And begin love there. Be that good news to your own people. And find
out about your next-door neighbour - do you know who they are?
Mother TERESA
You'll find that the most peaceful neighbourhoods are neighbours that get
together, neighbours that share street parties, people that go out and care, people that get
into their own area and take control of it, economically, socially and culturally. Those are
very happy neighbourhoods, you know. The estrangement from our neighbour is maybe a
fact that if we get too close, he just might ask us for something.
Betty WILLIAMS
I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering
and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the
victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must
interfere.
Elie WIESEL
Let my words convey to you the joy and the never extinguished hope of the
millions of my brothers – the millions of working people in factories and offices,
associated in the union who very name expresses one of the noblest aspirations of
humanity. Today all of them, like myself, feel greatly honoured by the Prize….
Lech WALESA
We believe that if we achieve peace, true peace, we shall be able to assist one
another in all realms of life, and a new era will be opened in the Middle East: new era
of flourishing and growth, of development and progress and advancement, as in ancient
times ...
Menachem BEGIN
True, we are but at the beginning, but it is the beginning of a great new era in
which the public opinion of mankind renders judgment, not upon peace and war, for a
vast majority of mankind is in favour of war when that is necessary for the preservation
of liberty and justice, but upon the just and unjust conduct of nations, as the public
opinion of each community passes upon the just and unjust conduct of its individual
members. The chief force which makes for peace and order in the community of
individuals is not the police officer, with his club, but it is the praise and blame, the
honour and shame, which follow observance or violation of the community's standards of
right conduct. In the new era that is dawning of the world's public opinion we need not
wait for the international policeman, with his artillery, for, when any people feels that its
government has done a shameful thing and has brought them into disgrace in the opinion
of the world, theirs will be the vengeance and they will inflict the punishment.
Elihu ROOT
The time is ripe for the development of new forms of economic,

technological and scientific co-operation and for the building up of an all-
European infrastructure. And above all: Europe evolved as a cultural community, and it
should again become what it was.
Willy BRANDT
This was the problem facing the new Germany. The way which led to those
events, referred to by your chairman when he mentioned Locarno and Geneva and spoke
of Germany's admission to the League of Nations, was not made easy for Germany. The
courtesy which most becomes a victor was denied to Germany for a long time. Germany
had to assume super-human reparations which the people would never have borne had
there not existed an ageless legacy of service to the state. Historians still often see the end
of the war as meaning nothing more for Germany than lost territories, lost participation in
colonization, and lost assets for the state and individuals. They frequently overlook the
most serious loss that Germany suffered. This was, in my view, that the intellectual and
professional middle class, which traditionally upheld the idea of service to the state, paid
for its total devotion to the state during the war with the total loss of its own wealth, and
with its consequent reduction to the level of the proletariat. Its money became worthless
when the state, which had issued it, refused to redeem it at face value. To what extent
demanding this sacrifice from an entire generation as a service to the state was legitimate
is a matter of controversy which concerns laymen and legislators alike and one which has
not yet been resolved. But all that has taken place in Germany since the war must be
looked at in the light of the mood of this completely uprooted class. As a consequence of
the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, the officer corps of the old army became part of this
class, as did that part of the younger generation who, in the old Germany, would have
become officers or civil servants. Theirs was an economic uprooting. But there was a
mental and political uprooting, as well, of all those who had a deep loyalty to the 500-
year-old tradition of the monarchy and who were now without a solid foundation for their
thinking and emotions. They all had shared in the rise and fall of Germany's fortunes
during the war, but not one had expected this disaster. They did not want to break with
the old because they did not know how to find their way in this changed Germany. As so
often happens in history, their difficulties were increased by the over-zealousness of
those who promoted their innovations too rashly, instead of combining to a certain extent
the old with the new.
Gustav STRESEMANN
In the new Guatemalan society there must be a fundamental reorganization

in the matter of land possession, to allow for the development of the agricultural
potentials, as well as for the return to the legitimate owners of the land that was taken
away from them. And not to forget that this process of reorganization must be carried out
with the greatest respect towards nature, in order to protect her and return to her, her
strength and capability to generate life.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Once these institutions are in place and we begin to work together in our very
substantial common interests, the real healing process will begin and we will erode the
distrust and prejudices of out past and our new society will evolve, based on agreement
and respect for diversity. The identities of both sections of our people will be respected
and there will be no victory for either side.
John HUME
But there are still some within our country who wrongly believe they can make a
contribution to the cause of justice and peace by clinging to the shibboleths that have
been proved to spell nothing but disaster.
It remains our hope that these, too, will be blessed with sufficient reason to realise that
history will not be denied and that the new society cannot be created by reproducing
the repugnant past, however refined or enticingly repackaged.
Nelson MANDELA
Let me close by saying that I have the personal faith that mankind will somehow
rise up to the occasion and give new directions to an age drifting rapidly to its doom. In
spite of the tensions and uncertainties of this period something profoundly meaningful is
taking place. Old systems of exploitation and oppression are passing away, and out of the
womb of a frail world new systems of justice and equality are being born. Doors of
opportunity are gradually being opened to those at the bottom of society. The shirtless
and barefoot people of the land are developing a new sense of "some-bodiness" and
carving a tunnel of hope through the dark mountain of despair. "The people who sat in
darkness have seen a great light.” Here and there an individual or group dares to love, and
rises to the majestic heights of moral maturity. So in a real sense this is a great time to be
alive. Therefore, I am not yet discouraged about the future.
Martin Luther KING

Jr.
That (military) system is doomed to failure. Once a new system begins to

emerge, the old ones must fall. The conviction that it is possible, that is necessary, and
that it would be a blessing to have an assured judicial peace between nations is already
deeply embedded in all social strata, even in those that wield the power. The task is
already so clearly outlined, and so many are already working on it, that it must sooner or
later be accomplished. A few years ago there was not a single minister of state professing
the ideals of the peace movement. Today there are already many heads of state who do
so.
Bertha von SUTTNER
The International Commission to which the League of Nations appealed believes

it necessary to acquaint the whole world with the altogether new conditions which could
be created by a new war. They are so frightening that no comparison can give even an
inkling of their possibilities. The direct consequences would be the destruction of the
human race and the abandonment of all that has, up to now, constituted civilization.
Ferdinand BUISSON
……….
In listing these tendencies making for a new world, we must not forget
developments in the religious or spiritual thinking and feeling of mankind, where also we
feel a strong unifying trend. There is a revulsion from dogmatic creeds and from the
sectarianism of Protestant Christianity. There is a great interest in comparative religion
and a desire to understand faiths other than our own and even to experiment with exotic
cults. There is a tolerance which (where it is not mere apathy and indifference) means
unwillingness to force one's belief, however precious it seems to oneself, on others.
Where our forbears not so long ago held that those who did not accept the correct faith
were bound for literal hell fire, we feel the development of a new spiritual climate. The
Christian reads Rabindranath Tagore, and the Hindu Gandhi reads the Sermon on the
Mount, and wise men from every quarter of the globe discuss their differences fraternally
and humbly.
I have been much interested in Professor Ernest Hocking's book Living Religions
and a World Faith, in which he tries to chart the wide, and widening, area of religious
agreement across religious frontiers.
Emily Greene BALCH
Knowledge and trust are the foundation of a new world order. Hence the
necessity, in my view, to learn to forecast the course of events in various regions of the
globe, by pooling the efforts of scientists, philosophers and humanitarian thinkers within
the United Nations framework. …..
I am an optimist and I believe that together we shall be able now to make the right
historical choice so as not to miss the great chance at the turn of centuries and millennia
and make the current extremely difficult transition to a peaceful world order. A balance
of interests rather than a balance of power, a search for compromise and concord rather
than a search for advantages at other people's expense, and respect for equality rather
than claims to leadership – such are the elements which can provide the ground work for
world progress and which should be readily acceptable for reasonable people informed by
the experience of the twentieth century.
Mikhail S.
GORBACHEV
There is no peace in Southern Africa. There is no peace because there is no

justice. There can be no real peace and security until there be first justice enjoyed by all
the inhabitants of that beautiful land. The Bible knows nothing about peace without
justice, for that would be crying, "Peace, peace, where there is no peace." God's shalom
peace, involves inevitably righteousness, justice, wholeness, fullness of life, participation
in decision making, goodness, laughter, joy, compassion, sharing and reconciliation.
Desmond TUTU
Originally Alfred Nobel thought that he would have his Peace Prize awarded
only six times once every five years, after which it would no longer be necessary. It has
in fact lasted longer, otherwise I would not have had the opportunity of addressing you
here today.
Willy BRANDT
If Alfred Nobel had been alive today, I venture to believe that he would have
welcomed the award of his Peace Prize to the United Nations Children's Fund. He would
have commended its purpose, its effectiveness, and achievement. He would have
understood the infusion of new hope which this recognition will bring to millions of
deprived and tragic children. His own childhood was, as he put it, "every day a renewed
fight for survival". But he did not suffer the pangs of hunger, nor did he know the cruel
vicissitudes of grim poverty. He experienced the warm love of a devoted mother, the
comforts of a good home. Andriette Nobel, tender and calm, brave and intelligent,
sustained him throughout his life. The symbol of UNICEF, a mother clasping her child,
exulting in the healthy baby held high in her arms, would have touched him significantly.
…
……….
A man of science, Nobel understood the potential of technical progress and
scientific discovery. He knew that they could be applied to dispel ignorance, fight
disease, and eliminate hunger. He realized the implications of scientific understanding for
the welfare of mankind and the ability of men of science to influence, even determine,
human destiny.

(UNICEF)
In a world filled with weapons of war and all too often words of war, the Nobel
Committee has become a vital agent for peace. Sadly, a prize for peace is a rarity in
this world. Most nations have monuments or memorials to war, bronze salutations to
heroic battles, archways of triumph. But peace has no parade, no pantheon of victory.
Kofi ANNAN
The awarding of the Nobel Prize to me, a simple monk from faraway Tibet,
here in Norway, also fills us Tibetans with hope. It means, despite the fact that we have
not drawn attention to our plight by means of violence, we have not been forgotten. It
also means that the values we cherish, in particular our respect for all forms of life and
the belief in the power of truth, are today recognised and encouraged. It is also a tribute
to my mentor, Mahatma Gandhi, whose example is an inspiration to so many of us. This
year's award is an indication that this sense of universal responsibility is developing. I am
deeply touched by the sincere concern shown by so many people in this part of the world
for the suffering of the people of Tibet. That is a source of hope not only for us Tibetans,
but for all oppressed people.

Lama
To me, the Nobel Peace Prize means that we can change the world through
non-violence.
Máiread CORRIGAN
I accept the Nobel Prize for Peace at a moment when twenty-two million
Negroes of the United States of America are engaged in a creative battle to end the long
night of racial injustice. I accept this award on behalf of a civil rights movement which is
moving with determination and a majestic scorn for risk and danger to establish a reign of
freedom and a rule of justice.
Martin Luther KING

The UNICEF Executive Board at a special meeting convened in the United
Nations on November 19, 1965, expressed its deep appreciation of the Nobel Peace
Prize award in a resolution. It considered the award a recognition of the importance of
the welfare and rearing of children in a spirit of friendship among nations for peace in the
world, and a tribute to cooperation on behalf of children among governments, United
Nations agencies, and other international organizations; an acknowledgment of the efforts
of millions of volunteers, both as individuals and as members of nongovernmental
organizations, and of the devotion and competence of the UNICEF staff; and expressed
the hope that this award will encourage all countries to increase their cooperative efforts
to improve the condition of children in their own countries and throughout the world.

(UNICEF)
I feel a deep emotion and pride for the honour of having been awarded the Nobel
Peace Prize for 1992. A deep personal feeling and pride for my country and its very
ancient culture. For the values of the community and the people to which I belong, for the
love of my country, of Mother Nature. Whoever understands this respects life and
encourages the struggle that aims at such objectives.
I consider this Prize, not as an award to me personally, but rather as one of the
greatest conquest in the struggle for peace, for the Human Rights and for the rights of the
indigenous people who, along all these 500 years, have been split, fragmented, as well as
the victims of genocides, repression and discrimination.
These countless human beings, both inside and outside our country, had the
nobility of spirit to stand in the path of tyranny and injustice, without seeking selfish
gain. They recognised that an injury to one is an injury to all and therefore acted together
in defence of justice and a common human decency.
Because of their courage and persistence for many years, we can, today, even set
the dates when all humanity will join together to celebrate one of the outstanding human
victories of our century.
Nelson MANDELA
We are not satisfied with merely bringing together those inspired by zeal for this
noble endeavour. We want the churches to be officially or at least semiofficially
represented - and this is truly difficult to bring about. Why struggle with the present
church system, rigid as it has been for centuries and, if not immovable, at least very
difficult to handle? The prophets, the Saviour, and St. Paul were not called by any
church. They were called by God, and they spoke on behalf of God. We must listen to
them and their followers, even though it may be painful, humiliating, and even contrary
to our thoughts and habits. But we must also take care that the voice of Christian faith,
love, and hope be heard.
Nathan SODERLOM
Nobody's brave all the time. Nobody's courageous all the time. We all have
our moments of fear. I'm a human being and I have moments of fear. Fear is a very
crippling emotion. When I get afraid then I do all of the wrong things.
Betty WILLIAMS
There was a time when war was fought for lack of choice. Today peace is the
"no-choice" option for all of us. The reasons for this are profound and
incontrovertible. The sources of material wealth and political power have changed. No
longer are they determined by the size of territory won by war. Today they are a
consequence of intellectual potential, obtained principally by education.
Shimon PERES
The word that symbolizes the spirit and the outward form of our encounter is non-
violence, and it is doubtless that factor which made it seem appropriate to award a peace
prize to one identified with struggle. Broadly speaking, non-violence in the civil rights
struggle has meant not relying on arms and weapons of struggle. It has meant non-
cooperation with customs and laws which are institutional aspects of a regime of
discrimination and enslavement. It has meant direct participation of masses in protest,
rather than reliance on indirect methods which frequently do not involve masses in action
at all.
Martin Luther KING

Jr.
I am sure, also, that all of us regard this prize less as a reward for past efforts on
behalf of peace than as encouragement and reinforcement for the continuing efforts that
are still required -- from Pugwash, from the many other nongovernmental
organizations (NGO) committed to building peace and international cooperation, from
governments, and, indeed, from every individual who cares about the future of our
civilization.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
Non-violence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our
time; the need for mankind to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to
oppression and violence. Mankind must evolve for all human conflict a method which
rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.
Martin Luther KING
I want to tell that young man non-violence is the weapon of the strong. Violence
is the easy way.
In Ireland, at one stage in my life I would have picked up a gun, I think, because I
saw the injustices being perpetrated on my people. Then to make a statement like that to
that young man seems a very sweeping thing to say. However, the answer is non-
violence.
Non-violence is not a thing that comes easily. You have to learn how to be non-
violent.
The toughest thing I've ever done in my life was to be a non-violent person in
Northern Ireland.
The easiest thing in the world is retaliation-when somebody gives you a dig in the
jaw, your natural reaction is to hit them back. It is so much harder not to go that way.
Non-violence is the right way to go. There is no other way.
If that young man lives in that area, he sees his friends die all the time. Why?
Because they became involved in violence. Maybe he can become a leader in that group
and have the spiritual force-I hate to say the non-violent force or whatever-help him. It
sounds so airy fairy. It's so hard to do.
These things are so hard to do. They're awfully easy to say. However, following
this through is a very difficult thing. I have to do it every day of my life.
You don't think I get angry when I see children die? I'm furious. I want to go to
the government, but I come home and bake bread. There's nothing as good as yeast for
pummelling, when you want to really find another way to get rid of that hostility.
I swear to God, it's an incredible force for good if you can remember that non-
violence is the weapon of the strong.
Surely one of the greatest teachers was the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King.
Betty WILLIAMS
Non-violence is a respect for life and for the individual. That is to say, non-
violence is not a method of non-aggression (as it is often Considered), but rather a way of
life, and a way of understanding the relationship of human beings to their fellow beings and
with nature.
Adolfo Perez
ESQUIVEL
I am only too well aware of the human weakness and failures which exist, the
doubts about the efficacy of non-violence, and the open advocacy of violence by some.
But I am still convinced that non-violence is both the most practically sound and
morally excellent way to grapple with the age-old problem of racial injustice.
Martin Luther KING
Therefore, I venture to suggest to all of you and all who hear and may eventually
read these words, that the philosophy and strategy of non-violence become
immediately a subject for study and for serious experimentation in every field of human
conflict, by no means excluding the relations between nations. It is, after all, nation-states
which make war, which have produced the weapons which threaten the survival of
mankind, and which are both genocidal and suicidal in character.
Martin Luther KING
The non-violent approach does not immediately change the heart of the
oppressor. It first does something to the hearts and souls of those committed to it. It gives
them new self-respect; it calls up resources of strength and courage that they did not
know they had. Finally it reaches the opponent and so stirs his conscience that
reconciliation becomes a reality.
Martin Luther KING
At the centre of non-violence stands the principle of love.
Martin Luther KING
I found in the non-violent resistance philosophy of Gandhi... the only

morally and practically sound method open to oppressed people in their struggle for
freedom.
Martin Luther KING
I almost think that for those of us who fight for justice, because that's what this is,
Ladies and Gentlemen, it' s a fight, a non-violent revolutionary fight; but for those
of us who fight for justice, using the techniques of non-violence sometimes we are very
polite, almost far too polite, almost apologetic.
Betty WILLIAMS
There are Hills in Northern Ireland and there are mountains. The hills are
decommissioning and policing. But the mountain, if we could but see it clearly, is not in
front of us but behind us, in history. The dark shadow we seem to see in the distance is
not really a mountain ahead, but the shadow of the mountain behind - a shadow from the
past thrown forward into our future. It is a dark sludge of historical sectarianism. We can
leave it behind us if we wish.
David TRIMBLE
If we could only remember that God loves me, and I have an opportunity to love
others as he loves me, not in big things, but in small things with great love, then
Norway becomes a nest of love. And how beautiful it will be that from here a centre for
peace has been given. That from here the joy of life of the unborn child comes out. If you
become a burning light in the world of peace, then really the Nobel Peace Prize is a gift
of the Norwegian people. God bless you!
Mother TERESA
In recent years Norway has played a central role in fostering dialogue and peace
among historical enemies. In the Middle East and Central America, your discrete nature,
determination and creativity have proven that some of the world's seemingly intractable
conflicts can be resolved when there is an honest mediator and when the parties in the
conflict are willing to end the war.
Small countries like Norway, Costa Rica and Portugal, and others, can succeed in
mediating conflicts when mighty powers failed. Diplomacy and mediation are not
prerogatives of the major powers. The small and medium-size countries without
ambitions to a neo-imperial role and whose strength is their moral integrity are best
placed to open dialogue among the parties in a conflict.
Thank you, people of Norway, for declaring on this singular occasion that our
survival has meaning for mankind.
Elie WIESEL
In this struggle, the Norwegian government and its delegation have taken an
active and honourable part. Imbued with the traditions bequeathed by Fridtjof Nansen,
the Norwegian authorities believed that their country had a special obligation to
champion the cause of the refugees. The name of Norway is therefore mentioned with
deep gratitude among the homeless.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
And now, allow me to say a few words in respectful tribute to the memory of
Alfred Nobel whose last act is responsible for my being here with you. Although Alfred
Nobel was Swedish, he wished the choice and award of the Peace Prize to be in the hands
of the Norwegian Parliament, which, as I have already said, was the first parliament
in Europe to support the idea of international arbitration.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
To a large extent the nuclear arms race was driven by scientists. They kept on
designing new types of weapons, not because of any credible requirement - arsenals a
hundred times smaller would have sufficed for any conceivable deterrence purpose - but
mainly to satisfy their inflated egos, or for the intense exhilaration experienced in
exploring new technical concepts.
Joseph ROTBLAT
Today we ask ourselves once again: Does mutual nuclear terror serve as a
deterrent against war? For almost 40 years the world has avoided a third world war. And,
quite possibly, nuclear deterrence has been, to a considerable extent, the reason for
this. But I am convinced that nuclear deterrence is gradually turning into its own
antithesis and becoming a dangerous remnant of the past. The equilibrium provided by
nuclear deterrence is becoming increasingly unsteady; increasingly real is the danger that
mankind will perish if an accident or insanity or uncontrolled escalation draws it into a
total thermonuclear war. In light of this it is necessary, gradually and carefully, to shift
the functions of deterrence onto conventional armed forces, with all the economic,
political, and social consequences this entails. It is necessary to strive for nuclear
disarmament. Of course, in all the intermediate stages of disarmament and negotiations,
international security must be provided for, vis-a-vis any possible move by a potential
aggressor. For this in particular one has to be ready to resist, at all the various possible
stages in the escalation of a conventional or a nuclear war. No side must feel any
temptation to engage in a limited or regional nuclear war.
Andrei
SAKHAROV
Let me remind you that nuclear disarmament is not just an ardent desire of
the people, as expressed in many resolutions of the United Nations. It is a legal
commitment by the five official nuclear states, entered into when, they signed the Non-
Proliferation Treaty. Only a few months ago when the indefinite extension of the Treaty
was agreed, the nuclear powers committed themselves again to complete nuclear
disarmament. This is still their declared goal. But the declarations are not matched by
their policies, and this divergence seems to be intrinsic.
Joseph
ROTBLAT
We are told that the possession of nuclear weapons - In some cases even the
testing of these weapons is essential for national security.
But this argument can be made by other countries as well. If the militarily most
powerful - and least threatened - states need nuclear weapons for their security, how can
one deny such security to countries that are truly insecure? The present nuclear policy
is a recipe for proliferation. It is a policy for disaster. To prevent this disaster for the sake
of humanity - we must get rid of all nuclear weapons.
Joseph
ROTBLAT
I agree that if the "nuclear threshold" is crossed, i.e., if any country uses a
nuclear weapon even on a limited scale, the further course of events would be difficult to
control and the most probable result would be swift escalation leading from a nuclear war
initially limited in scale or by region to an all-out nuclear war, i.e. to general suicide.
It is relatively unimportant how the "nuclear threshold" is crossed--as a

result of a preventive nuclear strike or in the course of a war fought with conventional
weapons, when a country is threatened with defeat, or simply as a result of an accident
(technical or organizational).
Andrei
SAKHAROV
As for the assertion that nuclear weapons prevent wars, how many more wars
are needed to refute this argument? Tens of millions have died in the many wars that have
taken place since 1945. In a number of them nuclear states were directly involved. In two
they were actually defeated. Having nuclear weapons was of no use to them.
To sum up, there is no evidence that a world without nuclear weapons would be a
dangerous world. On the contrary, it would be a safer world…
Joseph
ROTBLAT
Since the end of the Cold War the two main nuclear powers have begun to make
big reductions in their nuclear arsenals. Each of them is dismantling about 2000 nuclear
warheads a year. If this program continued, all nuclear warheads could be dismantled in
little over ten years from now. We have the technical means to create a nuclear-
weapon-free world in about a decade. Alas, the present program does not provide for
this, When the START-2 treaty has been implemented and remember it has not yet been
ratified - we will be left with some 15,000 nuclear warheads, active and in reserve.
Fifteen thousand weapons with an average yield of 20 Hiroshima bombs.
Joseph
ROTBLAT
……………..
O
It has been the great object of my life to build up and endow a great peace
organization which should be powerful enough to combat the forces which make for war,
and thanks to the Nobel Committee, I have been able to do a great deal in that direction.
Nearly the whole of the fund placed at my disposal has been given to and profitably
invested for the use of the League.
William Randal
CREMER
These broader social roles, of partner and advocate, may be relatively novel for
the corporate world, but they can no longer be separated cleanly from the standard
business model, nor can they be reduced to a question of philanthropy. Companies are
learning that, as markets have gone global, so, too, must the concept and practice of
corporate social responsibility. And they are discovering that doing the right thing, at the
end of the day, is actually good for business.
In other words, the fragility of globalisation that I have spoken about poses a
direct challenge to the self-interest of the corporate sector, and a central part of the
solution is the need for you to accept the obligations -- not merely the opportunities --
of global citizenship.
Kofi ANNAN
The obstacles to democracy have little to do with culture or religion, and
much more to do with the desire of those in power to maintain their position at any cost.
This is neither a new phenomenon nor one confined to any particular part of the world.
People of all cultures value their freedom of choice, and feel the need to have a say in
decisions affecting their lives.
Kofi ANNAN
The obstacles to peace are not obstacles in matter, in inanimate nature, in the
mountains which we pierce, in the seas across which we fly. The obstacles to peace
are in the minds and hearts of men.
Norman ANGELL
Old-fashioned ways which no longer apply to changed conditions are a snare

in which the feet of women have always become readily entangled.
Jane ADDAMS
It has not always succeeded; but what it has done it accomplished only because of
the cooperation of its immediate helpers and of the National Red Cross Societies, and
also - in spite of criticism understandable in view of the tragic situation prevailing in the
world - because of the unfailing sympathy and kindness extended on all sides, the
numerous and moving proofs of which have been a source of infinite encouragement to
the Committee. The Nobel Committee has seen fit to add a tribute of such invaluable
moral support that our appreciation can find no adequate expression.
Rouge
When evaluating the overall significance of the award of the Peace Prize, I would
like to say some words on behalf of all those whose voice cannot be heard or who have
been repressed for having spoken in the manner of an opinion, of all those who have been
marginalized, who have been discriminated, who live in poverty, in need, of all those
who are the victims of repression and violation of human rights. Those who, nevertheless,
have endured through centuries, who have not lost their conscience, the quality of
determination and hope.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
I accept this prestigious award on behalf of my family, on behalf of the South

African Council of Churches, on behalf of all in my motherland, on behalf of those
committed to the cause of justice, peace, and reconciliation everywhere.
Desmond TUTU
Amnesty International's work on behalf of prisoners of conscience and the

Campaign for the Abolition of Torture are better known than its efforts to combat the
death penalty. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights affirms the right to life and
asserts that no one shall be subjected to cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment.
Amnesty International also opposes the death penalty because it is irrevocable, is capable
of being inflicted upon the innocent, and does not act as a unique deterrent to crime.
The Nansen Office and its representatives have had to intervene in all aspects of
life in order to help those most in need. They have assisted the refugees in obtaining
identity cards or passports, visas, residence permits, work permits - for these last two do
not necessarily go together - the right to social benefits in those countries which have
them, and the like. They have also intervened on behalf of refugees who have
suffered injustice in any form, and we all know that it is the most defenceless who are the
most liable to suffer injustice, especially in localities where the higher levels of
governmental administration cannot exercise effective control. Furthermore, everybody
sooner or later needs some documents, either to prove his identity or to legalize his
signature, in order to comply with formalities connected with marriage, birth, death, and
so on. So here too the representatives of the Nansen Office have been able to help. When
the Nansen Office closes its doors, it will be able to show that, during the eight years that
have passed since its foundation, it has interceded on behalf of refugees in more than
800.000 instances. But the very fact that the Nansen Office has existed under the auspices
of the League of Nations has given the homeless the hope and confidence without which
men are condemned to despair. I feel I must say that few institutions have worked with
the direct purpose of promoting peace in men's hearts and thus of providing social order
among nations to the same extent as has the Nansen Office.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
……………..
A few months ago, a journalist asked me, was it worth the death of so many
people, thousands of East Timorans, destruction of your continent to have an independent
country?
Well, my answer was, one single life lost is one life too many. I personally do
not accept, subscribe to any intellectual, political, ideological, religious argument to
justify the killing of one single person. …
José RAMOS-HORTA
I truly tell you: we have before us today an opportunity for peace which time
will never repeat and we must seize it if we are really serious in struggling for peace. If
we weaken or fritter away this opportunity we shall end in a new blood-bath; he who has
conspired to lose it will have the curse of humanity and history on his head.
These developments should not surprise any student of history. Oppressed

people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually
manifests itself. The Bible tells the thrilling story of how Moses stood in Pharaoh's court
centuries ago and cried, "Let my people go.” This is a kind of opening chapter in a
continuing story. The present struggle in the United States is a later chapter in the same
unfolding story. Something within has reminded the Negro of his birthright of freedom,
and something without has reminded him that it can be gained. Consciously or
unconsciously, he has been caught up by the Zeitgeist, and with his black brothers of
Africa and his brown and yellow brothers in Asia, South America, and the Caribbean, the
United States Negro is moving with a sense of great urgency toward the promised land of
racial justice.
Martin Luther KING

Jr.
It is necessary to linger in a little more detail over the political consequences of
internationalism. Here the task is to devise patterns of organization for the concept of
world unity and cooperation between the nations. That, in a word, is the great and
dominating political task of our time.
Earlier ages fortified themselves behind the sovereign state, behind protectionism
and militarism. They were subject to what Norman Angell called the "optical
illusion" that a human being increased his stature by an inch if the state of which he
was a citizen annexed a few more square miles to rule over, and that it was beneficial for
a state to be economically self-supporting, in the sense that it required as few goods as
possible from abroad.
But war or peace; the destruction or the protection of nature; the violation or
promotion of human rights and democratic freedoms; poverty or material well-being; the
lack of moral and spiritual values or their existence and development; and the
breakdown or development of human understanding, are not isolated phenomena that
can be analysed and tackled independently of one another. In fact, they are very much
interrelated at all levels and need to be approached with that understanding.
Lama
I am sure that they share with me the knowledge that, most profoundly of all, we
owe this peace to the ordinary people of Ireland, particularly those of the North who
have lived and suffered the reality of our conflict.
John HUME
We need a new system of values, a system of the organic unity between

mankind and nature and the ethic of global responsibility
Mikhail GORBACHEV
Ultimately, of course, the organising of peace must be based on

considerations of reason and concern. It presupposes tremendous efforts to modify
through education some longstanding mental attitudes – to work towards limitation of
armaments, to manifest solidarity with the hungry, to co-operate in the strengthening of
family or societal units. But reason alone is not enough. Emotional factors and especially
the sense of justice must not be left to those who pervert them to the service of hate and
destruction…. The time has come to proclaim that, for the establishment of peace and
human dignity, each of us must work and fight to the last.
Martin Luther KING
The summons has come to wage a better planned, more aggressive, and more
triumphant warfare against the age-long enemies of mankind - ignorance, poverty,
disease, strife, and sin. Such distinctively qualitative leadership is essential in order that
the builders of the new civilization may possess the necessary background, outlook,
insight, and grasp to cope successfully with the forces which oppose and disintegrate.
How subtle, powerful, and ominous these are in both Orient and Occident!
John Raleigh MOTT
been created in the image of God, and that it is a blasphemy to treat them as if they were
less than this and to do so ultimately recoils on those who do this? In dehumanising
others, they are themselves dehumanised. Perhaps oppression dehumanises the
oppressor as much as, if not more than, the oppressed. They need each other to
become truly free, to become human. We can be human only in fellowship, in
community, in koinonia, in peace.
Desmond TUTU
Thomas Carlyle used to talk of "organic filaments" and in the cooperative
organs of the United Nations we seem to see the time-spirit weaving a web of the peoples
and creating, we hope, an unbreakable fabric binding all together by the habit of common
work for common ends.
The administrative aspect of the United Nations also seems to have great
possibilities of development, and international administration is in this context one form
of cooperation.
The administrative function of the United Nations is up to now chiefly exerted in
the form of trusteeships. This idea of political trusteeship is one of the relatively rare
inventions in the political field. It is curious that while inventions in the technological
field, in the arts of dealing with matter, are so numerous and effective, men are so
relatively poor in inventions for dealing with one another. The Greeks gave us public
assemblies, the British their representative parliaments and parliamentary government.
Switzerland and the United States created federal patterns of government combining
centralization with decentralization.
Emily Greene BALCH
My only regret is that I am unable to wholly, instead of partially, complete the

endowment. I hope, however, that others may be induced to follow my example, and
that before I die I may see the dream of my life realized.
There is still a great work before us. The advocates of peace are, however, no
longer regarded as idle dreamers, and I trust that I have convinced you that our cause has,
especially of late, made wonderful progress and that we are nearing the goal of our hopes.
William Randal
CREMER
Your Majesties, ladies and gentlemen, I emphasize to you that we will discover
ourselves through peace more than we did through confrontation and conflict. I am
certain that Israelis will find themselves through peace more than they did in war.
Yasser Arafat
P
Many small rivulets make a great stream, the stream becomes a river and the river
a great sea, a Pacific ocean around this world of ours.
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
The Government of the United States is prepared, therefore, to concert with the
Government of France with a view to the conclusion of a treaty among the principal
Powers of the world, open to signature by all nations, condemning war and renouncing it
as an instrument of national policy in favour of the pacific settlement of
international disputes.
Frank B. KELLOGG
Pacifism - as we have always advocated it, and as you are practicing it - does
not seek to obliterate countries by throwing them into the melting pot of
cosmopolitanism, but to organize them, if this is not already the case, according to the
dictates of justice.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
I shall discuss Internationalism, and not "Pacifism". The latter word has never
appealed to me - it is a linguistic hybrid, directing one-sided attention to the negative
aspect of the peace movement, the struggle against war; "antimilitarism" is a better word
for this aspect of our efforts. Not that I stand aside from pacifism or antimilitarism; they
constitute a necessary part of our work. But I endow these words with the special
connotation (not universally accepted) of a moral theory; by pacifism I understand a
moral protest against the use of violence and war in international relations. A pacifist will
often - at least nowadays - be an internationalist and vice versa. But history shows us that
a pacifist need not think internationally. Jesus of Nazareth was a pacifist; but all his
utterances, insofar as they have survived, show that internationalism was quite foreign to
him, for the very reason that he did not think politically at all; he was apolitical. If we
were to place him in one of our present-day categories, we should have to call him an
antimilitarist and an individualistic anarchist.
The beneficial results of a secure world peace are almost inconceivable, but even
more inconceivable are the consequences of the threatening world war which many
misguided people are prepared to precipitate. The advocates of pacifism are well aware
how meagre are their resources of personal influence and power. They know that they are
still few in number and weak in authority, but when they realistically consider themselves
and the ideal they serve, they see themselves as the servants of the greatest of all causes.
On the solution of this problem depends whether our Europe will become a showpiece of
ruins and failure, or whether we can avoid this danger and so enter sooner the coming era
of secure peace and law in which a civilization of unimagined glory will develop.
Bertha von SUTTNER
In any consideration of disarmament, a distinction must be drawn between the

positions of pacifists, of members of parliament, and of governments. We pacifists
have not ceased to point to the grave danger of armaments and to insist on their
curtailment. We have proposed resolutions and plans to the public and to governments.
The conclusion reached in our studies was that the best and perhaps the only way to limit
armaments would be through the creation of an international treaty embracing all the
great powers and the contention that national budgets provide the only practicable
yardstick for the limitation of armaments. We who were pacifists before the war
became very moderate in our demands so as not to be regarded as utopian idealists. Often
we spoke not of disarmament but of the "limitation of armaments", and because of this
terminology the question was placed on the agenda of the congresses.
Ludwig QUIDDE
It is not only on my own behalf that I thank you; I thank you also on behalf of all
the jurists who have devoted their efforts to the study of international law, and to whose
services in the interest of better international relations you have seen fit to testify so
appreciatively. These services had already been collectively honoured by the award given
to the Institute of International Law, an award which excited universal interest. From this
pacifist army of internationalists you have now singled out one soldier who, for many
years, has fought for the concept of law, both in teaching and in practice.
Louis RENAULT
Before I proceed with my observations on the Hague Conferences, I want to

comment on a term which I have not originated but have adopted from someone else.
This is the word "pacigérance" or "waging peace" in contrast to "belligérance" or
"waging war". I have taken it from a famous and distinguished Belgian writer, Baron
Descamps, who is at present Belgium's minister of science and art. In 1898 he wrote an
excellent book in which he developed the legal principles which should apply to neutral
and non-neutral states in time of war and which he calls "pacigérat" or
"pacigérance". According to French etymology, however, "pacigérat" must signify a
condition, a legal status; whereas "pacigérance" denotes an action, an activity, something
to be done, performed. Later Descamps used the word "pacigérat" only in the former
sense.
I requested and received his permission to borrow the word pacigérance and to
use it in another sense. Waging war we understand, but not waging peace, or at any rate
less consciously so. It should, however, be better understood, and we should direct the
attention of states to the matter of "waging peace" with other states; this should be one of
the ways by which we seek to further the cause of peace and in particular to put the
results of the Hague Conferences to practical use. I am convinced that this work will gain
increasing momentum.
Fredrik BAJER
To solve the problem of organizing world peace we must establish world law and
order. The nations must be organized internationally and induced to enter into
partnership, subordinating in some measure national sovereignty to worldwide
institutions and obligations. By these means reality would be given to the Pact of Paris
by all the nations settling every form of dispute peacefully, regarding every threat of war
as a common concern, and treating war as an international crime.
Arthur HENDERSON
Men and women everywhere are once more asking the old question - is it peace?
They are asking it with anxiety and fear; for, on the one hand, there has never been such a
longing for peace and dread of war as there is today. On the other hand, there have never
been such awful means of spreading destruction and death as those that are now being
prepared in well-nigh every country. To a visitor from another planet the world would
present a spectacle as melancholy as it is bewildering. He would see civilization in
danger of perishing under the oppression of a gigantic paradox: he would see
multitudes of people starving in the midst of plenty, and nations preparing for war
although pledged to peace.
Perhaps the grimmest aspect of this great paradox is that the very nations that
are chiefly responsible for starting and for maintaining the Disarmament Conference are
also the nations that have begun a new arms race. That is what a visitor from another
planet would see. But we are not visitors from another world. This is our world, and we
must make the best of it. We cannot give up hope for the future of humanity because it is
our destiny to shape that future for good or ill. Whatever we do or fail to do will
influence the course of history. We who are here belong to nations that are in the
vanguard of civilization. Those nations have a very great responsibility at this juncture of
the world's affairs, for by throwing their joint weight into the scales of history on the right
side, they may tip the balance decisively in favour of peace.
Arthur HENDERSON
Once again it was Russia who took the lead in making yet another change by
persuading twenty-six nations to send delegates to the first Peace Conference in 1899;
thus the movement spread beyond Europe to include nations in America and Asia: the
United States, Mexico, China, Japan, Persia, and Siam. The halfway point had been
reached. The decision as to which nations were to be invited was arrived at somewhat
arbitrarily by the Russian government, which compiled its list on the basis of whether or
not the respective powers had ambassadors at the Court of St. Petersburg. The last stage
was completed in 1907 when forty-six nations were invited and forty-four actually took
part. This time almost the entire civilized world was represented at the conference which
some daring journalist, not surprisingly, dubbed the Parliament of Mankind -
certainly an incorrect title in many respects, but a striking one just the same.
Louis RENAULT
A national economy lacking a democratic foundation is a castle built on sand.

Therefore, as President of the Republic of Korea, I have made the parallel
development of democracy and market economics, supplemented with a system of
productive welfare, the basic mission of my government.
KIM Dae Jung
Let us face squarely the paradox that the world which goes to war is a world,
usually, genuinely desiring peace. War is the outcome, not mainly of evil intentions, but
on the whole, of good intentions which miscarry or are frustrated. It is made, not usually
by evil men knowing themselves to be wrong, but is the outcome of policies pursued by
good men usually passionately convinced that they are right.
Norman ANGELL
A recollection. The time: After the war. The place: Paris. A young man struggles
to readjust to life. His mother, his father, his small sister are gone. He is alone. On the
verge of despair. And yet he does not give up. On the contrary, he strives to find a place
among the living. He acquires a new language. He makes a few friends who, like himself,
believe that the memory of evil will serve as a shield against evil; that the memory of
death will serve as a shield against death.
Elie WIESEL
If you want to make peace with your enemy, you have to work with your enemy.
Then he becomes your partner Nelson Mandela.
Nelson MANDELA
I then urge my partners in peace to view the peace process in a comprehensive

and strategic way. Confidence alone cannot make peace, but only recognizing the rights,
together with confidence, can make peace. Encroaching on rights generates a sense of
injustice, keeps the fire under the ashes, and will push peace to a dangerous point and
toward quicksand that may destroy it. We view peace as a strategic option, rather than a
tactical option influenced by temporary calculations of loss and profit. The peace process
is not only a political one, but also an integrated process in which national awareness and
economic, scientific and technological development play an important role. The
interaction of cultural, social and creative elements also play basic roles in strengthening
the peace process.
Yasser Arafat
The International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) and its partnership

with governments, has resulted in a truly remarkable process. Landmines have been used
since the U.S. Civil War and the Crimean War, yet through concerted political action,
they will be taken out of the arsenals of the world. This process has clearly demonstrated
that civil society and governments do not have to see each other as adversaries. It has
shown that in a partnership of civil society and governments, each brings particular assets
to the process, which is made stronger by the participation of both. It demonstrates that
small and middle powers can work together with civil society and address humanitarian
concerns with breathtaking speed. It shows that such a partnership can be a new kind
of "superpower" in the post-Cold War world.
Jody WILLIAMS
As you can imagine, I have been looking forward to this opportunity of
expressing publicly to the Nobel Committee my deep gratitude for the signal honour they
have conferred in awarding me the Peace Prize; I look upon it as the greatest honour of
my life. I should like also to keep a promise made to my distinguished colleague Mr.
Frédéric Passy when I saw him on the eve of my departure, by conveying to you his
regrets that age has prohibited him from discharging the same duty.
Louis RENAULT
The past dies hard because the contemporary political organizations or holders of
power seldom bend themselves willingly to the needs of the new age, and because past
glories and traditions generally become transformed into poetic or religious symbols,
emotional images, which must be repudiated by the practical and prosaic demands of the
new age. Within each such social group, a feeling of solidarity prevails, a compelling
need to work together and a joy in doing so that represent a high moral value. This
feeling is often strengthened by the ruling religion, which is generally a mythical and
mystical expression of the group feeling. War within the group is a crime, war against
other groups a holy duty.
The UNICEF Secretariat, with headquarters at the United Nations in New York,
became the nerve centre of a network of offices established in the different regions of the
world. Maurice Pate, the first executive director, who died early this year, provided
incomparable leadership. A man of compassion, he was imbued with a love of people; he
had infinite faith in them and saw good in everyone. With wisdom, dignity, and tact, he
inspired universal respect and invoked confidence. He not only selected his staff on the
basis of professional qualification, but sought in each of them special qualities of heart, a
willingness to subordinate self to a labour of love, in which hours and physical frailty did
not figure. A dedicated team was assembled, inspired always by the selflessness of Mr.
Pate himself and his certain conviction that he and his colleagues had been entrusted
with a task of sacred dimension. It is appropriate that the Executive Board should have
decided to link his name to the Nobel Peace Prize, which will constitute the nucleus of a
Maurice Pate Scholarship Fund.

(UNICEF)
I believe it is fitting that the prize has been awarded to Yasser Arafat. His quitting
the path of confrontation in favour of the path of dialogue, has opened the way to
peace between ourselves and the Palestinian people, to whom we wish all the best in the
future. We are leaving behind us the era of belligerency and are striding together toward
peace.
Shimon PERE
I want to say bluntly, that we have found a partner for peace among the
Palestinians as well: the PLO, which was an enemy, and has ceased to engage in
terrorism. Without partners for peace, there can be no peace.
We will demand that they do their part for peace, just as we will do our part for
peace, in order to solve the most complicated, prolonged, and emotionally charged aspect
of the Israeli-Arab conflict: the Palestinian- Israeli conflict.
This is a course which is fraught with difficulties and pain. For Israel, there is no
path that is without pain.
But the path of peace is preferable to the path of war.

That a peaceful and just society can only be achieved through non-violent means
and that the path to peace lies in each of our hearts.
Máiread CORRIGAN
You can't kill for your own country. Why do we say, "for God and country," when
we really worship a flag. We're very patriotic. I don't care if it's American patriotism or
Irish patriotism. It kills.
Patriotism kills.
Patriotism should be caring about whether the man next door has a loaf of bread
on his table. That's being a true patriot- feeding your neighbour - that's what it's all
about.
Betty WILLIAMS
Peace is more precious than a piece of land.
Peace is the beauty of life. It is sunshine. It is the smile of a child, the love of a
mother, the joy of a father, the togetherness of a family. It is the advancement of man, the
victory of a just cause, the triumph of truth. Peace is all of these and more and more.
Menachem BEGIN
Peace and development - one struggle, two fronts. Clearly, war is not the only
cause of poverty, and neither poverty nor inequality by themselves cause war. But one
thing is indisputable: development has no worse enemy than war. Prolonged armed
conflicts don't only kill people: they destroy a country's infrastructure, divert scarce
resources and disrupt economic life. Almost all today's conflicts are civil wars, in which
civilian populations are not incidental casualties but direct targets. These wars completely
destroy trust between communities, breaking down normal social relations and
undermining the legitimacy of government.
Kofi Annan
Peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but a means by which we arrive
at that goal.
Martin Luther KING
Peace, in the sense of the absence of war, is of little value to someone who is
dying of hunger or cold. It will not remove the pain of torture inflicted on a prisoner of
conscience. It does not comfort those who have lost their loved ones in floods caused by
senseless deforestation in a neighbouring country. Peace can only last where human
rights are respected, where the people are fed, and where individuals and nations are free.
True Peace with oneself and with the world around us can only be achieved through the
development of mental peace. The other phenomena mentioned above are similarly
interrelated. Thus, for example, we see that a clean environment, wealth or democracy
mean little in the face of war, especially nuclear war, and that material development is
not sufficient to ensure human happiness.
Lama
We are gratified for this acknowledgement that the concern for peace and the
promotion of human rights are inseparable. Peace is not to be measured by the absence
of conventional war, but constructed upon foundations of justice. Where there is
injustice, there is the seed of conflict. Where human rights are violated, there are threats
to peace.
Peace is no mere matter of men fighting or not fighting. Peace, to have meaning
for many who have known only suffering in both peace and war, must be translated into
bread or rice, shelter, health, and education, as well as freedom and human dignity - a
steadily better life.
Ralph J. BUNCHE
……….
There can thus be no real peace without justice or consent…There can thus be
no real peace without constant effort, planning and hard work. Peace, therefore, is not
an absence of conflict or a condition of stagnation. Peace is a frame of mind. It is a frame
of mind in which countries, communities, parties and individuals seek to resolve their
differences through agreements, through negotiation and compromise, instead of threats,
compulsion and violence.

There is only one radical means for sanctifying human life. The one radical
solution is a real peace.
Yitzhak Rabin
Peace is an interest because, in an atmosphere of just peace, the Palestinian

people will be able to achieve their ambitions for independence and sovereignty, to
develop their national and cultural existence through relations of good neighbourliness,
mutual respect, and cooperation with the Israeli people. Peace will enable the Israeli
people to define their Middle East identity and to enjoy economic and cultural openness
toward their Arab neighbours, who are eager to develop their region, which was kept by
the long war from find its real position in today's world in an atmosphere of democracy,
pluralism, and prosperity.
Yasser Arafat
…………
No more wars, no more bloodshed. Peace unto you. Shalom, salaam, forever.
Menachem BEGIN
Since then, of course, history has added a great deal to the specific content of the
concept of peace. In this nuclear age it also means a condition for the survival of the
human race. But the essence, as understood both by the popular wisdom and by
intellectual leaders , is the same.
Mikhail S. GORBACHEV
But, more than anything, in the more than three years of this Government's
existence, the Israeli people has proven that it is possible to make peace, that peace opens
the door to a better economy and society; that peace is not just a prayer.
Peace is first of all in our prayers, but it is also the aspiration of the Jewish
people, a genuine aspiration for peace.
There are enemies of peace who are trying to hurt us, in order to torpedo the peace
process
Mankind must remember that peace is not God's gift to his creatures; peace is
our gift to each other.
Elie WIESEL
The choice before my little America is whether to suffer another century of
violence, or to achieve peace by overcoming the fear of liberty. Only peace can write
the new history.
Oscar Arias SANCHEZ
In many parts of the world the people are searching for a solution which would
link the two basic values: peace and justice. The two are like bread and salt for
mankind.
Lech WALESA
There was still hard work to do in the peace and reconciliation process and
peace can be achieved through non-violent means.
Carlos Felipe Ximenes BELO
The other type of "peace" activity is political, specifically aiming to affect
governmental or other action on concrete issues. For instance, peace organizations
criticized the terms of the Peace Treaties made at Versailles and (in America at least)
opposed the demand for unconditional surrender in the Second World War.
Emily Greene BALCH
Is this to say that the term "Peace Conference" is entirely unjustified? I do not
believe so. Anything that contributes to extending the domain of law in international
relations contributes to peace. Since the possibility of future war cannot be ignored, it is a
farsighted policy that takes into account the difficulties created by war in the relations
between belligerents and neutrals; and it is a humanitarian policy that strives to reduce
the evils of war in the relations between the belligerents themselves and to safeguard as
far as possible the interests of non-combatants and of the sick and the wounded.
Whatever may be said by those who scoff at the work undertaken in this field by the
Peace Conferences, wars will not become rarer by becoming more barbarous.
Louis RENAULT
The Peace Conference was the scene, or, shall we say, the first stage, in a
tremendous struggle between the new forces, the new hopes and aspirations to which the
agony of the World War had given birth, and the champions of the old order in patriotism
and in economic relations alike. The compromise that emerged from this struggle was
embodied in the Covenant of the League, the International Labour Organization, and the
terms of the peace settlement. On the whole, the advocates of a new order triumphed in
the former two treaties; the champions of the old had their way to a considerable extent in
the peace settlement. But it must be realized that there were, at the Peace Conference,
strong forces in favour of going much further than the present Covenant, and that there
was afterwards a slump in international idealism that led to public opinion and
governments receding far below the level of even the compromise embodied in the
existing treaties.
Arthur
HENDERSON
Yet the continual recurrence of war and the universally increasing preparations for
war based upon expectation of it among nations all of whom declare themselves in favour
of peace, indicate that intellectual acceptance of peace doctrine is not sufficient to
control conduct, and that a general feeling in favour of peace, however sincere, does not
furnish a strong enough motive to withstand the passions which lead to war when a cause
of quarrel has arisen. The methods of peace propaganda which aim at establishing peace
doctrine by argument and by creating a feeling favourable to peace in general seem to
fall short of reaching the springs of human action and of dealing with the causes of the
conduct which they seek to modify. It is much like treating the symptoms of disease
instead of ascertaining and dealing with the cause of the symptoms. The mere assemblage
of peace loving people to interchange convincing reasons for their common faith, mere
exhortation and argument to the public in favour of peace in general fall short of the
mark.
Elihu ROOT
Alfred Nobel did not live to see the great progress and decisive events by which
the Peace Idea was brought to life and made to function in a number of organizations.
He was, however, still alive in 1894 when Gladstone, the great British statesman,
went even further than the principle of arbitration in proposing a permanent international
tribunal. Philip Stanhope, a friend of the Grand Old Man, delivered this proposition to the
Inter-parliamentary Conference of 1894 in Gladstone's name and succeeded in having a
plan for such a tribunal forwarded to the member governments. Alfred Nobel lived to see
the forwarding, but it was only after his death that any results were achieved: the calling
of the Hague Conference and the founding of the Permanent Court of Arbitration. It was
of incalculable damage to the [peace] movement that such men as Alfred Nobel, Moritz
von Egidy, and Johann von Bloch were taken from it prematurely. It is true that their
ideals and their work continue beyond the grave, but had they still been living in our
midst, how greatly would their personal influence and the effect of their work have
contributed to the acceleration of the movement! With what courage would they have
taken up the fight against the militarists who are at the present time trying to keep the
shaky old system going!
Bertha von SUTTNER
The Czar of Russia issued a Peace Manifesto which led to the creation of the
Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague, and the President of the United States
(Theodore Roosevelt, for translation ) is encouraging the nations to use it. The aged ruler
of Austria-Hungary (Francis Joseph I (1830-1916), emperor of Austria (1848-1916), king
of Hungary (1867-1916)) is often called the "Emperor of Peace" on account of his
character. The young Italian monarch has created an International Agricultural Institute
which he maintains with his own private means, and has also offered to pay for the
marble for the Palace of Peace at The Hague. The British head of state is at the forefront
of an entente policy which seeks to anticipate complications leading to hostility. King
Edward (Edward VII, called the Peacemaker (1841-1910), king of Great Britain and
Ireland (1901-1910), helped prepare the way for arbitration treaties with various nations
and for ententes with France and with Russia) greeted the World Peace Congress in
London with words to the effect that the heads of state could not aim at any goal higher
than that of fostering a common spirit of understanding and warm friendship between
nations, such being the surest means of realizing the highest ideal of humanity; and he
further promised that "to achieve this goal would be [his] perpetual endeavour". Kaiser
Wilhelm (FOR TRANSLATION emperor of Germany and king of Prussia), in a telegram
to the Inter-parliamentary Conference in Berlin, said that he took the blessings of peace
very much to heart, and the Crown Prince echoed these words, stating on behalf of his
father, that the latter's greatest concern was the maintenance of peace, "which is, and shall
ever be the foundation of all true cultural progress". The president of the French Republic
finds it natural to continue to advocate world peace, and the Japanese sovereign neglects
no opportunity to convince the world of his love of peace.
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
There is an urgent task that activates the peace mechanism and enables it to
overcome the problem that is troubling hearts, the question of prisoners. It is important to
release them so smiles can return to their children, their mothers, and their wives. Let us
together protect this little baby from the winter's winds, and let us provide it with the mild
and honey it deserves in the land of milk and honey in the land of Salim, Ibrahim, Isma'il,
and Ishaq - the holy land, the land of peace.
Yasser Arafat
Alfred Nobel’s will showed that he had gradually become convinced that the
Peace Movement had emerged from the fog of pious theories into the light of
attainable and realistically envisaged goals. He recognized science and idealistic
literature as pursuits which foster culture and help civilization. With these goals he
ranked the objectives of the peace congresses: the attainment of international justice and
the consequent reduction in the size of armies.
Bertha von SUTTNER
The peace movement or the movement to end war has been fed by many
springs and has taken many forms. It has been carried on mainly by private unofficial
organizations, local, national, and international. I would say that peace workers or
pacifists have dealt mainly with two types of issue, the moral or individual, and the
political or institutional. As a type of the former we may take those who are now
generally known specifically as pacifists. Largely on religious or ethical grounds they
repudiate violence and strive to put friendly and constructive activity in its place.
Emily Greene BALCH
except sin, and he proclaimed very clearly that he had come to give the good news. The
news was peace to all of good will and this is something that we all want – the peace of
heart.
Mother TERESA
Naturally it is not possible to name each and everyone of those heroes and
heroines who make up the huge host of peacemakers who, even as we speak, are at work
for peace around the world.
But even if it is not possible to name them we can note their presence on the
peace-lines around the world.
David TRIMBLE
I view all this as I recall the difficult peace march, in which we have covered
only a short distance. We should have courage and move as far as possible to cover the
greater distance based on just and comprehensive peace and to absorb the strength of
creativity which is contained in the deeper lesson of peace.
Yasser Arafat
It was a turning point in European history when the Germans initiated the policy
which led by way of Locarno to Geneva. Just read what Mr. Briand said about the
significance of this German decision. Along this road, Germany has experienced
numerous and profound disappointments. This is not the place to discuss them in detail. I
do not think of Locarno only in terms of its consequences for Germany. Locarno means
much more to me. It is the achievement of lasting peace on the Rhine, guaranteed by the
formal renunciation of force by the two great neighbouring nations and also by the
commitment of other states to come to the aid of the victim of an act of aggression in
violation of this treaty. Treuga Dei, the peace of God, shall reign where for centuries
bloody wars have raged. It can and it ought to be the basis for a general cooperative effort
among these nations to spread peace wherever their material power and moral influence
reach. The overwhelming majority of the German people support these aims. The youth
of Germany can be won over to the same cause. Youth sees its ideal of individual
physical and spiritual achievement in the peaceful competition of the Olympic Games
and, I hope, in technical and intellectual development as well.
Gustav STRESEMANN
The Peace People work with young people, with families of prisoners and with
community groups of all backgrounds, trying to heal the divisions which keep us apart
and feed the fear, the violence and the injustice.
In a society which desperately needs creative solutions to its problems, the Peace
People works to create debate on the type of future we want for ourselves and our
children.
By refusing to accept a life of fear, violence and injustice and by offering an
alternative to the narrow destinies offered by the spokesmen of history, the Peace
People commit themselves to campaigning for positive change.
Máiread
CORRIGAN
It was against the background of this worsening situation and in order to prevent
further bloodshed, that I proposed what is generally referred to as the Five-Point Peace
Plan for the restoration of peace and human rights in Tibet. I elaborated on the plan in a
speech in Strasbourg last year. I believe the plan provides a reasonable and realistic
framework for negotiations with the People's Republic of China. So far, however, China's
leaders have been unwilling to respond constructively. The brutal suppression of the
Chinese democracy movement in June of this year, however, reinforced my view that any
settlement of the Tibetan question will only be meaningful if it is supported by adequate
international guarantees.
Lama
Peace policy is a sober task. I, too, try with the means at my command to pave
the way for the prevalence of reason in my own country and in the world: that reason
which demands that we seek peace because the absence of peace has come to mean
extreme lack of reason.
Willy BRANDT
The reports are confined to one theme: peace through education. Because of
this narrow restriction, the question attains a degree of clarity, definition, and
forcefulness which should make it of particular interest to the Nobel Institute.
A great many educators, both men and women, who came from nearly every
country of the world, defined in this way the spirit we must inspire: the instruction given
to youth should serve the cause of peace. A few illustrations of this propaganda will not
be out of place.
Ferdinand
BUISSON
Stability and peace in our land will not come from the barrel of a gun, because
peace without justice is an impossibility.
Desmond TUTU
My peace work, I believe, begins with me on a daily basis and it has to be

centred within me before I can let anybody else see that example. It's not that I'm trying
to tell people what's right or wrong. I'm trying to show by my actions that you can make a
far better world if you just care enough. That's all you have to do. It's no big deal. It's not
I couldn't educationalise it for you. To say that on a daily basis you can make a
difference, well, you can. One act of kindness a day can do it.
Betty WILLIAMS
Let us work to be peacemakers, those given a wonderful share in Our Lord's

ministry of reconciliation. If we want peace, so we have been told, let us work for justice.
Let us beat our swords into ploughshares.
Desmond TUTU
This last concept – Peace-keeping – was honoured this year with the award of
the Nobel Peace Prize. This was a recognition not only of the architects and the soldiers
of peace-keeping, but also of an extremely important idea. The evolution of peace-
keeping may provide a useful practical indication of how international authority, and
respect for it, can be built up.
Javier Pérez de
CUÉLLAR
It is truly so strange to me and beyond my comprehension how all this business of

the Peace Prize has come about; for it was really entirely by chance that I was driven
to take up this work, which was not mine
Fridtjof NANSEN
We have started the peace process based on land for peace, on UN Resolutions
242 and 338, and on the other international resolutions calling for achieving the
legitimate rights of the Palestinian people. While the peace process has not yet reached its
target, the new atmosphere of confidence and the modest achievements of the first and
second year of the peace process are promising. Therefore, the parties are urged to
abandon their reservations, facilitate measures, and achieve the remaining goals, foremost
of which are transferring powers and taking steps toward an Israeli withdrawal in the
West Bank and the settlements. This will finally lead to a comprehensive withdrawal and
will enable our society to build its infrastructure and utilize its status, heritage,
knowledge and awareness to formulate our new world.
Yasser Arafat
We have in our mind the deepest felt demands of the entire Humanity, when we
strive for a peaceful coexistence and the preservation of the environment.
Tibet's height and size (the size of the European Community), as well as its
unique history and profound spiritual heritage makes it ideally suited to fulfil the role of a
sanctuary of peace in the strategic heart of Asia. It would also be in keeping with Tibet 's
historical role as a peaceful Buddhist nation and buffer region separating the Asian
continent's great and often rival powers.
Lama
Had there been no tribunal in existence, Russia and Great Britain would probably
have taken months to consider whether the so-called outrage was a fit subject to be
referred to arbitration, and that delay would have been used by the crimson press to lash
the public mind into a state of frenzy and to render a pacific solution impossible. But the
very fact that the peaceful machinery was at hand, ready to be set in motion,
suggested its employment, and notwithstanding the frantic efforts of some British
journals to provoke a conflict, the two governments in a few days agreed to resort to the
friendly offices of the Hague Tribunal.
During the last century the number of disputes settled by arbitration or friendly
mediation amounted to nearly 200. Many of the disputes were of a trifling character.
Some, however, were very serious, the most important of all being the great dispute
between the United States and Great Britain with regard to the pirate ship Alabama.
William Randal CREMER
I think recently we've seen a few little more peaceful movies. The best movie I
ever saw in my whole life was E.T. It's my favourite movie of all time because that taught
a child regardless of how ugly the creature the child did not know how not to love that
little creature. That's my favourite movie of all time, E.T. Stephen Spielberg is so
magnificent. There's a lesson there for other filmmakers.
The moviemakers need to learn that there's another way to go with the movies.
Pocahontas is out now and all of the kids are going crazy about Pocahontas and it's like
back to when I used to watch Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. It's kind of lovely, you
know, that a child can be a child instead of having to be in this adult world of violence.
Betty WILLIAMS
In the most troubled areas of the world, reserves of tolerance and compassion
disappear, security becomes non-existent and creature comforts are reduced to a
minimum—but stockpiles of weapons abound. As a system of values this is totally mad.
By the time it is accepted that the only way out of an impasse of hate, bloodshed and
social and economic chaos created by men is for those men to get together to find a
peaceful solution through dialogue and compromise, it is usually no longer easy to
restore sanity. l hose who have been conditioned by systems which make a mockery of
the law by legalizing injustices and which attack the very foundations of harmony by
perpetuating social, political and economic imbalances cannot adjust quickly—if at all—
to the concept of a fair settlement which places general well-being and justice above
partisan advantage.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
Although the peasant farmer may be illiterate, he can figure.
Norman BORLAUG
………
The pens which write against disarmament are made with the same steel from
which guns are made
Aristide BRIAND
The people of Guatemala will mobilize and will be aware of its strength to
build up a worthy future. It is preparing itself to sow the future, to free itself from
atavisms, to rediscover itself. To build up a country with a genuine national identity. To
start a new life.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
The entry of the People’s Republic of China into the organised system of
states is not in my opinion synonymous with a transition to tri-polarity; there are more
than two or three centres of the world power. But apart from other things there is a certain
significance in the fact that the huge China is both a developing country and a nuclear
power, and that in view of the ever-mounting problems in the Third World there is
growing disappointment with the industrialised countries.
Willy BRANDT
It is painful to me to admit that this depiction of science was deserved, The

decision to use the atom bomb on Japanese cities, and the consequent build up of
enormous nuclear arsenals, was made by governments, on the basis of political and
military perceptions.
Joseph ROTBLAT
At the root of human responsibility is the concept of perfection, the urge to

achieve it, the intelligence to find a path towards it, and the will to follow that path if not
to the end at least the distance needed to rise above individual limitations and
environmental impediments.
AUNG SAN Suu

Kyi
Kant believes that this process of perfecting will come of itself. In his opinion, '
nature, that great artist ' will lead men, very gradually, it is true, and over a very long
period of time, through the march of history and the misery of wars, to agree on an
international code of law which will guarantee perpetual peace…
Albert SCHWEITZER
Let us admit that if all the other signatory nations of the Hague Convention were
to draw up arbitration treaties between each other, and then were to settle points that
might possibly constitute a source of conflict, there would no longer be any need to
declare peace: it would exist ipso facto. No longer would the reign of peace be subject to
the perpetual contradictions of war, for it would rest on the unassailable bedrock
of justice, of law, and of the solidarity of peoples!
Élie
DUCOMMUN
Five times I faced near death at the hands of dictators, six years I spent in prison,
and forty years I lived under house arrest or in exile and under constant surveillance. I
could not have endured the hardship without the support of my people and the
encouragement of fellow democrats around the world. The strength also came from deep
personal beliefs.
KIM Dae Jung
Philanthropy is commendable, but it must not cause the philanthropist to

overlook the circumstances of economic injustice which make philanthropy
necessary.
Martin Luther KING
Well, we must not be blinded by the obvious; we must also look for the new
growth pushing up from the ground below. We must understand that two
philosophies, two eras of civilization, are wrestling with one another and that a
vigorous new spirit is supplanting the blatant and threatening old. No longer weak and
formless, this promising new life is already widely established and determined to survive.
Quite apart from the peace movement, which is a symptom rather than a cause of actual
change, there is taking place in the world a process of internationalisation and unification.
Factors contributing to the development of this process are technical inventions,
improved communications, economic interdependence, and closer international relations.
The instinct of self-preservation in human society, acting almost subconsciously, as do all
drives in the human mind, is rebelling against the constantly refined methods of
annihilation and against the destruction of humanity.
Bertha von SUTTNER
Many are beginning to think the only way forward is the way of armed struggle.
But I am certain that if we were to say today the government is serious about dismantling
apartheid most people would be glad. None of our people is really bloodthirsty. They just
want their place under the sun, a place where they are acknowledge for what they
are-human beings made in the image of God.
Desmond TUTU
Taking care of our planet is like taking care of our houses. Since we human
beings come from Nature, there is no point in our going against nature, which is why I
say the environment is not a matter of religion or ethics or morality. These are luxuries,
since we can survive without them. But we will not survive if we continue to go against
nature.
Lama
I also wish to share with you today my feelings concerning the plight and
aspirations of the people of Tibet. The Nobel Prize is a prize they well deserve for
their courage and unfailing determination during the past forty years of foreign
occupation. As a free spokesman for my captive countrymen and -women, I feel it is my
duty to speak out on their behalf. I speak not with a feeling of anger or hatred towards
those who are responsible for the immense suffering of our people and the destruction of
our land, homes and culture. They too are human beings who struggle to find happiness
and deserve our compassion. I speak to inform you of the sad situation in my country
today and of the aspirations of my people, because in our struggle for freedom, truth is
the only weapon we possess.
Lama
All of us look for some point of reference in the past, in the constellations that
mark our lives. Events in our lives are not the fruits of random, they find the cause in
horizons and past dawns or future ones, and they delineate in this way the paths that we
choose with which we hope to get to the future.
Adolfo Pérez
ESQUIVEL
Whether these things are true or not, the mere fact that they are uttered at all
reflects the manner in which the whole European community and its way of life have
been and still are toys in the hands of reckless political and financial speculators -
perhaps largely bunglers, inferior men who do not realize the outcome of their actions,
but who still speculate and gamble with the most valuable interests of European
civilization.
Fridtjof NANSEN
Nobel’s Peace Prize is the highest honour, but at the same time the one that
imposes the greatest obligations that can be bestowed on any man bearing political
responsibility.
Willy BRANDT
Politics can be likened to driving at night over unfamiliar hills and mountains.
Close attention must be paid to what the beam can reach and the next bend. Driving by
day, as I believe we are now doing, we should drive steadily, not recklessly, studying the
countryside ahead, with judicious glances in the mirror. We should be encouraged by
having come so far, and face into the next hill, rather than the mountain beyond. It is not
that the mountain is not in my mind, but the hill has to be climbed first.
David TRIMBLE
Because politics is not an exact science, but partakes of human nature within the
contingent circumstances of the moment, I have not pressed the paramilitaries on the
details of decommissioning. Although I am under pressure from my own political
community I have not insisted on precise dates quantities and manner of
decommissioning. All I have asked for is a credible beginning. All I have asked for is that
they say that the "war" is over. And that is proved by such a beginning. That is not too
much to ask for.
David TRIMBLE
I wish, figuratively speaking, to pause for a moment at the lowest story of the
structure of peace, that of the peace associations, and raise the question: Should they be
political? Yes or no? This is a moot point. They should be political insofar as the
cause of peace, like all else which concerns the activity of the state, also concerns
politics. But they should not be party-political. A sign that a peace association is going
adrift is its exclusion of other political parties, with whom it could collaborate effectively
on most of the problems besetting the cause of peace. Leave well enough alone and let
each have his own opinions about domestic policies! In this respect, the inter-
parliamentary groups, in which all shades of political opinion meet, are good models. In
the Danish Parliament, all members of the Lower House, without exception, are members
of the inter-parliamentary group, and so are all but eleven members of the Upper House.
Fredrik BAJER
But a few fanatics are not a fundamental problem. No, the problem arises if
political fanatics bury themselves within a morally legitimate political movement.
David TRIMBLE
It has not been very long since the people of each country were concerned almost
exclusively with their own affairs, and, with but few individual exceptions, neither knew
nor cared what was going on outside their own boundaries. All that has changed. The
spread of popular education; the enormous increase in the production and circulation
of newspapers and periodicals and cheap books; the competition of the press, which
ranges the world for news; the telegraph, which carries instantly knowledge of all
important events everywhere to all parts of the world; the new mobility of mankind,
which, availing itself of the new means of travel by steamship and railroad, with its new
freedom under the recently recognized right of expatriation and the recently established
right of free travel, moves to and fro by the million across the boundaries of the nations;
the vast extension of international commerce; the recognition of interdependence of the
peoples of different nations engendered by this commerce and this intercourse; their
dependence upon each other for the supply of their needs and for the profitable disposal
of their products, for the preservation of health, for the promotion of morals and for the
increase of knowledge and the advance of thought - all these are creating an international
community of knowledge and interest, of thought and feeling.
Elihu ROOT
Thanks to advances in science during this century - which is when the

population bomb really went off - food production has kept ahead of population
growth and, in general, has become more reliable. But, with the global population
currently increasing by one billion each decade, meeting future food demand is becoming
ever-more challenging and worrisome.
Norman E. BORLAUG
Taking seriously the problem of local conflicts also compels attention to the
evident inadequacies of the peacekeeping capabilities of the United Nations and of the
other international security organizations, such as NATO, that exist in many regions.
Clearly, these organizations can be no stronger than their member states are willing to
allow them to be, and so far they have not been allowed to be strong enough. The post-
Cold-War world needs a more powerful United Nations, probably with a standing
volunteer force -- owing loyalty directly to the UN rather than to contingents from
individual nations -- as recommended by the Commission on Global Governance.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
Around the world, not only in the poor countries, but I found the poverty of
the West so much more difficult to remove. When I pick up a person from the street,
hungry, I give him a plate of rice, a piece of bread, I have satisfied. I have removed that
hunger. But a person that is shut out, that feels unwanted, unloved, terrified, the person
that has been thrown out from society - that poverty is so hurtable and so much, and I
find that very difficult.
Mother TERESA
I can only hope that once the dust settles, the G8 countries, with the UN and the
World Bank, and the private sector around the world, forge a Marshall Plan to eradicate
poverty.
The US has shown that when there is political will it can mobilize the
international community on a common cause. If there is the political will and leadership
to forge this impressive coalition that spans the globe in the fight against global terrorism,
then surely there must also be the good will, leadership and vision to forge a new
international coalition against hunger, abject poverty, malaria and aids. Extreme
poverty is an affront to all. It should shame us that governments can readily allocate
billions of dollars to fight wars and yet refuse to spend modest sums to fight poverty. As
a human being I am ashamed.
José RAMOS-HORTA
That poverty comes right there in our own home, even neglect to love. Maybe in
our own family we have somebody who is feeling lonely, who is feeling sick, who is
feeling worried, and these are difficult days for everybody. Are we there, are we there to
receive them, is the mother there to receive the child?
Mother TERESA
And then came the thunder of Chernobyl. During that accident's first days, many
scientists-even some respected ones-argued that it was "no big deal," that we would get
by. From day one, however, it was our policy to get to the bottom of it. We decided that
people must know the truth. The power of the atom had gone out of control, and it
took the nation's supreme effort to cope with it. It was a watershed in our understanding
of many things.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
It has been the operation of these and similar influences which has brought about,
as I fear, a return to the old conception of what is called power diplomacy. To these
conceptions, it is not too much to say, the idea of the complete opposition of war and
peace was really foreign. That may seem rather a strong observation. Let me explain what
I mean. I remember reading in an article by one who utterly rejected the League and all it
stood for, that in his view war was merely intensified peace. He regarded the normal
condition of international affairs as one of rivalry between the nations, growing
ultimately to war. That was, as he saw it, what might be reasonably looked on as the
usual condition of international life. No doubt he thought diplomacy was useful in order
to postpone the actual outbreak of war as long as possible, but that was the limit of its
possibilities. It never could prevent war, and the conception that war could be prevented
was mere baseless ideology.
Today's real borders are not between nations, but between powerful and
powerless, free and fettered, privileged and humiliated. Today, no walls can separate
humanitarian or human rights crises in one part of the world from national security crises
in another.
Kofi ANNAN
Our prayers go out to the many who have lost their lives, those who have been
injured and the many more who have been traumatized by this senseless act of violence.
The Dalai Lama

The grim fact is that we prepare for war like precocious giants, and for peace
like retarded pygmies.
Lester Bowles PEARSON
Since we are deeply concerned with the present, with all its dangers and
contradictions, you may think it strange that I have talked to you about ancient Italy and
about the Italy of the Middle Ages rather than about the place and purpose of today's Italy
within the complicated framework of modem Europe.
I do not regard a look at the past as fruitless, however, for it was from the past that
the forerunners and the first apostles of our revolution drew their inspiration. The idea of
a legal system for the whole world, pursued by the pacifists in Europe and America
during both the last century and this one, is to be found back in the history of Rome and
in the minds of our greatest thinkers.
Thus shall we live, because we will have created a society which recognises that
all people are born equal, with each entitled in equal measure to life, liberty, prosperity,
human rights and good governance.
Such a society should never allow again that there should be prisoners of
conscience nor that any person's human rights should be violated.
Nelson Rohihlahia
MANDELA
…………
Our democracy is being born in pain. A political culture is emerging – one
that presupposes debate and pluralism, but also legal order and, if democracy is to work,
strong government authority based on one law for all.
Mikhail S.
GORBACHEV
Nobel's Peace Prize is the highest honour, but at the same time the one that
imposes the greatest obligations, that can be bestowed on any man bearing political
responsibility.
Willy BRANDT
The poor people are very great people. They can teach us so many beautiful
things. The other day one of them came to thank and said: You people who have vowed
chastity you are the best people to teach us family planning. Because it is nothing more
than self-control out of love for each other. And I think they said a beautiful sentence.
And these are people who maybe have nothing to eat, maybe they have not a home where
to live, but they are great people.
Mother TERESA
We will not build a peaceful world by following a negative path. It is not enough
to say "We must not wage war." It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it. We must
concentrate not merely on the negative expulsion of war, but on the positive
affirmation of peace. There is a fascinating little story that is preserved for us in
Greek literature about Ulysses and the Sirens. The Sirens had the ability to sing so
sweetly that sailors could not resist steering toward their island. Many ships were lured
upon the rocks, and men forgot home, duty, and honour as they flung themselves into the
sea to be embraced by arms that drew them down to death. Ulysses, determined not to be
lured by the Sirens, first decided to tie himself tightly to the mast of his boat, and his
crew stuffed their ears with wax. But finally he and his crew learned a better way to save
themselves: they took on board the beautiful singer Orpheus whose melodies were
sweeter than the music of the Sirens. When Orpheus sang, who bothered to listen to the
Sirens?
Martin Luther KING
We wake up every morning, now, as different people. Peace is possible. We see

the hope in our children's eyes. We see the light in our soldiers' faces, in the streets, in the
buses, in the fields. We must not let them down. We will not let them down.
Yitzhak Rabin
Poverty is the main cause for terrorism. 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.
KIM Dae Jung
Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.
Henry
KISSINGER
As we celebrate together, we invoke the powers of creativity within us to

reconstruct a home destroyed by war, a home overlooking our neighbour's, where our
children will play with their children and will compete in picking flowers. Now, I have a
sense of national and human pride in my Palestinian Arab people's patience and sacrifice,
through which they have established an uninterrupted link between the homeland, history
and the people, adding to the old legends of the homeland an epic of hope. For them, for
the children of those good-natured and tough people, who are made of oaks and dews, of
fire and sweat, I present this Nobel Prize, which I will carry to our children, who have a
promise of freedom, security and safety in a homeland not threatened by an invader from
outside or an exploiter from inside.
Yasser Arafat
I am not a professional politician. That is why I am always bothered by questions

concerning the usefulness and eventual results of my actions. I am inclined to believe that
moral criteria in combination with unrestricted inquiry provide the only possible compass
for these complex and contradictory problems. I shall refrain from specific predictions,
but today as always I believe in the power of reason and the human spirit.
Andrei
SAKHAROV
Along all these lines of practical effort for peace in the development of
arbitration and judicial decision in the development of a definite system of law,
determining the rights and obligations of nations, and in the enlightenment of the
civilized nations as to what their rights and obligations are, the present generation has
rendered a service in the cause of peace surpassing that of many centuries gone before,
and in further development along these same lines the present generation has before it a
golden opportunity for further service.
Elihu ROOT
For the future shape of the new organization will not depend upon what the
documents appear to state, but on what the members make of it. Practice in
cooperation is what will give the United Nations its character. Plans have not been set
up for a utopia but for Europe, Russia, America, and all the other countries with their
conflicting interests and ideas. And it is precisely because the proposals we have before
us are fairly modest that they may perhaps be realized.
Emily BALCH
It takes a very special person to run for any political office here in the United
States of America, and God forbid if after they are elected they should make a mistake.
Through the wonders of modern technology the whole world knows about it within
minutes. These were just some of the thoughts crossing my mind as I sat on the settee in
the Oval Office looking at the face of the young President seated facing me.
He's a handsome fellow, President Clinton; tall, broad shouldered, his eyes
are very blue and he has a lovely ability to look straight at you when he asks a question
and keep right on looking at you as you answer it.
"It's a shame really," I thought as I studied his boyish face. For some unknown
reason, I suddenly felt very sad. These next 3 and 1/2 years would take their toll on his
youth. One thing I have noticed about any man who has ever governed this enormous
country so wondrous and diverse is that he ages very quickly.
How well I remember the youthful face of Jimmy Carter on the day he was
sworn into office. Four years later as he vacated the White House he looked as though he
had been in office for at least twenty years.
President George Bush stood for a second and waved just before boarding a
helicopter as he said goodbye to the Presidency. He looked so sad and tired that I cried.
Betty WILLIAMS
Those who do not realize that, in the present state of mankind, arbitration is
incapable of avoiding or resolving large-scale international conflicts of interests, lay
themselves open to cruel disillusionment. Not until the day when international life in its
entirety is governed by the principles of law and justice, will it be possible to apply
arbitration, universally and without exception, to the relations between nations.
The principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of other states must

be respected, but non-interference is not enough. A Europe living in peace calls for its
members to be willing to listen to the arguments of others, for the struggle of convictions
and interests will continue. Europe needs tolerance. It needs freedom of thought, not
moral indifference.
Willy BRANDT
In the matter of proliferation of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass

destruction, and of the delivery systems for these, the most important next steps depend
on the existing nuclear-weapon powers. Prompt achievement of a Comprehensive Test
Ban Treaty -- without loopholes for low-yield tests or so-called "peaceful nuclear
explosions" -- is rightly seen by non-nuclear-weapon states as part of the basic bargain
sealed by the recent indefinite extension of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Among non-
nuclear-weapon states, pacts for mutual reassurance and joint monitoring of non-
proliferation commitments -- such as that agreed by Brazil and Argentina in 1994 --
should be pursued as useful complements to the NPT and regional Nuclear Weapon Free
Zones. Ultimately, though, the prevention of proliferation will depend on the
readiness of the nuclear-weapon states to continually reduce the prominence of nuclear
weapons in their foreign and military policies and, indeed, to find ways of moving toward
a nuclear-weapon-free world.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
The festival of Christmas is approaching when the message to mankind is: Peace
on earth.
Never has suffering and bewildered mankind awaited the Prince of Peace with
greater longing, the Prince of Charity who holds aloft a white banner bearing the one
word inscribed in golden letters: "Work".
All of us can become workers in his army on its triumphant march across the earth
to raise a new spirit in a new generation - to bring men love of their fellowmen and an
honest desire for peace - to bring back the will to work and the joy of work - to bring
faith in the dawn of a new day.
Fridtjof NANSEN
One of the ironies in Amnesty International is that whereas the repressive forces
in the world all know us, many of the prisoners of conscience for whom we are
working may never have heard the name "Amnesty International." Many have had all
contact with their friends and families cut off. Correspondence from abroad is
intercepted. In no few cases we only know their names and some scant details. There may
even be no way of locating them.
To work for the immediate and unconditional release of persons imprisoned,

detained or restricted for their political, religious or other conscientiously held beliefs,
their ethnic origin, sex, colour or language, who have not used or advocated violence.
They are called "prisoners of conscience".
I am convinced of the interrelatedness of international security and defence of

human rights, and am in favour of freedom of convictions and exchange of information,
freedom to choose one's country of domicile and place of domicile within that country,
and freedom of religion. I am deeply anxious about the fate of political prisoners in the
USSR, unjust courts, illegal repression. The most important aim for me is the release of
prisoners of conscience throughout the world, including the USSR, the countries of
Eastern Europe, and China.
Andrei SAKHAROV
Today's occasion offers an appropriate moment to share some of the thinking on

human rights which has arisen out of the experience which Amnesty International's
experience has had with prisoners of conscience. On certain points, a consensus
within our international movement seems to have developed. Other matters are little more
than postulates or questions which our membership has only begun to explore.
The Conventions in force are quite explicit on the statute dealing with prisoners of
war. The Convention of July 27, 1929, had filled an important gap: the more dangerous
the means of waging war became, the greater the obligation to protect prisoners.
The Convention, as we all know, provides for the organization of work for the
prisoners of war and for the designation of trustworthy leaders, to be chosen in each
camp by the prisoners themselves. It also determines the conditions under which
repatriation or hospital treatment in a neutral country will be permitted. In addition, it
arranges for the organization of a Central Information Agency. In a special article, the
Convention reminds us that "these provisions shall not be interpreted as restricting the
humanitarian work of the International Committee of the Red Cross for the protection of
prisoners of war."

Rouge
Private beneficence is totally inadequate to deal with the vast numbers of the
city's disinherited.
Jane ADDAMS
How often, recalls Jaurès in his book The New Host [L'Armée nouvelle], have the
socially and politically privileged believed or pretended to believe that their own
interests coincided with those of the fatherland: "The customs, traditions, and the
primitive instinct of solidarity which contribute to the formation of the concept of
patriotism, and perhaps constitute its physiological basis, often appear as reactionary
forces. The revolutionaries, the innovators, the men who represent a higher law have to
liberate a new and superior nation from the grip of the old... When the workers curse their
native country, they are, in reality, cursing the social maladjustments which plague it, and
this apparent condemnation is only an expression of the yearning for the new nation."
Karl Hjalmar
BRANTING
And with this Prize that I have received as a Prize of Peace, I am going to try
to make the home for many people that have no home. Because I believe that love begins
at home, and if we can create a home for the poor – I think that more and more love will
spread. And we will be able through this understanding love to bring peace, be the good
news to the poor. The poor in our own family first, in our country and in the world. To be
able to do this, our Sisters, our lives have to be woven with prayer. They have to be
woven with Christ to be able to understand, to be able to share.
Mother TERESA
All of us who work for the United Nations should be proud today, but also
humbled -- humbled because even more will be expected of us in the future. This award
is a tribute above all to our colleagues who have made the supreme sacrifice in the
service of humanity. The only true prize for them and for us will be peace itself.
Kofi ANNAN
And with this prize that I have received as a prize of peace, I am going to try to
make the home for many people that have no home.
Mother TERESA
This evening I would like to use this lofty and historic platform to discuss what
appears to me to be the most pressing problem confronting mankind today.
Modern man has brought this whole world to an awe-inspiring threshold of the future. He
has reached new and astonishing peaks of scientific success. He has produced machines
that think and instruments that peer into the unfathomable ranges of interstellar space. He
has built gigantic bridges to span the seas and gargantuan buildings to kiss the skies. His
airplanes and spaceships have dwarfed distance, placed time in chains, and carved
highways through the stratosphere. This is a dazzling picture of modern man's scientific
and technological progress.
Yet, in spite of these spectacular strides in science and technology, and still
unlimited ones to come, something basic is missing. There is a sort of poverty of the
spirit which stands in glaring contrast to our scientific and technological abundance. The
richer we have become materially, the poorer we have become morally and spiritually.
We have learned to fly the air like birds and swim the sea like fish, but we have not
learned the simple art of living together as brothers.
Martin Luther KING
After staring into the abyss of a global war we found ourselves beset by
problems of global dimensions: hunger, the population explosion, environmental
hazards, and the dwindling of natural resources. Only those who accept or even look
forward with pleasure to the end of the world can ignore problems of such magnitude.
Willy BRANDT
The twentieth century saw more momentous change than any previous century:
change for better, change for worse; change that brought enormous benefits to human
beings, change that threatens the very existence of the human species. Many factors
contributed to this change but - in my opinion - the most important factor was the
progress in science.
Joseph ROTBLAT
The lesson learned would seem to have been forceful enough to persuade
everybody, from then on, to devote himself to establishing the permanent peace so badly
needed. However, the waves stirred up by the storm were not so easily calmed, and the
end of the seventeenth century was marked by a series of intrigues and truces which
continued to the middle of the eighteenth, alternating with periods of so-called general
peace which, even then, allowed few people to breathe freely.
We certainly cannot claim that civilization made no progress at all in the course
of the centuries following the Dark Ages. Wars, however frequent and destructive they
may be, have never been able to kill entirely the intellectual and moral sense which raises
man above the beast. The spirit of discovery and the need for solidarity as a prime
condition of personal well-being had not been lost in the debris of kingdoms made and
unmade by war. Great inventions and important discoveries had broadened the scope of
productive activity, first of individuals and then of groups, and mankind was beginning to
seek protection against an arbitrary use of violence that served only ignorance and
oppression. The relative calm of the second half of the seventeenth and the first half of
the eighteenth centuries nurtured this tendency, allowing it to grow - timidly at first
among the enlightened - and to spread later among the masses. The concept of justice was
emerging, escaping from the shackles of violence.
Élie DUCOMMUN
You should always keep in mind the promotion of this continuous process
through which the progressive development of international justice and peace may
be carried on; and you should regard the work of the Second Conference, not merely with
reference to the definite results to be reached in that Conference, but also with reference
to the foundations which may be laid for further results in future conferences. It may well
be that among the most valuable services rendered to civilization by this Second
Conference will be found the progress made in matters upon which the delegates reach no
definite agreement.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
I believe that no human being should be sacrificed to a project; and in particular I

believe that no human being should be sacrificed to the project of perfecting nuclear
weapons that could kill hundreds of millions of human beings, could devastate this
beautiful world in which we live."
Linus Carl PAULING
The dangers exist in the further proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and

biological weapons capabilities into the possession of more and more nations. This
problem may actually have been aggravated by the end of the Cold War, which increased
ambiguities about the regional security interests and commitments of the major nuclear-
weapon states. The proliferation problem will CERTAINLY be aggravated if the existing
nuclear-weapon states continue, now that the Cold War is over, to act as if their
possession of nuclear weapons still confers crucial security benefits which they intend to
keep indefinitely, contrary to their obligations under the recently extended Non-
Proliferation Treaty.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
Let me not leave you with a false impression. The problem is far from solved. We
still have a long, long way to go before the dream of freedom is a reality for the Negro in
the United States. To put it figuratively in biblical language, we have left the dusty soils
of Egypt and crossed a Red Sea whose waters had for years been hardened by a long and
piercing winter of massive resistance. But before we reach the majestic shores of the
Promised Land, there is a frustrating and bewildering wilderness ahead. We must still
face prodigious hilltops of opposition and gigantic mountains of resistance. But with
patient and firm determination we will press on until every valley of despair is exalted to
new peaks of hope, until every mountain of pride and irrationality is made low by the
levelling process of humility and compassion; until the rough places of injustice are
transformed into a smooth plane of equality of opportunity; and until the crooked places
of prejudice are transformed by the straightening process of bright-eyed wisdom.
Martin Luther KING
Jr.
Propaganda is a topic of particular concern to peace associations. This is a

matter of educating the population in general, and not least the voters. The voters elect
the people's representatives who will enter the inter-parliamentary groups forming the
Inter-parliamentary Union. For this reason,. the peace associations have often approved
their members' asking prospective candidates if they, upon election, would join the inter-
parliamentary groups. I believe that at present no further commitment is required, for
election automatically brings membership, at any rate in Denmark.
With regard to the task of education, I shall touch on the question of literature.
There are those who believe we have need of more literature, of a large international
publishing house, of a great peace newspaper, or the like. I am rather sceptical about this
idea. We already have an immense literature.
Fredrik BAJER
The past is prophetic in that it asserts loudly that wars are poor chisels for
carving out peaceful tomorrows.
Martin Luther KING
Although there is greater emphasis on justice and human rights today, there are
still ardent advocates in favour of giving priority to political and economic expediency—
increasingly the latter. It is the old argument: achieve economic success and all else will
follow. But even long affluent societies are plagued by fortnidable social ills which have
provoked deep anxieties about the future. And newly rich nations appear to be spending a
significant portion of their wealth on arms and armies. Clearly there is no inherent link
between greater prosperity and greater security and peace — or even the expectation of
greater peace. Both prosperity and peace are necessary for the happiness of mankind,
the one to alleviate suffering, the other to promote tranquillity. Only policies which place
equal importance on both will make a truly richer world, one in which men can enjoy
chantha drive for economic progress needs to be tempered by an awareness of the
dangers of greed and selfishness which so easily lead to narrowness and inhumanity. If
peoples and nations cultivate a generous spirit that welcomes the happiness of others as
an enhancement of the happiness of the self, many seemingly insoluble problems would
prove less intractable.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
The protection of universal human rights requires the establishment of

machinery to provide for effective ways of individual appeal and redress, starting at the
local level and moving upwards to the national and international levels. Much remains to
be done among the nations of the world to secure an independent judiciary, procedural
guarantees, and observance of legality.
Elie WIESEL
The danger that the psychological residues of the Cold War mentality, if
allowed free rein, could bring a halt to the progress of recent years in arms reductions and
could lead, ultimately, to the renewal of increasingly expensive and risky military
competitions and confrontations between Russia and the West, even in the absence of the
former Cold War's ideological basis. The reality of this peril is apparent in the failure of
the United States and Russia, until now, to ratify either the START 2 agreement or the
Chemical Weapons Convention, as well as in the very serious possibility that the United
States will choose to abandon the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty -- the cornerstone of
nuclear arms limitation for nearly a quarter century -- in order to pursue the illusion of a
national defence against ballistic missiles.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
One can take exception to this idea on the grounds that a method of disarmament
exists which does not interfere with military security. The present level of armaments
could be taken as the starting point. It could be stipulated in an international treaty that
these armaments should be simultaneously and uniformly reduced by a certain proportion
in all countries. The military security would remain unchanged since it is dependent on
the relative, rather than the absolute, level of armaments. The ratio of 100 to 100 gives no
more security than 10 to 10. Thus, if armaments were curtailed without a secure peace
and all countries disarmed proportionately, military security would have been in no way
affected.
This is logically sound, but it misunderstands psychology. In life, particularly in
public life, psychology is more powerful than logic. When distrust exists between
governments, when there is a danger of war, they will not be willing to disarm even when
logic indicates that disarmament would not affect military security at all.
Ludwig QUIDDE
If one seeks to analyse experiences and reactions to the first post-war years, I
hope one may say without being accused of bias that it is easier for the victor than for the
vanquished to advocate peace. For the victor peace means the preservation of the position
of power which he has secured. For the vanquished it means resigning himself to the
position left to him. To walk behind others on a road you are travelling together, to give
precedence to others without envy - this is painful for an individual and painful for a
nation. But to believe that the work of half a century has brought one to the summit, and
then to plunge down from that summit - that is even more painful to the human soul. The
psychology of a people who have experienced this is not so easy to understand and
not so easy to alter as many believe.
Gustav STRESEMANN
Public dissatisfaction with economic hardships has been seen as the chief
cause of the movement for democracy in Burma, sparked off by the student
demonstrations 1988. It is true that years of incoherent policies, inept official measures,
burgeoning inflation and falling real income had turned the country into an economic
shambles. But it was more than the difficulties of eking out a barely acceptable standard
of living that had eroded the patience of a traditionally good-natured, quiescent people - it
was also the humiliation of a way of life disfigured by corruption and fear.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
Curious, at first glance, is the fact that codification of public international

law was begun before that of private international law. The interests of the individual
undoubtedly suffered in the absence of rulings in cases of conflicting civil law, but
complaints were not lively enough to attract the attention of the various governments. It
was the initiative of The Netherlands government, prompted by an eminent jurist, the
Minister of State Mr. Asser, that finally led the nations of Europe to discuss the conflicts
of civil law; the action this inspired was blessed with favourable results, and we can say
that in Europe the codification of private international law is well on its way.
Louis RENAULT
Our challenge is not the protests we have witnessed, but the public mood they
reflect and help to spread. For far too many people in the world today, greater openness
looms as a threat -- a threat to their livelihoods, to their ways of life, and to the ability of
their governments to serve and protect them. Even when it may be exaggerated or
misplaced, “fear has big eyes,” in the words of the Russian proverb. And, we might add,
it has the ear of governments, who feel compelled to respond.
But it is not the case that most people would wish to reverse globalisation. It is
that they aspire to a different and better kind than we have today.
Kofi
ANNAN
When one comes to try and analyse why the League succeeded so well in its first
ten years of existence, no doubt the chief reason must be found in the immense horror
which the War of 1914 had created amongst the human race. Almost all those engaged in
the work at Geneva had personal knowledge of the vast slaughter and destruction which
the war had produced. Many had been face to face with what looked like a vivid danger
of relapse into barbarism in their own countries, and there was a tremendous urge to
discover some effective prevention of future wars. It was under the impulse of these
feelings that we worked in those days and that we made our appeal, not in vain, for the
support of the public opinion of the world.
In my own country, and perhaps in some others, the workers for the League of
Nations are sometimes reproached with attaching too much importance to collective
security and the forcible prevention of war. That only shows how short people's
memories are in political affairs. As a matter of fact, during the first ten years of the
League very little was said about these subjects. We dwelt on the social and humanitarian
sides of the League. We urged disarmament and treaty revision. Great reliance -
particularly in England - was placed not upon forcible action but upon public opinion.
We preached - and, I am glad to say, preached successfully - the enormous importance of
publicity in the actions of the League, so that the world might know not only what was
being done but why it was being done at Geneva. We attached perhaps even too great
importance to the conception that no nation would be so rash or so wicked as to set itself
against public opinion of the world.
.
At the same time, the strength of U.S. and Soviet participation in Pugwash in its
first three decades, and the strength of U.S. and Russian participation today, have enabled
our organization to treat effectively those aspects of the nuclear danger that have been
dominated by the nuclear arsenals and postures of these powers. This dimension of
Pugwash's activities has included the organization's efforts in the 1950s and 1960s
on the technical basis for the Limited Test Ban Treaty, in the 1960s on the issues
underlying the ABM Treaty, in the 1980s on the intermediate-range nuclear forces issue,
and in the 1990s on managing -- and shrinking -- the U.S. and Russian nuclear arsenals
and nuclear-weapon-production complexes in the aftermath of the Cold War.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
Although the Pugwash Conferences came into being, four decades ago, in
response to the extraordinary dangers posed by thermonuclear weapons, and while the
pursuit of ways to reduce those dangers has always remained at the core of Pugwash
concerns, our founders recognized from the outset the seamless-ness of the web of
interconnections linking the nuclear danger with the dangers of other weapons of mass
destruction, with conventional conflicts, and with the ultimate causes of war rooted in the
human condition. Thus the Pugwash agenda expanded, in the early years of the
organization, to embrace not only the perils of nuclear weapons but also those aspects of
the wider security landscape in which the Pugwash format -- natural scientists meeting
with other scholars and political and military figures for off-the-record exploration of the
issues -- might be able to make a contribution.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
We can be defeated, but we will not be compelled to work. Because if people

want us to build tanks, we will build streetcars. And trucks will go backward if we build
them that way. We know how to beat the system. We are pupils of that system.
Lech WALESA
The pure light of the Revelation is perceived differently by different eyes,

and the church has been divided into many parts by human shortcomings, different
historical conditions, and by the church's neglect and distortion of doctrines during
certain periods of time.
Nathan SODERLOM
It has already been said that in most states the "nation" is a product of the state,
not the basis for the creation of the state. And when it is asserted that these "nations" have
anthropological character of their own, a "racial" character, the answer must be that the
state which is inhabited by an anthropologically pure race is yet to be found. Scientific
investigations prove that there is in all countries an endless crossbreeding between the
various constituents of the population. A "pure race" does not exist at all.
Furthermore, although various external anthropological distinctions - the shape of the
head, the hair, the colour of skin - are exact enough in themselves, we cannot prove that
any intellectual or spiritual traits are associated with them.
The purpose of law is to serve, not to thwart progress and development. Even
in the internal life of nations such progress cannot always be made without some conflict
of interests that cannot be resolved without violation of existing law, either through
revolutions or coups d'etat. How many of the numerous constitutions the world has seen
introduced in the last century have been able to operate without any infringement of their
laws? Should we, on this account, refuse to recognize a constitutional law or deny its
judicial character? No sensible person will say Yes. Does this mean then that we must
regard violations of international law from a totally different point of view?
The pursuit of peace and progress cannot end in a few years in either victory
or defeat. The pursuit of peace and progress, with its trials and errors, its successes and
setbacks, can never be relaxed and never abandoned.
Dag
HAMMARSKJOLD
Q
Such highly qualitative leadership is demanded especially in the realm of the
fostering of right international relations. Here the demand is simply irresistible. In a sense
the present generation is the first generation which could be truly international and it
finds itself poorly prepared. Many, subtle, and baffling are the maladjustments,
misunderstandings, with resultant strife and working at cross-purposes. We have nothing
less to do than to get inside of whole peoples and change their motives and dispositions.
John Raleigh
MOTT
Throughout my years in political life, I have seen extraordinary courage and

fortitude by individual men and women, innocent victims of violence. Amid shattered
lives, a quiet heroism has born silent rebuke to the evil that violence represents, to the
carnage and waste of violence, to its ultimate futility.
John
HUME
The quintessential revolution is that of the spirit, born of an intellectual

conviction of the need for change in those mental attitudes and values which shape the
course of a nation's development. A revolution which aims merely at changing official
policies and institutions with a view to an improvement in material conditions has little
chance of genuine success. Without a revolution of the spirit, the forces which produced
the iniquities of the old order would continue to be operative, posing a constant threat to
the process of reform and regeneration. It is not enough merely to call for freedom,
democracy and human rights. There has to be a united determination to persevere in the
struggle, to make sacrifices in the name of enduring truths, to resist the corrupting
influences of desire, ill will, ignorance and fear.
Saints, it has been said, are the sinners who go on trying. So free men are the oppressed
who go on trying and who in the process make themselves fit to bear the responsibilities
and to uphold the disciplines which will maintain a free society. Among the basic
freedoms to which men aspire that their lives might be full and un-cramped, freedom
from fear stands out as both a means and an end. A people who would build a nation in
which strong, democratic institutions are firmly established as a guarantee against state-
induced power must first learn to liberate their own minds from apathy and fear.
AUNG SAN Suu
Kyi
R ……………..
So we must fix our vision not merely on the negative expulsion of war, but upon
the positive affirmation of peace. We must see that peace represents a sweeter music, a
cosmic melody that is far superior to the discords of war. Somehow we must transform
the dynamics of the world power struggle from the negative nuclear arms race which no
one can win to a positive contest to harness man's creative genius for the purpose of
making peace and prosperity a reality for all of the nations of the world. In short, we must
shift the arms race into a "peace race". If we have the will and determination to
mount such a peace offensive, we will unlock hitherto tightly sealed doors of hope and
transform our imminent cosmic elegy into a psalm of creative fulfilment.
Martin Luther KING
Jr.
Beginning in 1957 (not without the influence of statements on this subject made
throughout the world by such people as Albert Schweitzer, Linus Pauling, and others) I
felt myself responsible for the problem of radioactive contamination from nuclear
explosions.
Andrei SAKHAROV
In my opinion, the problem has to a large extent arisen from the uneven rate of
advance in the different areas of human activities, in particular, between the progress in
the natural sciences - which include the physical and biological disciplines, and the
various social sciences - economics, sociology, politics (with psychology perhaps at the
interface between the two major groups). Undoubtedly, there has been much faster
progress in the natural sciences than in the social ones.
Joseph ROTBLAT
My reaction was above all a feeling that this was a tragic break in the work which
to me appeared to be the real task of our time: to construct a more satisfying
economic order.
Emily BALCH
To the realist, peace represents a stable arrangement of power; to the idealist, a

goal so pre-eminent that it conceals the difficulty of finding the means to its achievement.
But in this age of thermonuclear technology, neither view can assure man’s preservation.
Instead, peace, the ideal, must be practised. A sense of responsibility and accommodation
must guide the behaviour of all nations. Some common notion of justice can and must be
found, for failure to do so will only bring more “just” wars.
Henry
KISSINGER
I said that realistic self-confidence need not fear contact with the political
and ideological antagonist; that the uncertainty of the present time must not be permitted
to make us uncertain, too.
Willy BRANDT
The reality will give us the answer. We have gained experience over the past 15
years. Let reality justify.
LE DUC Tho
The first problem that I would like to mention is racial injustice. The struggle to
eliminate the evil of racial injustice constitutes one of the major struggles of our time.
The present upsurge of the Negro people of the United States grows out of a deep and
passionate determination to make freedom and equality a reality "here" and "now".
In one sense the civil rights movement in the United States is a special American
phenomenon which must be understood in the light of American history and dealt with in
terms of the American situation. But on another and more important level, what is
happening in the United States today is a relatively small part of a world development.
Martin Luther
KING
Realpolitik as grossly abused in Germany over a period of twelve years proved

to be an infernal chimera. Today we are in the process of finding a tolerable balance
between ourselves and with the world. If the balance sheet of my political effectiveness
were to say that I have helped to open up the way of new sense of reality in Germany,
then one of the greatest hopes of my life would have been fulfilled.
Willy BRANDT
I think that David Trimble would agree with me that this Nobel prize for peace
which names us both is in the deepest sense a powerful recognition from the wider
world of the tremendous qualities of compassion and humanity of all the people we
represent between us.
John HUME
A committee of competent persons, formed well in advance, could render a signal
service in collecting the various proposals, classifying them, and suggesting a program
which would of course be decided upon by the governments themselves. Furthermore,
regulations covering organization and procedure should be drawn up. In the wise
recommendations made, which will, one hopes, find a receptive audience, there is an
intentional omission: nothing has been said about the composition of the preparatory
committee which will raise problems similar to those I have mentioned in connection
with the court of arbitration. Let us hope that excessive touchiness does not thwart its
appointment.
Louis RENAULT
I had expected the talks with the North Korean leader to be extremely tough, and
they were. However, starting from the shared desire to promote the safety,
reconciliation and cooperation of our people, the Chairman and I were able to obtain
some important agreements.
KIM Dae Jung
We must try to mitigate the horrors of war, to reduce as far as possible the number
of its victims, and to prevent as far as possible the suffering it causes. This work must be
organized in advance before war breaks out, for no one knows where or when war will
come; and it must be organized on an international scale. In this way we shall also invoke
and develop the spirit of brotherly love which will oppose war in the most telling manner.
It is on this idea that the work of the Red Cross is founded.
Henri DUNANT
We need peace not only in the sense of the absence of violence; we need it as the
basis for that redeeming co-operation I have spoken about. And in the same way
that it presupposes peace, it can help to create peace, for where there is redeeming co-
operation there is peace; and there also mutual confidence will gradually establish itself.
Willy BRANDT
We need reform, not revolution. We need a flexible, pluralist, tolerant society,

which selectively and experimentally can foster a free, un-dogmatic use of the
experiences of all kinds of social systems. What is detente? What is rapprochement? We
are concerned not with words, but with a willingness to create a better and more decent
society, a better world order.
Andrei SAKHAROV
Peace is more than just absence of war. It is rather a state in which no people of
any country, in fact no group of people of any kind live in fear or in need….Today, more
than ten million refugees live in fear or in need. On our road towards a better future for
mankind we certainly cannot ignore the tragic presence of those millions for whom peace
does not exist.
Poul HARTLING
Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees
Then it occurred to me that the Burmese expression for refugee is dukkha-the,

"one who has to bear dukkha, suffering". In that sense, none of us can avoid knowing
what it is to be a refugee. The refuge we all seek is protection from forces which wrench
us away from the security and comfort, physical and mental, which give dignity and
meaning to human existence.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
The refugee problem has, all in all, become the greatest social problem of our
time. This problem can be solved, but only by energetic cooperation with the League of
Nations by governments aware of their responsibility to mankind. It will probably be
necessary to arrange an international loan, as was done when Greece had to find room for
some 1.300.000 refugees from Asia Minor. But financial measures alone are not enough.
We must tear down the barriers which today separate nation from nation, barriers that
have already destroyed untold material and intellectual wealth.
For my part, I believe that in time we will come to realize that the adoption of a
liberal policy on immigration will prove profitable in the long run. It is true that the
admission of refugees leads to various difficulties and costs a lot of money in the
beginning. Experience has shown, however, that immigration, especially when it takes
place gradually, far from harming a country, has instead after a time provided a new
source of energy and wealth in many ways.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
I feel it rather surprising also that refusal of war has never taken the form, on any
large scale, of refusal to pay taxes for military use, a refusal which would have
involved not only young men but (and mainly) older men and women, holders of
property.
Emily Greene BALCH
If God wishes to remember our suffering, all will be well; if he refuses, all will be
lost. Thus, the rejection of memory becomes a divine curse, one that would doom us
to repeat past disasters, past wars.
Elie WIESEL
It is true that even today it happens that international treaties are broken or that
generally accepted laws are violated. But cast your eyes, you sceptics, upon the vast
domains which are today controlled by international conventions or by generally
recognized codes of law-domains which include political, economic, philanthropic,
artistic, and literary relations which lie at the very heart of the material interests and
ideals of nations and which dominate their everyday life. You will see that, compared
with the large number of conventional or customary precepts which are scrupulously
observed, instances are relatively rare and exceptional in which a treaty is broken by a
temporary abuse or a pre-dominating interest. Furthermore, if we want to do justice to
these exceptions, we must be truly aware of the relative value of each rule of law -
whether it is founded on a convention or on some other source, whether it concerns the
internal relations of a country or international life.
The full title of our Society is The Religious Society of Friends. Indeed it
was the religious fervour of our forebears that caused them to "tremble before the Lord"
that early won them the nickname of Quakers from the verb to quake or tremble. This
nickname is no longer applicable to Friends in their quiet worship, but the name has
remained although it has lost its original meaning.
The Society was born in a period when much that bore the name of religion was
corrupt and very far removed from the teaching of Christ, and in the unrest of the times
men were seeking for the foundation truths that would give them freedom of spirit. For
years the young George Fox, founder of the Society of Friends, had been seeking this
freedom with an ever increasing sense of hopelessness. He could find no help from the
formalism of the church of his time, and its religious leaders used argument or subterfuge
that left him more and more conscious of his own inability to find a solution to the evil of
the world. In 1647 the burden was lifted from him, not by a conviction that he was
without sin, but that within his own soul he had the God-given capacity for Christ-
likeness; that within him he had a measure of the same love and life, of the same mercy
and power and of the same divine nature. He spoke of this measure of the divine in man
as the "Light of Christ within". He found that the spirit of Christ could speak directly to
him and evoke within him the power to choose his way through the evil of life when he
was willing to follow the light. He found too that this capacity lay within every man and
that the light could shine through all men. This did not make him believe that all that men
did was good; this was obviously untrue, but that there was within every man something
fundamentally good that could be developed.
Upon this basic truth all the principles and actions of the Society of Friends are
founded.
Quakers)
Prejudice and passion and suspicion are more dangerous than the incitement of
self-interest or the most stubborn adherence to real differences of opinion regarding
rights. In private life more quarrels arise, more implacable resentment is caused, more
lives are sacrificed, because of insult than because of substantial injury. And it is so with
nations.
The remedy is the same. When friends quarrel we try to dissipate their
misunderstandings, to soften their mutual feelings, and to bring them together in such a
way that their friendship may be renewed. Misunderstanding and prejudice and dislike
are, as a rule, the fruits of isolation. There is so much of good in human nature that men
grow to like each other upon better acquaintance, and this points to another way in which
we may strive to promote the peace of the world. That is by international conciliation
through intercourse, not the formal intercourse of the traveller or the merchant, but the
intercourse of real acquaintance, of personal knowledge, of little courtesies and kindly
consideration; by the exchange of professors between universities, by the exchange of
students between countries; by the visits to other countries on the part of leaders of
opinion, to be received in private hospitality and in public conference; by the spreading
of correct information through the press; by circulating and attracting attention to
expressions of praise and honour rather than the reverse; by giving public credit where
credit is due and taking pains to expose and publish our good opinions of other peoples;
by cooperation in the multitude of causes which are worldwide in their interest; by urging
upon our countrymen the duty of international civility and kindly consideration; and by
constant pressure in the right direction in a multitude of ways - a slow process, but one
which counts little by little if persisted in.
Elihu ROOT
Because I remember, I despair. Because I remember, I have the duty to

reject despair.
Elie WIESEL
I remember the killers, I remember the victims, even as I struggle to invent a

thousand and one reasons to hope.
Elie WIESEL
Moved by that appeal and inspired by the eminence you have thrust upon us, we
undertake that we too will do what we can to contribute to the renewal of our world
so that none should, in future, be described as the wretched of the earth …
Nelson R. MANDELA
I am also here today as a representative of the millions of people across the

globe, the anti-apartheid movement, the governments and organisations that joined with
us, not to fight against South Africa as a country or any of its peoples, but to oppose an
inhuman system and sue for a speedy end to the apartheid crime against humanity.
Nelson MANDELA
As the world community develops in peace, it will open up great untapped

reservoirs in human nature. Like a spring released from pressure would be the
response of a generation of young men and women growing up in an atmosphere of
friendliness and security, in a world demanding their service, offering them comradeship,
calling to all adventurous and forward reaching natures.
We are not asked to subscribe to any utopia or to believe in a perfect world just
around the comer. We are asked to be patient with necessarily slow and groping advance
on the road forward, and to be ready for each step ahead as it becomes practicable. We
are asked to equip ourselves with courage, hope, readiness for hard work, and to cherish
large and generous ideals.
Emily Greene BALCH
In the decades of my struggle for democracy, I was constantly faced with the
refutation that western-style democracy was not suitable for Asia, that Asia lacked the
roots. This is far from true. In Asia, long before the west, the respect for human
dignity was written into systems of thought, and intellectual traditions upholding the
concept of "demos" took root. "The people are heaven. The will of the people is the will
of heaven. Revere the people, as you would heaven."
This was the central tenet in the political thoughts of China and Korea as early as
three thousand years ago. Five centuries later in India, Buddhism rose to preach the
supreme importance of one's dignity and rights as a human being.
KIM Dae Jung
If the whole of humanity is now weary of the burdens of war, something more
effective than a mere "serious examination" is required if we are to lighten these burdens
and perhaps finally eradicate them. If this is regarded as impossible, it is not so much
because of certain technical difficulties as it is because we lack strong moral fibre.
We demand too much of others and too little of ourselves. No one wishes to be
the first to take the straight and narrow path. In addition, there is a tendency to overrate
our own goodwill and underestimate that of others. "Of course we want to live in peace",
we say. "But our neighbour and the others!" If only we would worry a little less about
others and a little more about ourselves, ask a little less of others and more of ourselves!
This applies to all nations. It also applies first and last to individuals, especially in
the context of their citizenship. They should each of them carry the responsibility for
the welfare of their country and for the whole of mankind. This, then, is the original
idea which I have very much at heart, and now is the time and opportunity to proclaim it
to the world.
Klas Pontus
ARNOLDSON
I appeal to scientists everywhere to defend those who have been repressed. I

believe that in order to protect innocent persons it is permissible and, in many cases,
necessary to adopt extraordinary measures such as the interruption of scientific contacts
or other types of boycotts. I urge the use, as well, of all the possibilities of publicity and
of diplomacy.
……
I hope that carefully thought out and organized actions in defence of victims of
repression will ease their lot and add strength, authority, and energy to the international
scientific community.
I have called this statement "The Responsibility of Scientists." Tatiana
Velikanova, Yury Orlov, Sergei Kovalev, and many others have decided this question for
themselves by their active, self-sacrificing struggle for human rights and for an open
society. Their sacrifices have been enormous, but they have not been in vain. These
individuals are improving the ethical image of our world.
Andrei SAKHAROV
It is, after all, the responsibility of the expert to operate the familiar and that
of the leader to transcend it.
Henry KISSINGER
Accepting the Nobel Peace Prize, the honouree is committed to an endless duty. I
humbly pledge before you that, as the great heroes of history have taught us, as Alfred
Nobel would expect of us, I shall give the rest of my life to human rights and peace in
my country and the world, and to the reconciliation and cooperation of my people. I ask
for your encouragement and the abiding support of all who are committed to advancing
democracy and peace around the world.
KIM Dae Jung
We understand the depth of feelings of loss and pain but we would appeal that
there be no retaliation. Violence serves no purpose. Violence solves no problems.
Retaliation would mean the further deaths of many more people. This would, in turn,
add to an increasing sense of fear, anxiety, and hopelessness, being felt around the world.
Mairead CORRIGAN
Our revolution did not explode in a sudden uprising of people intolerant of a

tyrannical regime; it was the result of a long period of intellectual and moral evolution,
brought about by men of great talent and of rare spiritual qualities, poets and
philosophers, true educators of the people. In speaking of liberty and patriotism, all of
them taught that liberty may be won by risking death, but it is preserved only by
adherence to the principles of justice and through acts of civic virtue.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
Children and young people are growing up today in a period of rapid,

revolutionary transition, shattering century-old norms and patterns of life. New
political realities, new freedom, the responsibilities implicit in newly acquired
independence find apathy, fatalism, and indifference to be major stumbling blocks.
Modern development envisages growth in every sphere, political, economic, social,
cultural, and educational. UNICEF became increasingly aware of the importance of
preparing the child for the exigencies of life from its earliest childhood. It began to
examine its role in the light of the crucial need to invest in human resources, to develop
the abilities inherent in people, to increase their capacity to produce and fend for
themselves.
United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF)
In the final analysis, the rich must not ignore the poor because both rich and
poor are tied in a single garment of destiny. All life is interrelated, and all men are
interdependent. The agony of the poor diminishes the rich, and the salvation of the poor
enlarges the rich. We are inevitably our brother's keeper because of the interrelated
structure of reality.
Martin Luther KING
Take my own country for example. We have developed the greatest system of
production that history has ever known. We have become the richest nation in the
world (1968). Our national gross product this year will reach the astounding figure of
almost 650 billion dollars. Yet, at least one-fifth of our fellow citizens - some ten million
families, comprising about forty million individuals - are bound to a miserable culture of
poverty. In a sense the poverty of the poor in America is more frustrating than the
poverty of Africa and Asia. The misery of the poor in Africa and Asia is shared misery, a
fact of life for the vast majority; they are all poor together as a result of years of
exploitation and underdevelopment. In sad contrast, the poor in America know that they
live in the richest nation in the world, and that even though they are perishing on a
lonely island of poverty they are surrounded by a vast ocean of material prosperity.
Glistening towers of glass and steel easily seen from their slum dwellings spring up
almost overnight. Jet liners speed over their ghettoes at 600 miles an hour; satellites
streak through outer space and reveal details of the moon. President Johnson, in his State
of the Union Message, emphasized this contradiction when he heralded the United States'
"highest standard of living in the world", and deplored that it was accompanied by
"dislocation; loss of jobs, and the spectre of poverty in the midst of plenty".
Martin Luther KING

Jr.
Every state has not only the right but the duty to make adequate provision for its
own defence in that way it thinks best
Lester B. PEARSON
The time is always right to do what is right.
Martin Luther KING
There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic,
nor popular but one must take it because it's right.
Martin Luther KING
When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are wrong, you cannot
be too conservative.
Martin Luther KING
Our problem is to find out in what respect their judgment is defective (if we
assume it to be defective); why nations have so often followed policies, the intention of
which may have been peace, but the outcome of which has been war. Why, in what
manner, the public mind is at fault in this matter. Until we face that aspect of the
difficulty it serves little purpose to devise new plans for peace, for the plans will be
rejected. It serves little purpose to find the way of escape if those who are to tread it do
not believe it to be the way, cannot be brought to see that it is, and refuse to follow it. The
problem which confronts our modern democracies is the problem of choosing between a
great many different remedies that are offered them, often between rival and mutually
exclusive remedies, sometimes based upon highly technical considerations, the merits of
which it is often extremely difficult for the layman to judge.
It must seem to the patient that the doctors are in most violent disagreement. And
if the problem for the laymen is to know how to choose, the problem for the expert
adviser is not only, and not first, to find the way of escape; it is first to enable those for
whom the way of escape is designed, and who are travelling in other directions, to see
that it is indeed the right road.
Norman ANGELL
In Guatemala it is just as important to recognize the Identity and the Rights of

the Indigenous People, that have been ignored and despised not only during the
colonial period, but also in the republican one. It is not possible to conceive a democratic
Guatemala, free and independent, without the indigenous identity shaping its character
into all aspects of national existence.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
The rights of the individual are of no less importance to immigrants and

minorities in Europe and the Americas than to women in Afghanistan or children in
Africa. They are as fundamental to the poor as to the rich; they are as necessary to the
security of the developed world as to that of the developing world.
Kofi ANNAN
Millions of peoples seek to assert their most fundamental rights and if we attempt
to find a common denominator for the problems I have just listed, there is one: the right
of peoples to self-determination.
In most cases the demands are not for secession. They are about their survival as a
people with a language and a culture, with their land and environment protected from
rapacious multinationals. Only when these basic demands are not met there has been
recourse to other forms of struggle with an escalation in their demands.
While self-determination in the de-colonisation process of the non-self-governing
territories almost always led to independence, this is not the case in most of the conflicts
of today.
We must ever bear in mind that the great end in view is righteousness, justice
as between man and man, nation and nation, the chance to lead our lives on a somewhat
higher level, with a broader spirit of brotherly goodwill one for another. Peace is
generally good in itself, but it is never the highest good unless it comes as the handmaid
of righteousness; and it becomes a very evil thing if it serves merely as a mask for
cowardice and sloth, or as an instrument to further the ends of despotism or anarchy.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
We have to find an acceptable level of risk. And that acceptable level will vary
from one country or society to another, depending on the social-economic evolution of
that country.
Norman E. BORLAUG
The road ahead is still full of obstacles and, therefore, dangerous. There is,
however, no question of turning back.
And now we knew, we learned, we discovered that the Pentagon knew, the State
Department knew. And the illustrious occupant of the White House then, who was a great
leader -- and I say it with some anguish and pain, because, today is exactly 54 years
marking his death -- Franklin Delano Roosevelt died on April the 12th, 1945, so he
is very much present to me and to us.
No doubt, he was a great leader. He mobilized the American people and the
world, going into battle, bringing hundreds and thousands of valiant and brave soldiers in
America to fight fascism, to fight dictatorship, to fight Hitler. And so many of the young
people fell in battle. And, nevertheless, his image in Jewish history -- I must say it -- his
image in Jewish history is flawed.
The depressing tale of the St. Louis is a case in point. Sixty years ago, its human
cargo -- maybe 1,000 Jews -- was turned back to Nazi Germany. And that happened after
the Kristallnacht, after the first state sponsored pogrom, with hundreds of Jewish shops
destroyed, synagogues burned, thousands of people put in concentration camps. And that
ship, which was already on the shores of the United States, was sent back.
I don't understand. Roosevelt was a good man, with a heart. He understood

those who needed help. Why didn't he allow these refugees to disembark? A thousand
people -- in America, a great country, the greatest democracy, the most generous of all
new nations in modern history. What happened? I don't understand.
Elie WIESEL
We can, however, record one very honourable exception: President Theodore

Roosevelt, in spite of everything, persisted in offering his good offices to the Russians
and Japanese. Neither party chose to condemn the offer as an unfriendly act. Exhausted
by a terrible war, both accepted, and peace was concluded7 under the folds of the star-
spangled banner. President Roosevelt was the first head of state to apply the rules of the
Hague Convention concerning the preservation of general peace. Honour and glory to
this eminent statesman!
One of the ways of helping to destroy a people is to tell them that they don't have
a history, that they have no roots.
Desmond TUTU
I shall never go astray, because I know with such certainty that I have my roots
in the village, deep down in the soil from which I, like the trees and other growing
things, have sprung.
Women prevent the threads of life from being broken. The finest minds have
always understood the peacemaking Mikhail Gorbachev role of women.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
Among the features that characterize society today, is the role of the woman,
although woman emancipation has not been fully achieved so far by any country in the
world.
The historical development in Guatemala reflects now the need and the
irreversibility of the active contribution of the woman in the configuration of the new
Guatemalan social order, of which, I humbly believe, the indian women already are a
clear testimony. This Nobel Prize is a recognition to those who have been, and still are in
most parts of the world, the most exploited of the exploited ones; the most discriminated
of the discriminated ones, the most marginalized of the marginalized ones, but still they
are the ones that produce life and riches.
Democracy, development and modernization of a country are impossible and
incongruous without the solution of these problems.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Terrorist acts must be fought, but the root causes of terrorism must also be
eliminated.
KIM Dae Jung
The most intractable of the six security problems I have mentioned is likely to be
the one that relates not to the "tools" of conflict -- to weapons and military forces -- but to
the roots of conflict in the inadequacies of the economic and environmental
circumstances of a majority of the world's people.
The overwhelming economic and environmental predicaments of the poor cannot
be solved by the poor alone without substantial cooperation from the rich, and,
conversely, the predicament of the poor cannot be allowed to persist without peril to the
rich. We all live under one atmosphere, on the shores of one global ocean, our countries
linked by flows of people, money, goods, weapons, drugs, diseases, and ideas. Either we
will achieve an environmentally sustainable prosperity for all, in a world where weapons
of mass destruction have disappeared or become irrelevant, or we will all suffer from the
chaos, conflict, and destruction resulting from the failure to achieve this.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
All human experience seems to show that in international, as in national, affairs,
the rule of law is an essential ultimate objective for any society which wishes to
survive in reasonable conditions. We now recognise that all humanity – the whole
population of this planet – has in many respects become, through the revolutionary force
of technological and other changes, a simple society. The evolution of, and respect for,
international law and international authority may well be decisive in determining whether
this global society is going to survive in reasonable conditions.
Javier Pérez de CUÉLLAR
……………..
In acceding to this rule of mediation no power would in any way be

abrogating its rights to another. For mediation is simply an attempt at conciliation like
that which is insisted upon by many civil codes before a case can be taken to court. The
mediator's proposals are not a judgment but a simple, friendly presentation. The
sovereignty of the states involved remains completely intact, and it would really take a
peculiarly obstinate government, devoid of all moral sense and concern for intellectual
values, to reject mediation in the face of impending war. The state ruled by such a
government would place itself beyond the precincts of civilization.
This need was recognized forty years ago when we said in the Russell-Einstein
Manifesto:
Here then is the problem which we present to you, stark and dreadful, and
inescapable: shall we put an end to the human race: or shall mankind renounce war? The
abolition of war is also the commitment of the nuclear weapon states; Article VI of the
NPT calls for a treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective
international control.
Any international treaty entails some surrender of national sovereignty, and is

generally unpopular. As we said in the Russell- Einstein Manifesto:
"The abolition of War will demand distasteful limitations of national
sovereignty."
Joseph ROTBLAT
S
We stand, with the victims, against terrorism.
The terrorist crime in New York and Washington is a great disaster that affected
all humanity and struck at civilization and human decency. ….
I, and the people of Palestine, suffering from occupation, pray for the innocent
victims in New York and Washington. We join our voices to all those sincere ones
calling for joint action under the flag of the United Nations to destroy all forms of
terrorism, which is a danger to humanity and to the sacred human right to life.
Yasser ARAFAT
11th )
There is so much suffering, so much hatred, so much misery, and we with our
prayer, with our sacrifice are beginning at home. Love begins at home, and it is not how
much we do, but how much love we put in the action that we do. It is to God Almighty -
how much we do it does not matter, because He is infinite, but how much love we put in
that action. How much we do to Him in the person that we are serving.
Mother TERESA
It will no doubt be thought by many that such a scheme will never, in fact, be
generally accepted, because it would involve a sacrifice of military liberty to which
no Government in present-day conditions, can be expected to agree.
Philip J. NOEL
-BAKER
We have been speaking of forces making for unity mainly on a psychological

level. But an influence which is not ideological so much as practical and external is of
absolutely prime importance. I refer to the technical advances which are so rapidly and
widely remaking the world. Industrialization based on machinery, already referred to as a
characteristic of our age, is but one aspect of the revolution that is being wrought by
technology. Under modern conditions our physical setting tends towards sameness.
More and more we have the same trains and the same airplanes, the same bathrooms and
the same picture galleries, the same hospitals, the same food, and the same fashion in
clothes. These develop the same habits and with these the same ideas and same mind set.
To take a tiny example, a population where everyone has a watch is deeply affected in the
way it conducts its activities, economic and social, by this simple fact. Technology gives
us the facilities that lessen the barriers of time and distance - the telegraph and cable, the
telephone, radio, and the rest. But technology is a tool, not a virtue. It may be used for
good or bad ends, and bringing men closer does not make them love one another unless
they prove lovable. Multiplying contacts can mean multiplying points of friction.
Emily Greene BALCH
The profession of soldiering embraces a certain paradox. We take the best and the
bravest of our young men into the army. We supply them with equipment which costs a
virtual fortune. We rigorously train them for the day when they must do their duty -- and
we expect them to do it well. Yet we fervently pray that that day will never come -- that
the planes will never take off, the tanks will never move forward, the soldiers will never
mount the attacks for which they have been trained so well.
We pray that it will never happen, because of the sanctity of life.
Yitzhak Rabin
In the 21st Century I believe the mission of the United Nations will be defined by
a new, more profound, awareness of the sanctity and dignity of every human
life, regardless of race or religion. This will require us to look beyond the framework of
States, and beneath the surface of nations or communities.
Kofi ANNAN
The wellspring of courage and endurance in the face of unbridled power is

generally a firm belief in the sanctity of ethical principles combined with a
historical sense that despite all setbacks the condition of man is set on an ultimate course
for both spiritual and material advancement. It is his capacity for self-improvement and
self-redemption which most distinguishes man from the mere brute.
AUNG SAN Suu

Kyi
Those who have worked with refugees are in the best position to know that when
people have been stripped of all their material supports there only remain to sustain them
the values of their cultural and spiritual inheritance. A tradition of sharing instilled by
age-old beliefs in the joy of giving and the sanctity of compassion will move a homeless
destitute to press a portion of his meagre rations on strangers with all the grace and
delight of one who has ample riches to dispense. On the other hand, predatory traits
honed by a long-established habit of yielding to "every urge of nature which made self-
serving the essence of human life" will lead men to plunder fellow sufferers of their last
pathetic possessions. And of course the great majority of the world's refugees are seeking
sanctuary from situations rendered untenable by a dearth of humanity and wisdom.
AUNG SAN Suu
Kyi
……………..
We must not stumble over the barriers we meet. We must run hard, for sometimes
we must leap high to surmount the difficulties of fulfilling our obligations to humanity.
We must not let ourselves be torn by the thorns of thickets obstructing the "savage
paths" of which I spoke earlier. We must look higher and at the same time nearer. We
must draw close in body and in spirit in order to merit the name by which the magnificent
symbol of the Red Cross calls us, the name Man, the name Christian.
Rouge
We must focus, as never before, on improving the conditions of the individual

men and women who give the state or nation its richness and character. We must begin
with the young Afghan girl, recognizing that saving that one life is to save
humanity itself.
Kofi ANNAN
At this momentous event in my life - the acceptance of the Nobel Peace Prize, I
want to speak as a scientist, but also as a human being. From my earliest days I had a
passion for science. But science, the exercise of the supreme power of the human
intellect, was always linked in my mind with benefit to people. I saw science as being in
harmony with humanity. I did not imagine that the second half of my life would be spent
on efforts to avert a mortal danger to humanity created by science.
Joseph
ROTBLAT
Science, technology, information are -- for better or for worse -- universal, not
national. They are universally available. Their availability is not contingent on colour of
skin or place of birth. Past distinctions between West and East, North and South, have
lost their importance in the face of a new distinction: between those who move ahead in
pace with new opportunities, and those who lag behind.
Shimon PERES
On the other side there are the scientists, in Pugwash and other bodies, who
devote much of their time and ingenuity to averting the dangers created by advances In
science and technology. However, they embrace only a small part of the scientific
community. I want to address the scientific community as a whole, You are doing
fundamental work pushing forward the frontiers of knowledge, but often you do it
without giving much thought to the impact of your work on society. Precepts such as
"science is neutral" or "science has nothing to do with politics," still prevail. They are
remnants of the ivory tower mentality, although the ivory tower was finally demolished
by the Hiroshima bomb.
Here, for instance, is a question; Should any scientist work on the development of
weapons of mass destruction? A clear &"no&" was the answer recently given by Hans
Bethe. Professor Bethe, a Nobel Laureate, is the most senior of the surviving
members of the Manhattan Project on the occasion of the 50th Anniversary of Hiroshima,
he issued a statement that I will quote in full.
As the Director of the Theoretical Division of Los Alamos, I participated at the
most senior level in the World War II Manhattan Project that produced the first atomic
weapons.
Now, at age 88, I am one of the few remaining such senior persons alive. Looking
back at the half century since that time, I feel the most intense relief that these weapons
have not been used since World War II, mixed with the horror that tens of thousands of
such weapons have been built since that time - one hundred times more than any of us at
Los Alamos could ever had imagined.
Joseph ROTBLAT
The founders of the Institute of International Law believed, with good reason, that
its deliberations and resolutions would not carry sufficient weight unless its members and
associates were more or less restricted to persons of specialized knowledge who
represented the science of international law in various countries. The statutes
demand that members should have "rendered services to international law in the domain
of theory or of practice". The Institute does not open its doors to everybody and
consequently does not have the kind of democratic character, so to speak, which in this
day and age is generally a prerequisite for popularity. In its day-to-day activities, the
Institute can hardly appeal to popular sentiment, nor can it attract to its work the untiring
attention of that powerful instrument for expressing and broadcasting such sentiment, the
modern press.
At a time when science plays such a powerful role in the life of society, when the
destiny of the whole of mankind may hinge on the result of scientific research, it is
incumbent on all scientists to be fully conscious of that role, and conduct themselves
accordingly. I appeal to my fellow scientists to remember their responsibility to
humanity.
Joseph ROTBLAT
But scientists on both sides of the iron curtain played a very significant role in
maintaining the momentum of the nuclear arms race throughout the four decades of the
Cold War.
Joseph
ROTBLAT
They call us romantics, weak, stupid, sentimental idealists, perhaps because we

have some faith in the good which exists even in our opponents and because we believe
that kindness achieves more than cruelty. It may be that we are simpleminded, but I do
not think that we are dangerous. Those, however, who stagnate behind their political
programs, offering nothing else to suffering mankind, to starving, dying millions - they
are the scourge of Europe.
Fridtjof NANSEN
The popular, and one may say naive, idea is that peace can be secured by
disarmament and that disarmament must therefore precede the attainment of absolute
security and lasting peace. This idea prevailed in the early days of the organized peace
movement. Lay Down Your Arms was the title that our great pioneer, Bertha von Suttner,
gave her famous book - a book which, in German-speaking countries at least, has done
more to popularise our cause than all our congresses and pamphlets. This title was
generally understood to mean: "Lay down your arms and we shall have peace."
It is to the credit of the peace movement that it demonstrated before the war that
this was a misconception. Lightly armed nations can move toward war just as easily as
those which are armed to the teeth, and they will do so if the usual causes of war are not
removed. Even a total and universal disarmament does not guarantee the maintenance of
peace. Should the occasion arise, flails and scythes would again come into their own as
weapons. Disarmed nations embroiled in war would obtain modern weapons as quickly
as possible by converting peacetime industry.
The relationship of the two problems is rather the reverse. To a great extent
disarmament is dependent on guarantees of peace. Security comes first and
disarmament second.
Ludwig QUIDDE
The acquisition of the power of original thinking has greatly accelerated the
process of natural evolution. It has resulted in huge strides in all aspects of civilization, in
the arts, in literature, in medicine, in technology, above all, in science, which is at the
forefront of the expansion of the human intellect. However, these very advances in
science have led to the acquisition of the capacity for self-destruction, to the
development of the means to destroy the human species itself.
Joseph ROTBLAT
The desire that others should share the knowledge that there lies within
themselves a potential answer to evil, leads Friends to aim to draw out from those with
whom they are in contact the will to strive for the betterment of their own conditions.
……
It is usual for Quaker teams to try to lead people on from self-help towards the
giving of voluntary service. Self-interest can re-establish a man's self-esteem, but it is
only the first step towards the realization of the brotherhood of man in the sight of God.
By sharing his goods and, better still, sacrificing his time and energy, he can break down
barriers and enter into the lives of others, developing the good within himself. In China it
has been traditional for scholars not to soil their hands with manual work; yet, in
company with Friends from America, Britain, Canada, and New Zealand, parties of
students from the Chinese universities have spent their vacations building, hauling, and
making bricks with their own hands as they shared in the reconstruction of war and flood
devastated areas. They acclaimed with enthusiasm the joy of manual labour when it was
raised from the menial to service for others.

Quakers)
Many people tell me that I am courageous, because I have been to prison six or
seven times and overcome several close calls in my life. However, the truth is that I am
as timid now as I was in my boyhood. Considering what I have experienced in my life, I
should not be afraid of being imprisoned. But, whenever I was locked up, I was
invariably fearful and anxious.
Self-knowledge of this order does not detract from the courage!
KIM Dae Jung
Non-violence has also meant that my people in the agonizing struggles of recent
years have taken suffering upon themselves instead of inflicting it on others. It has meant,
as I said, that we are no longer afraid and cowed. But in some substantial degree it has
meant that we do not want to install fear in others or into the society of which we are a
part. The movement does not seek to liberate Negroes at the expense of the humiliation
and enslavement of whites. It seeks no victory over anyone. It seeks to liberate American
society and to share in the self-liberation of all the people.
Martin Luther KING
Mott's powerful personality and completely self-sacrificing devotion to the

cause of peace, have, I believe, never been equalled. He does not owe his influence to
the official positions he holds; rather, it is the positions which have acquired importance
through the work he has accomplished. Over the years he has travelled over the whole
world, using his official position to create and strengthen a universal sympathy for the
fundamental ideas on which peace necessarily depends.
Elihu ROOT
Appreciation is always encouraging, and this award has brought to us much that is
pleasurable, not only in the recognition but in the expressions of goodwill from many of
our friends. This is stimulating at a time when the need in the world is growing greater
and material resources at our disposal become less and more difficult to obtain. But there
also comes a great sense of responsibility to respond to the confidence shown in us.
We are very conscious of our human inability to make an adequate response and we pray
for strength if God desires us to continue in the work.

Quakers)
We live in a country that has many casualties and disasters. Some of these are
naturally caused, but many are caused by man in his inhumanity to his fellow man. . .You
have to have the sensitivity of love not to hurt people's pride. Don't be a do-gooder.
Sometimes all that is necessary is to visit a banned or detained person and show
that you do not fear contamination and that you don't fear the system. . ."
Desmond TUTU
I do not wish to minimize the complexity of the problems that need to be faced in
achieving disarmament and peace. But I think it is a fact that we shall not have the will,
the courage, and the insight to deal with such matters unless in this field we are prepared
to undergo a mental and spiritual re-evaluation - a change of focus which will enable us
to see that the things which seem most real and powerful are indeed now unreal and have
come under the sentence of death. We need to make a supreme effort to generate the
readiness, indeed the eagerness, to enter into the new world which is now possible, "the
city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God".
Martin Luther KING
Jr.
This reward will not be measured in money. Nor can it be reckoned in the
collective price of the rare metals and precious stones that rest in the bowels of the
African soil we tread in the footsteps of our ancestors.
These great masses will have turned their backs on the grave insult to human
dignity which described some as masters and others as servants, and transformed each
into a predator whose survival depended on the destruction of the other.
Nelson
MANDELA
The technique which has come to be called peace-keeping uses soldiers as the
Servants of Peace rather than as the instruments of war. It introduces to the military
sphere the principle of non-violence. It provides an honourable alternative to conflict and
a means of reducing strife and tension, so that a solution can be sought through
negotiation. Never before in history have military forces been employed internationally
not to wage war, not to establish domination and not to serve the interests of any power
or group of powers, but rather to prevent conflict between peoples….
Javier Pérez de
CUÉLLAR
The industrialized countries learned that lesson in their bitter and costly encounter
with the Great Depression. In order to restore social harmony and political stability, they
adopted social safety nets and other measures, designed to limit economic volatility and
compensate the victims of market failures. That consensus made possible successive
moves towards liberalization, which brought about the long post-war period of
expansion.
Our challenge today is to devise a similar compact on the global scale, to underpin
the new global economy. If we succeed in that, we would lay the foundation for an age of
global prosperity, comparable to that enjoyed by the industrialized countries in the
decades after the Second World War. Specifically, I call on you -- individually through
your firms, and collectively through your business associations -- to embrace, support and
enact a set of core values in the areas of human rights, labour standards, and
environmental practices.
Kofi ANNAN
Some time ago in Calcutta we had great difficulty in getting sugar, and I don't
know how the word got around to the children, and a little boy of four years old, Hindu
boy, went home and told his parents: I will not eat sugar for three days, I will give my
sugar to Mother Teresa for her children. After three days his father and mother brought
him to our home. I had never met them before, and this little one could scarcely
pronounce my name, but he knew exactly what he had come to do. He knew that he
wanted to share his love.
Mother TERESA
Opinion-makers and leaders, academics, writers and journalists who pretend to be

objective and neutral in the face of racism and discrimination, the rape of a small nation
by a larger power, the persecution of a weaker people by a ruthless army, must share
the guilt. No amount of intellectual arguments will suffice to erase their responsibility.
No-one is asked to yield their cherished convictions or beliefs. All of us are asked
to respect the views and rights of others as equal of our own and, together, to forge a
covenant of shared ideals based on commitment to the rights of all allied to a new
generosity of purpose.
John HUME
All over the world, like a fever, the freedom movement is spreading in the widest
liberation in history. The great masses of people are determined to end the exploitation of
their races and land. They are awake and moving toward their goal like a tidal wave. You
can hear them rumbling in every village street, on the docks, in the houses, among the
students, in the churches, and at political meetings. Historic movement was for several
centuries that of the nations and societies of Western Europe out into the rest of the world
in "conquest" of various sorts. That period, the era of colonialism, is at an end. East is
meeting West. The earth is being redistributed. Yes, we are "shifting our basic
outlooks".
Martin Luther
KING
One day when my father and brothers were absent, I watched, from the windows
of my home, three Austrian soldiers fall amid a hail of bullets. Apparently dead, they
were carried away to a neighbouring square. I saw them again two hours later: one of
them was still in the throes of dying. This sight froze the blood in my veins and I was
overcome by a great compassion. In these three soldiers I no longer saw enemies but men
like myself, and with remorse as keenly suffered as if I had killed them with my own
hands, I thought of their families who were perhaps at that very moment preparing for
their return.
In that instant I felt all the cruelty and inhumanity of war which sets peoples
against one another to their mutual detriment, peoples who should have every interest in
understanding and being friends with each other. I was to feel this way many times as I
looked at the dead and the wounded in all the wars for our independence in which I took
part.
I was not alone in thinking and feeling this way. On the day following the victory
of the people, the government set up after the insurrection issued a manifesto to the
peoples of Europe, in which it said:
"The day is probably not far distant when all nations will forget old quarrels and
rally to the banner of international brotherhood, putting an end to all conflict and
enjoying peace and friendship, strengthened by the bonds of commerce and industry. We
look forward to that day. Italians! Free and independent we shall seal the peace of
brotherhood with our own hands, not least with the nations which today constitute the
Austrian Empire, if only they are willing."
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
I was a young man who has now grown fully in years. In Hebrew, we say, 'Na'ar
hayiti, ve-gam zakanti' [I was a young man, who has grown fully in years]. And of all the
memories I have stored up in my seventy-two years, what I shall remember most, to my
last day, are the silences: The heavy silence of the moment after, and the terrifying
silence of the moment before.
Yitzhak Rabin
We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and
actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people.
Martin Luther
KING
Silence has long been confused with neutrality, and has been presented as a
necessary condition for humanitarian action. From its beginning, MSF was created in
opposition to this assumption. We are not sure that words can always save lives, but we
know that silence can certainly kill. Over our 28 years we have been – and are today –
firmly and irrevocably committed to this ethic of refusal. This is the proud genesis of our
identity, and today we struggle as an imperfect movement, but strong in thousands of
volunteers and national staff, and with millions of donors who support both financially
and morally, the project that is MSF.
Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.
Martin Luther
KING
All too many others have been more cautious than courageous and have remained
silent behind the anesthetising security of stained-glass windows.
Martin Luther
KING
This is the outcome of the lust for power, the imperialism, the militarism, that
have run amok across the earth. The golden produce of the earth has been trampled under
iron feet, the land lies in ruins everywhere, and the foundations of its communities are
crumbling. People bow their heads in silent despair. The shrill battle cries still
clamour around them, but they hardly hear them anymore. Cast out of the lost Eden, they
look back upon the simple basic values of life. The soul of the world is mortally sick, its
courage broken, its ideals tarnished, and the will to live gone; the horizon is hazy, hidden
behind burning clouds of destruction, and faith in the dawn of mankind is no more.
Fridtjof NANSEN
Surely such simple fundamental truths of social action ought to be

commonplaces of the public mind, commonly applied to politics as a product of
education. But they are not. The failure to grasp these fundamental simplicities can
coexist sometimes with great learning, profound erudition. Someone once said "There is
no truth so simple that the learned cannot render it incomprehensible."
Surely it is not beyond the wit of our educationalists to develop, through
education, the particular skill which enables the ordinary man, the ordinary voter, to
apply such commonplace truths to the guidance of the policies for which he is responsible
and which he imposes upon his government. Not more knowledge but better use of the
knowledge which we now have, is perhaps the main educational need and the main
educational problem which confronts us.
Norman ANGELL
The world is facing an unbelievable danger and we have to put aside secondary
skirmishes.
Shimon PERES
11th )
We are living in a world of the many and of change. Small nations, too, have a
part in the big game; they, too, can represent power in their own way; they can be a help
to themselves and to others; and they can also be a danger to themselves and to others.
Willy BRANDT
Do small things with a great heart

Mother TERESA
America’s goal is the building of a structure of peace, a peace in which all nations
have a stake and therefore to which all nations have a commitment. We are seeking a
stable world, not as an end in itself but as a bridge to the realisation of man’s noble
aspirations of tranquillity and community.
Henry
KISSINGER
No nation is so great as to be able to afford, in the long run, to remain outside an

increasingly universal League of Nations. However, in the nature of things, the smaller
states have a special reason for doing all they can to promote its existence and
development.
The equality among all members of the League, which is provided in the statutes
giving each state only one vote, cannot of course abolish the actual material inequality of
the powers concerned. The great powers which, from various motives, direct the
development of the world toward good or evil, either forging the links of a higher concept
of humanity or pandering to the greed of the few, will always exert an influence far
greater than their individual votes, regardless of any permanent support they may or may
not receive from the votes of dependent states. A formally recognized equality does,
however, accord the smaller nations a position which they should be able to use
increasingly in the interest of humanity as a whole and in the service of the ideal. The
prerequisite is merely that they try as far as possible to act in unison.
Karl Hjalmar
BRANTING
You must come to know the poor, maybe our people here have material things,
everything, but I think that if we all look into our own homes, how difficult we find it
sometimes to smile at each, other, and that the smile is the beginning of love. And so
let us always meet each other with a smile, for the smile is the beginning of love, and
once we begin to love each other naturally we want to do something.
Mother TERESA
I have argued that we must eliminate nuclear weapons. While this would remove
the immediate threat. it will not provide permanent security. Nuclear weapons cannot be
disinvented. The knowledge of how to make them cannot be erased. Even in a nuclear-
weapon-free world, should any of the great powers become involved in a military
confrontation, they would be tempted to rebuild their nuclear arsenals. That would still
be. a better situation than the one we have now, because the rebuilding would take a
considerable time, and in that time the dispute might be settled, A nuclear-weapon-free
world would be safer than the present one. But the danger of the ultimate catastrophe
would still be there.
The only way to prevent it is to abolish war altogether. War must cease to be an
admissible social institution. We must learn to resolve our disputes by means other
than military confrontation.
Joseph
ROTBLAT
Another essential to a universal and durable peace is social justice. The

constitution of the International Labour Organization, which, as you know, is part of the
machinery of the League of Nations, says that universal peace can be established only on
the basis of social justice. It goes on to add that conditions of labour exist involving such
injustice, hardship, and privation to large numbers of people that the resulting unrest
imperils the peace and harmony of the world. Thus, the struggle for peace includes the
struggle for freedom and justice for the masses of all countries. That is the basis and
background of the whole world situation which should always be kept in mind.
Arthur
HENDERSON
My social and political views underwent a major evolution over the fifteen
years from 1953 to 1968. In particular, my role in the development of thermonuclear
weapons from 1953 to 1962, and in the preparation and execution of thermonuclear tests,
led to an increased awareness of problems engendered by such activities. In the late
1950s I began a campaign to halt or to limit the testing of nuclear weapons. This brought
me into conflict first with Nikita Khrushchev in 1961, and then with the Minister of
Medium Machine Building, Efim Slavsky, in 1962. I helped to promote the 1963
Moscow treaty banning nuclear weapon tests in the atmosphere, in outer space, and under
water. From 1964, when I spoke out on problems of biology, and especially from 1967, I
have been interested in an ever-expanding circle of questions. In 1967 I joined the
Committee for Lake Baikal. My first appeals for victims of repression date from 1966-
67.
Andrei
SAKHAROV
Why have the natural sciences, especially the physical sciences, advanced so
much faster than the social sciences? It is not because physicists are wiser or cleverer
than, say, economists. The explanation is simply that physics is easier to master than
economics. Although the material world is a highly complex system, for practical
purposes it can be described by a few general laws. The laws of physics are immutable,
they apply everywhere, on this planet as well as everywhere else in the universe, and are
not affected by human reactions and emotions, as the social sciences are.
Joseph ROTBLAT
Social security is one of the foundations of lasting peace.
Willy BRANDT
A third strong source is socialism with its aspiration ti social justice at home and
abroad. And with its insistence that moral laws should find application not only between
individual citizens but among nations and states.
Willy BRANDT
A democratic and just society without racial divisions
Desmond TUTU
The Talmud tells us that by saving a single human being, man can save the world.
We may be powerless to open all the jails and free all prisoners, but by declaring our
solidarity with one prisoner, we indict all jailers. None of us is in a position to
eliminate war, but it is our obligation to denounce it and expose it in all its hideousness.
Elie WIESEL
Concepts like solidarity and helping third world countries to fight

poverty and backwardness have disappeared from the political vocabulary. But if
these concepts are not revived politically, the worst scenarios of a clash of
civilizations could become reality.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
On my behalf, and that of the Foundation Peace and Justice, we want to express
our solidarity and support for the US nation, both to you (President Bush), and to
the families of the victims of this irrationality and barbarity. It has saddened us all.
We accompany you with our prayers and solidarity, and ask that God illuminate
and guide you in the overcoming this grave moment, and in building the roads to peace.
Adolfo Pérez
ESQUIVEL
With the men, women and children in many parts of the world who have given us
so many years of their lives I wish to share this moment of joy. Without the generous
solidarity movement we would be even poorer and alone. Some of our good friends
have passed away from this earth: Denis Freney, Michelle Turner, Michel Robert, Carlos
Vilares, the little and beautiful Sarah Taylor whom God took away at age 15. We will
remember them for ever.
To receive this Nobel Prize on the 10th of December is for me a marvellous

coincidence. My son – here present – is eight years old today. I say to him, and through
him to all the children of my country, that we shall never resort to violence, we shall
never support military solutions to the problems of Central America. It is for the new
generation that we must understand more than ever that this can only be achieved through
its own instruments: dialogue and understanding, tolerance and forgiveness, freedom and
democracy.
Oscar Arias SANCHEZ
It is fair to hope, then, that in the institutions of the League there is a sound
foundation for whatever more complicated system of international government the
future may require.
Philip J. NOEL –
BAKER
We live with the hope that as she battles to remake herself, South Africa, will
be like a microcosm of the new world that is striving to be born.
This must be a world of democracy and respect for human rights, a world freed
from the horrors of poverty, hunger, deprivation and ignorance, relieved of the threat and
the scourge of civil wars and external aggression and unburdened of the great tragedy of
millions forced to become refugees.
Nelson MANDELA
Our goal is a new South Africa: A totally changed South Africa;

A South Africa which has rid itself of the antagonism of the past;
A South Africa free of domination or oppression in whatever form;
A South Africa within which the democratic forces - all reasonable people - align
themselves behind mutually acceptable goals and against radicalism, irrespective of
where it comes from.

In this new century, we must start from the understanding that peace belongs not
only to states or peoples, but to each and every member of those communities. The
sovereignty of States must no longer be used as a shield for gross violations of
human rights. Peace must be made real and tangible in the daily existence of every
individual in need. Peace must be sought, above all, because it is the condition for every
member of the human family to live a life of dignity and security.
Kofi ANNAN
The form of government is not, however, the decisive factor in the life of nations;
it does not generate the philosophies of socialism or nationalism. Indeed, it may be asked
in the sphere of economics, for instance, whether the party system does not give
greater influence to capitalism than other forms of government accord it. The German
economy, even because of its ties and because of the structure of post-war Europe, was
among the first to break through national frontiers and find the path toward international
involvement. The trend toward formation of large business combines which is taking
place all over the world does not in itself, as I see it, make for progress for mankind as a
whole. I regret that this is leading to the decline in the number of independent
businessmen. It was the risk-taking initiative of these independent small businessmen that
first caused our economy to thrive.
Gustav STRESEMANN
Our political leaders impelled by the massed feelings of the people of the world
must learn that peace is the important goal - a peace that reflects the spirit of true
humanity, the spirit of the brotherhood of man.
Linus Carl PAULING
In this context, I call on Russia and the United States, sponsors of the peace
process, to accelerate the steps of this process, to take part in its formulation and to
overcome its obstacles. I urge Norway and Egypt, in their capacity as hosts to the
Palestinian-Israeli agreement, to continue their good initiative, which started from Oslo
and reached Washington and Cairo. Oslo, as well as the names of the other states that
have been hosting the multilateral talks, will remain shining names linked to the peace of
the courageous. I also urge all countries, foremost of which are the donor countries, to
make their contributions quickly to enable the Palestinian people to overcome their
economic and social problems, to rebuild themselves and to establish their infrastructure.
Peace cannot grow and the peace process cannot be entrenched unless their necessary
material conditions are met.
Yasser Arafat
The basic task of Amnesty International has been to spotlight the victims in
every society where imprisonment results from political or religious belief, or from racial,
linguistic or sexual discrimination. The issues to be that person, to have that faith, to
express that point of view. There are people in prison because they belong to a particular
party or group, and because they do not. Because they want social change, and because
they do not. Because they have spoken out, and because they have kept silent.
Just as we cannot in this day have a stable national democracy without

progress in living standards and a sense that the community as a whole participates in
those standards, without too great extremes of wealth and poverty, likewise we cannot
have one world at peace without a general social and economic progress in the same
direction.
Lester B. PEARSON
……………..
How difficult we find it sometimes to smile at each other, and that the smile is
the beginning of love. And so let us always meet each other with a smile, for a smile is
the beginning of love, and once we begin to love each other naturally we want to do
something……
Smile at each other, make time for each other in your family. Smile at each
other.
Mother TERESA
Social advance depends as much upon the process through which it is secured
as upon the result itself.
Jane ADDAMS
No less characteristic in a democracy is social justice. This demands a solution
to the frightening indexes of infantile mortality, of malnutrition, lack of education,
analfabetism, wages not sufficient to sustain life. These problems have a growing and
painful impact on the Guatemalan population and there are no prospects and no hopes.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Each one of us felt compelled to record every story, every encounter. Each one of
us felt compelled to bear witness. Such were the wishes of the dying, the testament of the
dead. Since the so-called civilized world had no use for their lives, then let it be
inhabited by their deaths.
Elie WIESEL
Don't hit at all if it is honourably possible to avoid hitting, but never hit soft.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
You are also honouring the Soldiers of Peace, some half a million young men
and women from fifty-eight countries. Seven hundred and thirty-three ' Blue Helmets '
have given their lives in the service of peace…. Nor can we forget the civilians of the
United Nations Secretariat, and especially the Field Operation Service, who have
supported their military colleagues with dedication and courage in fifteen peace-keeping
operations all over the world.
Javier Pérez de
CUÉLLAR
Without excessive self-confidence, with a deep awareness of the difficulties

which confront them, as well as with the wisdom and moderation which they must
always display, they courageously undertake the conversion of mankind to a doctrine
which will mean definitive progress. How could the Nobel Institute fail to encourage so
worthy an effort? It cannot be unaware of the help contributed all over the world by the
humble army of peace, whose first-line soldiers are those who first influence the young.
Ferdinand BUISSON
It will be about the best solutions for the future in the interests of all our
people. It will not be about apartheid or armed struggle. It will be about future peace and
stability, about progress and prosperity, about nation-building.
I saw these people out there on the streets in the cold, mostly grown men and
whole families too, sleeping on newspapers, hands out, asking for a nickel, begging for
food. This was before the soup lines.
Norman E. BORLAUG
We live with the hope that as she battles to remake herself, South Africa will
be like a microcosm of the new world that is striving to be born.
This must be a world of democracy and respect for human rights, a world freed
from the horrors of poverty, hunger, deprivation and ignorance, relieved of the threat and
the scourge of civil wars and an external aggression and unburdened of the great tragedy
of millions forced to become refugees…
Nelson R. MANDELA
The sovereign state has in our times become a lethal danger to human
civilization because technical developments enable it to employ an infinite number and
variety of means of destruction. Technology is a useful servant but a dangerous master.
The independent state's armaments, built up in a militaristic spirit, with unlimited access
to modern methods of destruction, are a danger to the state and to others. From this point
of view we can see how important work for disarmament is; it is not only a task of
economic importance, which will save unproductive expenditure, but also a link in the
efforts to demilitarise - or we might say, to civilize - the states, to remove from them the
temptation to adopt an arbitrary anarchical policy, to which their armaments subject
them.
These two institutions (League of Nations and the United Nations organizations),
however, have not been capable of leading to a state of peace. Their efforts were fated to
receive a setback because they were obliged to try them in a world in which there never
existed a spirit directed toward the realization of peace.
Can the spirit bring about what we in our distress are obliged to expect from it?
Let us not underestimate its force for it is something which manifests itself
throughout the history of humanity. It is the spirit which has created that
humanitarianism which is the origin of all progress toward a form of higher existence.
Albert SCHWEITZER
In history, Judaism has been far more successful than the Jews themselves. The
Jewish people remained small, but the spirit of Jerusalem -- the capital of Jewish
life, the city holy and open to all religions -- went from strength to strength. The Bible is
to be found in hundreds of millions of homes. The moral majesty of the Book of Books
has been undefeated by the ups and downs of history.
Shimon PERES
The work for refugees can sometimes seem overwhelming. It can often appear
downright hopeless. Nevertheless, the one thing we must never do is to give it up. I feel
sure that the new High Commissioner will continue this work in accordance with the
traditions of the Nansen Office and in the spirit of Fridtjof Nansen.
Michael
HANSSON
Refugees
All of us have much that is primitive in us, and Friends do not ignore the fact that
emotions cause gulfs between groups of people, but, because of their belief in the power
of man to respond to the divine within him, Quakers know that difficulties can be
resolved; so they are frequently led into places of tension. In a spirit of
reconciliation they try to clear away misunderstanding.
In recent history there have been few cases where bitterness has been higher than
in India. During the communal riots a small Quaker team, composed of one American,
one Briton, a Hindu and a Moslem, the latter two friends of the Friends, went to a village
where false rumours had caused the Moslem section of the community to attack the
Hindus, driving them out, destroying and pillaging their homes. The first task was to
persuade the Moslems that their Hindu neighbours for many years had been good
members of the community, and next to convince the Hindus that it was safe to return.
The team won the confidence of both sides by impartial distribution of supplies and
medical service to all in need. Within a few weeks the contending parties had been
reconciled, and the Hindus were coming back to their homes as the united community
worked to repair the damage. Before the team withdrew, Moslems, Hindus, and
Christians came together in united worship silently to offer thanks to God for the
reconciliation.
Quakers)
The achievement of peace could not have been won without this goodwill and
generosity of spirit. We should recall too on this formal occasion that our Springtime
of peace and hope in Ireland owes an overwhelming debt to several others who devoted
their passionate intensity and all of their skills to this enterprise..
John HUME
In the morning under a dazzling sun all the gay young people in their varied and
picturesque costumes, stepping so briskly and waving their flags so joyously, made me
think of the springtime of life on its march into the future. In the afternoon the scene
took on a more serious aspect, and the sky was less radiant; it all seemed more like
autumn. I was deeply moved to hear the national anthem sung by everybody with almost
religious fervour, and to see the banners of so many societies and associations dipped in
universal salute to the highest representative of the country.
So it was that I saw the two faces of Norway's noble image - the one gay, the
other serious, but both equally engaging. My eyes and my heart were fully satisfied.
You have shown me every kindness and no doubt you will now think me only too
quick to take advantage of your patience. Forgive me and understand that I am repaying a
debt of gratitude.
Louis RENAULT
All that I have said boils down to the point of affirming that mankind's survival is
dependent upon man's ability to solve the problems of racial injustice, poverty, and war;
the solution of these problems is in turn dependent upon man squaring his moral
progress with his scientific progress, and learning the practical art of living in harmony.
Some years ago a famous novelist died. Among his papers was found a list of suggested
story plots for future stories, the most prominently underscored being this one: "A widely
separated family inherits a house in which they have to live together." This is the great
new problem of mankind. We have inherited a big house, a great "world house" in which
we have to live together - black and white, Easterners and Westerners, Gentiles and Jews,
Catholics and Protestants, Moslem and Hindu, a family unduly separated in ideas,
culture, and interests who, because we can never again live without each other, must
learn, somehow, in this one big world, to live with each other.
Martin Luther KING
Jr.
They are useful, they serve to strengthen the faith of the participants, they tend
very gradually to create a new standard of conduct, just as exhortations to be good
and demonstrations that honesty is the best policy have a certain utility by way of
suggestion. But they do not, as a rule, reach or extirpate or modify the causes of war.
Elihu ROOT
It is unnecessary for me to point out how little this right and this commandment
are respected in the present state of civilization. Up to the present time, the military
organization of our society has been founded upon a denial of the possibility of peace, a
contempt for the value of human life, and an acceptance of the urge to kill.
And because this has been so, as far back as world history records (and how short
is the actual time, for what are a few thousand years?), most people believe that it must
always remain so. That the world is ever changing and developing is still not generally
recognized, since the knowledge of the laws of evolution, which control all life, whether
in the geological time-span or in society, belongs to a recent period of scientific
development.
Bertha von SUTTNER

Nansen was the first to say what others have repeated, that ‘the difficult is what
takes a little while; the impossible is what takes a little longer.’ If politics is the art of the
possible, statesmanship is the art, in Nansen’s sense, of the impossible; and it is
statesmanship that our perplexed and tortured humanity requires today.
Philip NOEL-BAKER
World peace is coming, it certainly is coming, but only step by step.
Theodore
ROOSEVELT
Again, at the first rumours of war, the market price of many necessary
commodities is affected, especially articles which are crossing the seas and upon which
the premium for insurance is increased, all such increases having ultimately to be paid for
by the consumer.
Such treaties would also weaken the baneful influence of panic mongers and serve
to protect honest investors from being defrauded by stock exchange gamblers. At
the first rumours of war, timid investors in various government stock, being panic-
stricken, sell out, to their loss and the gamblers' gain. This evil would be lessened, if not
obviated, as investors would not rush to sell out, knowing as they would, that war could
not take place until after the dispute had been referred to arbitration.
William Randal
CREMER
Moreover, the worst that this insecurity, this speculation in uncertainty, creates, is
the fear of work; it was bred during the war, and it has grown steadily since. It was bred
by the stock-jobbing and the speculation familiar to us all, whereby people could
make fortunes in a short time, thinking they could live on them for the rest of their lives
without having to work and toil. This created an aversion to work which has lasted to this
very day. There are still some who will honestly and wholeheartedly settle down to hard
toil, but the only places where I have met this sincere will to work are those where the
angel of death by starvation is reaping his terrible harvest.
Fridtjof NANSEN
I want the government to know now and always that I do not fear them...There is
nothing the government can do to me that will stop me from...what I believe is
what God wants me to do...I cannot help it when I see injustice. I cannot keep quiet. .
.
Desmond TUTU
It will have seemed strange to some that two South Africans, with respective
histories as different as those of this year's honourees, should share the honour of
receiving the eminent Philadelphia Liberty Medal. Equally, it will have seemed strange
to some that we, as fighters for liberation, are -- together with those who have been the
captains of apartheid -- involved in processes leading to the democratic transformation of
South Africa.
Some have also made the point that it was strange, 200 years ago, that those who
designed the world's first democratic constitution should have permitted the system of
slavery to continue.
Strange though all these things might be, they nevertheless speak to one issue:
They affirm the correctness and invincibility of the truths and the ideals of liberty,
equality and the pursuit of human happiness.
Nelson R. MANDELA
If a man is called to be a street-sweeper, he should sweep streets even as

Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He
should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, here
lived a great street-sweeper who did his job well.
Martin Luther KING
The struggle we fight purifies and shapes the future.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
The object lesson of the war between Japan and Russia, with its unparalleled
holocaust, will make it practically impossible for the convention to disregard the question
of disarmament.
To the industrial classes, the subject is of supreme importance. The workers have
to pay, and the workers have to fight.
The task before us is a mighty one. All the vested interests and people who profit
by war will - with the journals they control - resolutely oppose any reduction of
armaments.
But science is rapidly becoming a powerful auxiliary of peace; the restiveness of
the burden bearers and the growing political power of the people are also factors which
will have to be reckoned with in the great struggle between the supporters of barbarism,
and the higher civilization.
William Randal
CREMER
Complementing this subconscious striving toward an era free of war are

people who are working deliberately toward this goal, who visualize the main essentials
of a plan of action, who are seeking methods which will accomplish our aim as soon as
possible. The present British prime minister, Campbell-Bannerman, is reopening the
question of disarmament. The French senator d'Estournelles is working for a Franco-
German entente. Jaurès summons the socialists of all countries to a united resistance to
war. A Russian scholar, Novikov, calls for a sevenfold alliance of confederated great
powers of the world. Roosevelt offers arbitration treaties to all countries and speaks the
following words in his message to Congress: "It remains our clear duty to strive in every
practicable way to bring nearer the time when the sword shall not be the arbiter among
nations."
Bertha von SUTTNER
I remember that in prison, someone, a male or female prisoner, had written, with
his or her own blood, on the wall of the torture centre: 'God does not kill. As the sunset
of life sets you will be reclaimed in love.' In the same way, many of us, shipwrecked or
resistance survivors, from dictatorships and oppression, we can, through crossing a
limiting situation, understand the words of St. John of the Cross and redo our path.
Adolfo Pérez
ESQUIVEL
Let us dare to face the situation. Man has become a superman. He is a

superman because he not only disposes of innate physical forces, but because he is in
command, thanks to the conquests of science and technique, of latent forces in nature and
because he can put them to his service.
The superman suffers from a fatal imperfection in his spirit. He is elevated to
that level of superhuman reason which must correspond to the possession of superhuman
force. He lacks the capacity to put this enormous power to work only for reasonable and
useful ends instead of to destructive and murderous ends.
Albert SCHWEITZER
A supranational judicial system is being built. Binding treaties between

nations who are committed to conciliation or arbitration when disputes arise rather than
to war represent the foundations of a larger edifice of the rule of law. What we do
advocate is obedience to the rule of Christ and His apostles instructing us to respect civic
law. We do not limit this to our own people or province. All people and all nations must
participate in the construction of a supranational legal system, which, according to our
Christian doctrine, is a continuation of God's creation. And when this legal obligation has
been fully realized, Christians and the church must unswervingly observe it, even in case
of conflict.
Nathan SODERLOM
There has been personal refusal of war service on grounds of conscience on a
large scale and at great personal cost by thousands of young men called up for military
service. While many people fail to understand and certainly do not approve their position,
I believe that it has been an invaluable witness to the supremacy of conscience over
all other considerations and a very great service to a public too much affected by the
conception that might makes right.
Emily Greene BALCH
In the State of Israel, from which I come today; in the Israel Defence Forces,
which I have had the privilege to serve, we have always viewed the sanctity of life as a
supreme value. We have never gone to war unless a war was forced on us.
The history of the State of Israel, the annals of the Israel Defence Forces, are
filled with thousands of stories of soldiers who sacrificed themselves -- who died while
trying to save wounded comrades; who gave their lives to avoid causing harm to innocent
people on their enemy's side.
Yitzhak Rabin
In Guatemala, one of the main concerns of native peoples has always been the
preservation of their languages which are as different as the great diversity of cultures
existing in the country. It is true that we have lost a lot, but today there is a movement of
recovery that I believe is very important for the survival of our cultures. (...)
17
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Since 1983 an unprecedented number of Chinese have been encouraged by their

government to migrate to all parts of Tibet, including central and western Tibet (which
the People's Republic of China refers to as the so-called Tibet Autonomous Region).
Tibetans are rapidly being reduced to an insignificant minority in their own country. This
development, which threatens the very survival of the Tibetan nation, its culture
and spiritual heritage, can still be stopped and reversed. But this must be done now,
before it is too late.

Lama
Nobody is stronger, nobody is weaker than someone (survivor) who came back.
There is nothing you can do to such a person because whatever you could do is less than
what has already been done to him. We have already paid the price.
Elie WIESEL
As you know, I am myself a survivor of a massacred family….
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
The sword, as the Bible teaches us, consumes flesh, but it cannot provide
sustenance. It is not rifles but people who triumph, and the conclusion from all the wars is
that we need better people, not better rifles -- to avoid wars, to win peace.
Shimon PERES
It remains our clear duty to strive in every practicable way to bring nearer the time
when the sword shall not be the arbiter among nations.
Theodore
ROOSEVELT
I extend my deepest sympathy to the families of victims of this dreadful

atrocity. I am quite sure that that sympathy is shared by people all over the world.
Naturally, I condemn without reservation the people who carried out this terrible
atrocity. They are clearly the enemies of humanity, as they have no respect whatsoever
for the most fundamental right of all -- the right to life.
John HUME
11th )
T
……………..
The human species is the outcome of a continuous, natural process of evolution,

involving an infinite number of transformations; an inexorable process that has been
going on since the formation of the Earth, about 4.5 billion years ago. This process of
evolution has led, through random mutations, and influenced by environmental factors, to
the emergence of systems of ever better adaptation, thus securing their continuity. In
animals, this has led to the evolution of species with increasing intelligence, climaxing in
the human species, which has acquired the ability of original thinking. I believe that this
marks a very important phase in evolution, the first time that a species has been able to
take charge of its own destiny.
Joseph ROTBLAT
Peace in the heart and peace on earth make up the task of the church, so long
as it bears the name of the Prince of Peace.
Lars Olof Nathan SOEDERBLOM
In 1945 I began to read for my doctorate at the Lebedev Institute, the department
of physics in the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. My teacher there was the great
theoretical physicist, Igor Evgenyevich Tamm. He influenced me enormously and later
became a member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR and a winner of the Nobel
Prize for physics. In 1947 I defended my thesis on nuclear physics, and in 1948 I was
included in a group of research scientists whose task was to develop nuclear weapons.
The leader of this group was I. E. Tamm.
As early as 1950, Tamm and I were the joint originators of a Soviet work on
controlled thermonuclear reaction (the thermonuclear reaction of hydrogen isotopes
either for the production of electrical energy or for the production of fuel for nuclear
reactors). Great advances have now been made in this work. A year later, at my initiative,
experiments were started on the construction of implosive magnetic generators (devices
by which chemical or nuclear reactions are transformed into magnetic field energy). In
1964 we attained a record with a magnetic field of 25 million gauss.
Andrei
SAKHAROV
How are we to reconcile our supreme duty towards memory with the need to
forget that is essential to life? No generation has had to confront this paradox with such
urgency. The survivors wanted to communicate everything to the living: the victim's
solitude and sorrow, the tears of mothers driven to madness, the prayers of the
doomed beneath a fiery sky.
Elie WIESEL
In an age when immense technological advances have created lethal

weapons which could be, and are, used by the powerful and the unprincipled to dominate
the weak and the helpless, there is a compelling need for a closer relationship between
politics and ethics at both the national and international levels. The Universal Declaration
of Human Rights of the United Nations proclaims that 'every individual and every organ
of society' should strive to promote the basic rights and freedoms to which all human
beings regardless of race, nationality or religion are entitled. But as long as there are
governments whose authority is founded on coercion rather than on the mandate of the
people, and interest groups which place short-term profits above long-term peace and
prosperity, concerted international action to protect and promote human rights will
remain at best a partially realized struggle. There will continue to be arenas of struggle
where victims of oppression have to draw on their own inner resources to defend their
inalienable rights as members of the human family.
AUNG SAN Suu

Kyi
That moment has already come, and at the very hour in which we live the
organizing of international life is a possibility. In Kant's lifetime the world was too large
for such a thing. Seas, mountain ranges, and deserts separated nations from one another,
and it took months to circulate a message throughout the world. These difficulties have
now disappeared. The same technology which has made war so terrible has given us
the means to bring the whole world within one international organization. Naturally, the
moral basis of such an organization must not be merely the fear of war. It must be the
conviction that it is a moral duty to do away with war and to secure peace. Only on this
basis can we hope to reach complete disarmament and a peace secured by treaties.
Ludwig QUIDDE
Moreover, if the territorial state is to continue as the last word in the development
of society, then war is inevitable. For the state by its nature claims sovereignty, the right
to an unlimited development of power, determined only by self-interest. It is by nature
anarchistic. The theoretically unrestricted right to develop power, to wage war against
other states, is antisocial and is doubly dangerous, because the state as a mass entity
represents a low moral and intellectual level. It is an accepted commonplace in
psychology that the spiritual level of people acting as a crowd is far lower than the mean
of each individual's intelligence or morality. Therefore, all hope of a better future for
mankind rests on the promotion of "a higher form of development for world civilization",
an all-embracing human community. Are we right in adopting a teleological
viewpoint, a belief that a radiant and beneficent purpose guides the fate of men and of
nations and will lead us forward to that higher stage of social development? In
propaganda work we must necessarily build upon such an optimistic assumption.
Propaganda must appeal to mankind's better judgment and to the necessary belief in a
better future. For this belief, the valley of the shadow of death is but a war station on the
road to the blessed summit.
But teleological considerations can lead no further than to a belief and a hope.
They do not give certainty. History shows us that other highly developed forms of
civilization have collapsed. Who knows whether the same fate does not await our own?
In the international sphere, a tendency can now be observed to construct and

adopt juridical instruments in relation to the respect and validity of native peoples’ rights.
This tendency implies that the traditional silence existing in relation to the problems of
native peoples has been broken. This has been possible thanks to our unyielding will and
faith in our struggle. This does not mean that native people see a clear and open path
towards an absolute solution to their historical problems or that their economic, political,
social and cultural rights will achieve a state of full acknowledgement and respect.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
We must combine the toughness of the serpent with the softness of the dove, a
tough mind and a tender heart.
Martin Luther KING
Today we stand on a bridge leading from the territorial state to the world
community. Politically, we are still governed by the concept of the territorial state;
economically and technically, we live under the auspices of worldwide communications
and worldwide markets.
The territorial state is such an ancient form of society - here in Europe it dates
back thousands of years - that it is now protected by the sanctity of age and the glory of
tradition. A strong religious feeling mingles with the respect and the devotion to the
fatherland.
The territorial state today is always ready to don its "national" costume: it
sees in national feeling its ideal foundation. Historically, at least in the case of the older
states, nationalism, the fatherland feeling, is a product of state feeling. Only recently,
during the nineteenth century, and then only in Europe, do we meet forms of the state
which have been created by a deliberate national feeling. In particular, the efforts to re-
establish peace after the World War have been directed toward the formation of states
and the regulation of their frontiers according to a consciously national program.
I hope the Member States will play their part. I think you referred to the fight
against terrorism. That fight can be won only if each Member State plays its part. I
think the Security Council has given us a very good basis for moving forward and has
given us a foundation for the coalition we are trying to build.
Kofi ANNAN
Terrorism is the enemy of all peace-loving people around the world. Whatever
the reason and whatever the target of attack, terrorism is the most heinous crime that no
one should commit.
KIM Dae Jung
I firmly condemn the horrible terrorist attacks that have taken thousands of
innocent civilian lives and have provoked an unpredictable spiral of violent
consequences. Terrorism, wherever it may come from, is a politically unjustified and
morally unacceptable behaviour. ….
Rigoberta Menchú
TUM
Terrorism must be outlawed by all civilized nations - not explained or

rationalized, but fought and eradicted . Nothing can, nothing will justify the murder of
innocent people and helpless children.
Elie WIESEL
Only to defend those lives, we can call upon our citizens to enlist in the army.
And to defend the lives of our citizens serving in the army, we invest huge sums in planes
and tanks, and other means. Yet despite it all, we fail to protect the lives of our citizens
and soldiers. Military cemeteries in every corner of the world are silent testimony to
the failure of national leaders to sanctify human life.
Yitzhak Rabin
In the past ten years unarmed gallant men and women of the United States have
given living testimony to the moral power and efficacy of non-violence. By the
thousands, faceless, anonymous, relentless young people, black and white, have
temporarily left the ivory towers of learning for the barricades of bias. Their courageous
and disciplined activities have come as a refreshing oasis in a desert sweltering with the
heat of injustice. They have taken our whole nation back to those great wells of
democracy which were dug deep by the founding fathers in the formulation of the
Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. One day all of America will be proud
of their achievements.
Martin Luther KING
There does not seem to be any theoretical limit to the size of these nuclear
weapons.
Linus Carl PAULING
In 1950 I collaborated with Igor Tamm on some of the earliest research on

controlled thermonuclear reactions. We proposed principles for the magnetic
thermal isolation of plasma. The tokamak system, which is under intensive study in many
countries, is closely related to our early ideas.
In 1953 I was elected a member of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
Andrei SAKHAROV
Nothing pains some people more than having to think.
Martin Luther KING
We will need to work out the necessary verification system to safeguard the
Convention. A Pugwash study produced suggestions on these matters. The mechanism
for negotiating such a Convention already exist. Entering into negotiations does not
commit the parties. There is no reason why they should not begin now. If not now, when?
So I ask the nuclear powers to abandon the out-of-date thinking of the Cold
War period and take a fresh look. Above all, I appeal to them to bear in mind the long-
term threat that nuclear weapons pose to humankind and to begin action towards their
elimination. Remember your duty to humanity.
Joseph ROTBLAT
The government, and the people, of the United States are in an extremely delicate
position at this time. They are struggling to find a response that will stop the evil of
terrorism, but without repeating that same evil: without killing even more innocents. The
greatest danger I see is this: that people will begin to welcome violence into their hearts,
and in this way diminish their own souls. While I believe that actions such as those
carried out by terrorists on September 11 must be responded to, I believe it is vital that
Americans not allow themselves to be overtaken with a thirst for revenge.
Oscar Arias SANCHEZ
Perhaps they are still here - not the great army of the slain but the multitude who
sacrificed everything - those so far away, 'higher than thoughts can reach', but yet
so near that they can whisper into our hearts without words. Were their sacrifices in
vain? Do the fatherless, the widows, the brother-less now see a happier world, a more
truthful world? Is there less hatred, less envy, less despair? Does the message of peace
resound outside the portals of the church? Do we now stretch out our hands to one
another more willingly? Have the creations of genius, which enable us to send words
around the world in a few seconds and to use transport to break down distance - have
these gifts of God bound us closer together than before?
The question is not flung out from a great teacher to any particular pupil in the
class; it creeps of itself into anxious and thoughtful hearts quietly pondering the duty of
man and the future of our race.
The flying colours and the rumbling drums are spread out beneath fresh winds and
sunny skies. The clop of horses' hooves, the beat of drums, the blast of shiny trumpets go
before. Men follow. Not those between thirty-five and fifty - they have no such desire.
They are not taken in. But the growing ones, the young to whom new gods are to be
given, new ideas, new dreams, new tasks - the youth that is to build a new world? Poor
world!"
Nathan
SODERLOM
The place to stop it is at the level of the individual. Therefore, the protection of
the rights of the individual to think freely, to express himself freely, to associate freely
with others and to disseminate his thoughts is essential to the preservation of world
peace.
We know so well these things that divide us that it has seemed useful to stop and
sort out and examine more especially threads that run through society drawing it
together.
We must not be discouraged that the threads of our social texture cross one
another. We must remember that nothing can be woven out of threads that all run the
same way. This figure of speech can easily be abused - I only want to point out that
differences as well as likenesses are inevitable, essential, and desirable. An unchallenged
belief or idea is on the way to death and meaninglessness.
That these clashes of ideals and purposes should take the form of war is, however,
intolerable. Indeed in the light of all that mankind has achieved and desired it seems
almost incomprehensible that it is today so largely occupied in preparing for war in more
hideous forms than ever before. Huge sums of money and treasures of human cleverness
and industry are invested in inventing new and more ghastly poisons, methods of
disseminating diseases and perfecting instruments of destruction instantaneous and
almost unlimited.
Emily Greene BALCH
As you know, Tibet has, for forty years, been under foreign occupation. Today,
more than a quarter of a million Chinese troops are stationed in Tibet. Some sources
estimate the occupation army to be twice this strength. During this time, Tibetans have
been deprived of their most basic human rights, including the right to life, movement,
speech, worship, only to mention a few. More than one sixth of Tibet's population of six
million died as a direct result of the Chinese invasion and occupation. Even before the
Cultural Revolution started, many of Tibet's monasteries, temples and historic buildings
were destroyed. Almost everything that remained was destroyed during the Cultural
Revolution. I do not wish to dwell on this point, which is well documented. What is
important to realise, however, is that despite the limited freedom granted after 1979, to
rebuild parts of some monasteries and other such tokens of liberalisation, the fundamental
human rights of the Tibetan people are still today being systematically violated. In recent
months this bad situation has become even worse.
If it were not for our community in exile, so generously sheltered and supported
by the government and people of India and helped by organisations and individuals from
many parts of the world, our nation would today be little more than a shattered remnant
of a people. Our culture, religion and national identity would have been effectively
eliminated. As it is, we have built schools and monasteries in exile and have created
democratic institutions to serve our people and preserve the seeds of our civilisation.
With this experience, we intend to implement full democracy in a future free Tibet. Thus,
as we develop our community in exile on modern lines, we also cherish and preserve our
own identity and culture and bring hope to millions of our countrymen and -women in
Tibet.
The Dalai Lama
Let us be patient and let us have confidence in the beneficial effect of time in
consolidating what is already decided and in developing what is only anticipated. Time
can indeed be a "galant'uomo", to use the Italian phrase, but we must not leave it to work
on its own; we must help it along.
Louis RENAULT
This is a period of change. Probably people always feel that they are living in a
time of transition, but we can hardly be mistaken perhaps in thinking that this is an
era of particularly momentous change, rapid and proceeding at an ever quickening rate.
This change is traceable to many causes. A major one which no one can overlook is
technological and based on inventions and discoveries which have altered the whole basis
of production and deeply affected social relations. This great change which began with
the inventions of machinery in the late eighteenth century doubtless is not closed with the
development of atomic energy. The change from peasant agriculture and handicraft to
machinery is a main dividing line in human history.
Another cause of change, one less noticeable but fundamental, is the modern
growth of population closely connected with scientific and medical discoveries. It is
interesting that the United Nations has set up a special Commission to study this
question.
A third and sufficiently obvious cause of change is the impact of the series of
terrible wars that have recently afflicted mankind.
Emily Greene BALCH
Time goes by. The broken cannon which ended in a bush on the battlefield is
no longer horrifying. It is covered in moss, and small flowers raise their wondering heads
through the spokes of its wheels. The brass-work becomes as green with verdigris as the
fields in the spring, and birds build their nests in the muzzle. Perhaps young couples
seeking privacy sit down on the gun carriage and talk about their dreams, love, and future
- words befitting the eternal melody of the world in spring, murmured around the tools of
death. The weapons have forgotten the taste of blood, and death rattles are no longer
heard, for those who uttered them sleep beneath the earth. Perhaps the mouldering hearts
of those who were taken from us now give life to the flower sprouting forth twelve years
later. But the dream was tom from the heart so suddenly. The war was to teach hatred
instead of love. The hand which wanted to caress was to be clenched instead, the lip
which yearned to speak of good was to wither. Life was stolen and death awarded in its
place. The flowers do not speak of revenge; they spring up from hearts warmly
remembered; rooted in bitter reality, they grow in a new dream.
Nathan SODERLOM
It is not the critic who counts. Not the man who points out how the strong man
stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the
man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who
strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great
enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause. Who, at the best,
knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, at least fails
while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those timid souls who know
neither victory nor defeat.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
It is recognition of the fact that NGOs have worked in close cooperation with
governments for the first time on an arms control issue, with the United Nations, with the
International Committee of the Red Cross. Together, we have set a precedent.
Together, we have changed history.
Jody WILLIAMS
Food aid or humanitarian assistance, if it is to be «humanitarian assistance» –

cannot be a tool in state-craft. In this case we must denounce the perfidious use of
food that confuses the meaning of humanitarian assistance. If the political masks itself in
an ambulance, then it is certain that the ambulance will be fired on. As well, if food is
allowed to be used as a weapon of war, then it also legitimates that populations can be
starved as a weapon of war.
The holy writings of the Torah, the Bible, and the Koran have been twisted
so often that it has become difficult for ordinary, good, and compassionate people of all
faiths to discern the principles that are primary in all the holy books: peace and justice,
fair treatment of our neighbours, and the primacy of love as the supreme value.
Whether or not we subscribe to any religion, and whichever faith has shaped the
culture that we live in, let us all remember the importance of working together as a
human race for the survival of our planet, and for its lasting peace.
Oscar Arias SANCHEZ

I would add to that group the Soviet Union which, in its international policy, has
shown that it is devoted to peace, abhors war, and sincerely believes in the ideal of world
union and world cooperation, although it is of the opinion that in the long run such a
consummation is impossible without a far-reaching change in the present social order.
The democracies stand for a certain view of what constitutes the good life. That view is
incompatible with war or with the "totalitarian state" do not believe that the values
which the Western democracies consider essential to civilization can survive in a world
rent by the international anarchy of nationalism and the economic anarchy of competitive
enterprise. I think we must get the better of both those forces and subordinate them to the
common good through world union on the basis of social justice. I believe that the
League of Nations and the International Labour Organization are the instruments to our
hand for conceiving and executing such a policy. Today the world is in transition. The
vast upheaval of the World War set in motion forces that will either destroy civilization
or raise mankind to undreamed of heights of human welfare and prosperity.
Arthur
HENDERSON
Totalitarianism is another force that seems still to be gaining ground. It may

be due partly to the urge for effective and rapid political techniques and impatience of
political democracy with its often provokingly slow and fumbling processes. It may be
due largely to cynicism regarding liberalism and individualism in the economic process.
It seems, however, to be emphatically on the wrong path.
A most dangerous aspect of Totalitarianism is that which is typified in the
phrase "the iron curtain", the endeavour to shut off the contagion of the ideas that are now
interpenetrating the rest of the world. It is hard to believe that the natural spread of ideas
and experiences can be cut off either totally or for a very long time.
Emily Greene BALCH
We the Indians are willing to combine tradition with modernism, but not at
all costs. We will not tolerate nor permit that our future be planned as possible guardians
of ethno- touristic projects at continental level.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
As a result of the World War, this old Germany collapsed. It collapsed in its
constitution, in its social order, in its economic structure. Its thinking and feeling
changed. No one can say that this transformation is yet complete. It is a process
which will continue through generations: But just as haste and restlessness are typical of
our present-day life, so change also takes place more rapidly than before. This applies to
change in the relationships between nations as it does to change within an individual
nation.
Gustav STRESEMANN
The solution of mutual problems implies establishing links through meaningful

co-operation among states beyond inter-bloc frontiers. This means transforming the
conflict; it means doing away with actual or supposed barriers with peaceful risks on
both sides. It means building up confidence through practical arrangements. And this
confidence may then become the new basis for the solution of long-standing problems.
This opportunity can be Europe’s opportunity in a word which, as has been proved,
cannot be ruled by Washington or Moscow – or by Peking – alone
Willy BRANDT
Travellers anxious to reach their journey's end, occasionally ask themselves

how far they have got and how much farther they have to go before they reach the goal of
their hopes. The progress they have made can be easily ascertained, but the remaining
distance and possible accidents on the way are more difficult to calculate.
In the time at our disposal this evening, we pilgrims of peace might imitate the
travellers and note how many milestones we have passed: whether we have made any
real progress, whether we have any cause for rejoicing, whether any - and if so, what -
real obstacles are still to be overcome.
William Randal
CREMER
Thirty-four years ago, the British and French workmen inaugurated a series of
conferences and meetings and the circulation of mutual addresses to their countrymen in
favour of a better understanding between the peoples.
These efforts have been continued during the whole of that time and at last have
culminated in the Treaty of Arbitration between France and England - the first
treaty of that nature concluded between any of the nations of Europe. The example thus
set has already led to the series of treaties I have previously referred to.
The victory which has been achieved is therefore a people's victory, and this is the
opinion emphatically expressed by the great French orator and popular leader, Mr. Jaurès.
William Randal
CREMER
The advance can be made along several lines. First of all there can be treaties of
arbitration. There are, of course, states so backward that a civilized community ought
not to enter into an arbitration treaty with them, at least until we have gone much further
than at present in securing some kind of international police action. But all really
civilized communities should have effective arbitration treaties among themselves. I
believe that these treaties can cover almost all questions liable to arise between such
nations, if they are drawn with the explicit agreement that each contracting party will
respect the others territory and its absolute sovereignty within that territory, and the
equally explicit agreement that (aside from the very rare cases where the nation's honour
is vitally concerned) all other possible subjects of controversy will be submitted to
arbitration. Such a treaty would insure peace unless one party deliberately violated it. Of
course, as yet there is no adequate safeguard against such deliberate violation, but the
establishment of a sufficient number of these treaties would go a long way towards
creating a world opinion which would finally find expression in the provision of methods
to forbid or punish any such violation.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
But, say the sceptics, what use are the treaties now that you have got them? To
this I make answer that the treaty between France and Great Britain, although only twelve
months old, has been followed by a convention between the two governments in which
all the differences between the two countries, some of which had lasted for centuries,
have been equitably adjusted and the decisions of the convention endorsed by both
parliaments. So today France and Great Britain, whose sons had frequently slaughtered
each other and wasted the resources of both nations, are now living on terms of the most
cordial friendship without a cloud on the horizon.
William Randal
CREMER
It is natural to try to understand one's own time and to seek to analyse the forces
that move it. The future will be determined in part by happenings that it is impossible to
foresee; it will also be influenced by trends that are now existent and observable. We
speculate as to what is in store for us. But we not only undergo events, we in part cause
them or at least influence their course. We have not only to study them but to act.
Especially is this true as regards peace in the future. The question whether the long effort
to put an end to war can succeed without another major convulsion challenges not only
our minds but our sense of responsibility.
As to judging our own time, and thereby gaining some basis for a judgment of
future possibilities, we are doubtless not only too close to it to appraise it but too much
formed by it and enclosed within it to do so.
Emily Greene BALCH
Considering much that tends toward the unity of mankind, we have noted such
matters as liberty, democracy, humaneness, public spirit, repudiation of coercion and
violence, spiritual universalism, common cultural treasures, sameness of physical
environment and habits, technical control of time and space, and the tendency to
universalise both achievements and ideas.
In thinking of trends to unify mankind, we must face squarely, without
underrating them, all that tends to the contrary, tends to divide men, to separate and hold
them apart, to array them consciously and passionately against one another. Not only
democracy and the cult of humaneness mark our age, but also greed, violence, the self-
adulation of national and racial groups, the fanaticism of political cults like fascism or
nazism, the glorification of might and power for their own sake, the blind reliance on
violence as that before which all idealism is but a dissolving mist. All these things we
know only too well.
Emily Greene BALCH
We will pursue the course of peace with determination and fortitude. We will not
let up. We will not give in. Peace will triumph over all its enemies, because the
alternative is grimmer for us all. And we will prevail.
Yitzhak Rabin
The most trustworthy leader is one who adopts and applies guiding
principles. He trusts them like the North Star. He follows his principles no matter how
many oppose him and no matter how few go with him. This has been the real secret of
the wonderful leadership of Mahatma Gandhi. In the midst of most bewildering
conditions he has followed, cost what it might, the guiding principles of non-violence,
religious unity, removal of untouchability, and economic independence.
The great statesmen observe relationships - a governing consideration
imperatively demanded on the part of leaders in the present bewildering age.
John Raleigh MOTT
People are trustworthy. People do some tremendous things. Young people I've
met them in places like Hondouras incredible young people from the United States who
go out into remote villages-you hardly hear of them! Peace Corps who go there to teach,
who go there to nurse, who go there to do incredible things for no reward, except for the
reward of doing something good. That is what makes you continue to have faith in
people. That is what holds people. Like a Nelson Mandela - twenty-seven years in jail.
Comes out not bitter but magnanimous, ready to forgive. That must give you hope that
there is something (points to his heart) tick, tick, tick.
I won't ever forget the image of the student in Beijing, remember the student
uprising in Tianamen Square? That student who stood in front of a tank and as the tank
came, the tank had to veer away from him. And then, when it went that way, the student
went and stood in front of it again! Those are moments that make you thrill to be human,
to say hey! isn't wonderful to be alive! Yes! There are awful things! There's Bosnia,
there's Rwanda, there are also some beautiful things - like Mother Teresa looking after
derelicts.
DESMOND TUTU
In our struggle for freedom, truth is the only weapon we possess.
Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama
No man of sense and feeling can fail to see the grave dangers of this situation or
to shudder at the thought of the terrible conflagration it could lead to if we delay much
longer in finding the remedy.
It is urgently necessary that some ray of truth and love fall upon the three or
four men who are today the arbiters of peace and war, so that a peace rich in justice and
well-being for Europe may replace the present armed truce.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in
reality. That is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.
Martin Luther KING
The country needs and, unless I mistake its temper, the country demands bold,
persistent, experimentation. It is common sense to take a method and try it, if it fails,
admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
For the next 20 years I worked under conditions of the highest security and under
great pressure, first in Moscow and subsequently in a special secret research centre. At
the time we were all convinced that this work was of vital significance for the balance of
power in the world and we were fascinated by the grandeur of the task. In the foreword to
my book "Sakharov Speaks", as well as in "My Country and the World", I have already
described the development of my socio-political views in the period 1953-68 and the
dramatic events which contributed to or were the expression of this development.
Between 1953 and 1962 much of what happened was connected with the development of
nuclear weapons and with the preparations for and realization of the nuclear experiments.
At the same time I was becoming ever more conscious of the moral problems inherent in
this work. In and after 1964 when I began to concern myself with the biological issues,
and particularly from 1967 onwards, the extent of the problems over which I felt uneasy
increased to such a point that in 1968 I felt a compelling urge to make my views public.
Thus it was that the article "Thoughts on Progress, Peaceful Coexistence and Intellectual
Freedom" came into being. In reality these are the same themes which seven and a half
years later were to become the title of my Nobel Lecture ("Peace, Progress and Human
Rights"). I consider these themes to be fundamentally important and closely
interconnected. My public stand represented a turning point for me and my entire
future. The article very quickly became known throughout the world.
Andrei
SAKHAROV
……………..
The struggle against apartheid required and itself produced men and women of
courage. Archbishop Desmond Tutu is one such outstanding patriot. . .Such is the
character of a fighter against apartheid that he was 'public enemy number one' to the
powers-that-be. And it is tribute to his independent mind that what he said was not
always popular.
Nelson
MANDELA
There are two types of laws: just and unjust... An unjust law is a code that is
out of harmony with the moral law...
An unjust law is a code that a numerical or powerful majority group compels a
minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself...
One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness
to accept the penalty.
Martin Luther
KING
U
War is no longer the ultima ratio but rather the ultima irratio.
Willy BRANDT
The ultimate aim of economic and social development is not to be measured

only by rates of growth or magnitude of production but by its impact on human dignity
and the quality of life. The ultimate end of such development is the individual, made
freer, more able to express and fulfil himself, more able to contribute to the family of
mankind. Communities of individuals free to act and conscious of their own potentials as
well as the potentials of the land on which they live will reduce the exploitation of the
weaker by the stronger, whether by a social class, a nation, a group of nations or a
multinational body. Such exploitation, by the fears or expectations it arouses, by the
tensions and connivances it creates, is the root cause of many conflicts. Therefore, the
promotion of human rights as a whole is directly related to the preservation of lasting
peace.
I remember what one of my patients said to me in Kigali: «Ummera,

Ummera-sha». It is a Rwandan saying that loosely translated, means «courage,
courage, my friend – find and let live your courage». It was said to me in Kigali at our
hospital, by a woman who was not just attacked with a machete, but her entire body
rationally and systematically mutilated. Her ears had been cut off. And her face had been
so carefully disfigured, that a pattern was obvious in the slashes. There were hundreds of
women, children and men brought to the hospital that day, so many that we had to lay
them out on the street. And in many cases, we operated on them then and there, as the
gutters around the hospital literally ran red with blood. She was one among many – living
an inhuman and simply indescribable suffering. We could do little more for her at that
moment than stop the bleeding with a few necessary sutures. We were completely
overwhelmed, and she knew that there were so many others. She knew and I knew. She
released me from my own inescapable hell. She said to me in the clearest voice I have
ever heard «allez, allez ... ummera, ummera-sha» – «go, go... my friend; find and
let live your courage».
Unanimity is basic to any diplomatic conference, for the goal of such a

conference must be the alignment of equal but distinct wills; in a parliamentary assembly,
on the other hand, it is the expression of a single will, that of the nation represented,
which must be obtained. This necessity for unanimity is a constraining factor since it can
lead to the exercise of the liberum veto, in short to a stalemate, but it is also an
indispensable safeguard against hasty decisions and against coalitions of interests. It
allows compromise in the sense that a resolution can represent the will of the conference
as a whole, in spite of some disagreements. It is a matter of tact and prudence; such
delicate problems are not resolved mathematically. The main point is that no nation
should be forced into anything against its will.
Louis RENAULT
A little uncertainty is good for everyone.
Henry KISSINGER
Don't wait for every country to introduce laws protecting freedom of association
and the right to collective bargaining. You can at least make sure your own employees,
and those of your subcontractors, enjoy those rights. You can at least make sure that you
yourselves are not employing under-age children or forced labour, either
directly or indirectly. And you can make sure that, in your own hiring and firing policies,
you do not discriminate on grounds of race, creed, gender or ethnic origin.
You can also support a precautionary approach to environmental challenges. You
can undertake initiatives to promote greater environmental responsibility. And you can
encourage the development and diffusion of environmentally friendly technologies.
Kofi ANNAN
How can there be peace without people understanding each other, and how
can this be if they don't know each other ?
Lester B. PEARSON
The first prerequisite, surely, is understanding - first of all, an understanding

of the cause and the nature of the disease itself, an understanding of the trends that mark
our times and of what is happening among the mass of the population. In short, an
understanding of the psychology of every characteristic of our apparently confused and
confounded European society.
Such an understanding is certainly not attainable in a day. But the first
condition for its final establishment is the sincere will to understand; this is a great step in
the right direction. The continuous mutual abuse of groups holding differing views,
which we witness in the newspapers, will certainly never lead to progress. Abuse
convinces no one; it only degrades and brutalizes the abuser. Lies and unjust accusations
achieve still less; they often finally boomerang on those who originate them.
Fridtjof NANSEN
………
When the United States was battling with unemployment, the late President
Roosevelt said that there were so many people ill-fed, ill-clothed, and ill-housed that if
their needs were to be satisfied, there would be work for every man and woman willing to
work. If that were true of the United States, how much truer is it of the world in which
two out of every three people suffer premature death for the lack of the primary
necessities of life.
John BOYD-ORR
World organization of a functional and not a governmental type is also beginning

on the cultural level. If UNESCO has not yet fully found itself, that is because the
potentialities that lie before it in the field of science, music, art, religion, and education
are so vast and as yet so undefined. Here what is wanted is not so much administration as
contact, consultation, cooperation.
If UNESCO succeeds, as it well may, in securing the general adoption of a
universal auxiliary language, such as the International Language Association is now
engaged in selecting and elaborating, it will be the dawn of a new day in literature such as
the world has hardly dreamed of. None of the natural languages will be tampered with,
reformed, or cut down to a restricted base. But all men who can read and write may
command an idiom universally understood. This will not only be an enormous advantage
in business, in travel, and in all sorts of practical ways. Far more important will be its
service in the world of ideas. Poets and the great writers will have open to them a reading
public including not only all European and American peoples but the Chinese, the Arabs,
the island peoples, and the people of Africa, who may yet make a great contribution.
Music and mathematics already command a universal notation not yet available for the
expression of thought. Such a public for the printed and spoken word, comparable to that
for music, would give an immense impetus to world literature.
Emily Greene BALCH
I think there are a lot of potential leaders who never become leaders because
they don't put out that extra effort to move into unexplored territory. It's pretty
boggy ground out there on the front lots of times. But the difference is courage. I think
there is a lot of innate talent that's not utilized to anything approaching its real potential.
Norman E. BORLAUG
UNICEF's original mandate stressed the importance of child health
generally. The basic needs of the child are, indeed, protection against disease, adequate
food, clean water, shelter and clothing, and an environment conducive to healthy
emotional and social development. The first need, however, is to ensure the survival of
the infant and its mother.

(UNICEF)
UNICEF was born of the tragedy of war to become a major implement of peace.
It was brought into existence on December 11, 1946, by a resolution of the General
Assembly, as the International Children's Emergency Fund, charged with responsibility
to prevent epidemics and stave off the worst consequences of malnutrition among
millions of children who had been exposed to the ravages of war. It brought supplies of
food, clothing, and drugs to these young victims of man-made upheaval and
conflagration, which tore at the roots of European civilization.

(UNICEF)
Bringing the United Nations closer to the people.
Kofi ANNAN
What would the world be like? If the United Nations makes mistakes it is
because it is a human institution and all humans make mistakes, but what would the
world be like without it? A much darker place!
Betty WILLIAMS
We need to strengthen our institutions of peace like the United Nations,

making certain they are fully used by the weak as well the strong….
Oscar Arias SANCHEZ

I believe the United Nations Security Council should take the lead
in fighting terrorism and in dealing with other global problems. All the main issues
considered by the United Nations affect mankind's security. It is time to stop
reviling the United Nations and get on with the work of adapting it to new tasks.
Concrete steps should include accelerated nuclear and chemical
disarmament and control over the remaining stocks of dangerous substances,
including chemical and biological agents. No amount of money is too much for
that. I hope the United States will support the verification protocol of the
convention banning biological weapons and ratify the treaty to prohibit all nuclear
tests. Both steps would reverse the Bush administration's current positions.
Mikhail GORBACHEV
The United States is proud of her remoteness from the old world, her freedom
from entanglement in its quarrels, her isolation. Yet in her relatively very short history as
an independent state she has fought at least six foreign wars while her troops have landed
on foreign soil on nearly a hundred occasions. Not one of those wars was for the purpose
of defending American soil.
Norman ANGELL
This wonderful land was founded by people fleeing oppression and determined to
build something better. Neil Diamond's song "Coming to America" explains the idea:
"On the boats and on the planes, they're coming to America. Never looking back again,
they're coming to America." God bless the people who feel the United States of
America has all the answers, and God bless the President, whoever he may be. America
has enormous problems of her own with forty million hungry people of which twelve
million are children, with racial and sexual discrimination still rearing their ugly twin
heads, with poor or nonexistent health coverage for a large number of its citizens and
numerous other instances of people being deprived of the opportunity to live in peace and
harmony. And yet the 200 year old democracy, despite all its faults, still shines out as the
hope of the world for that elusive dream of freedom with equality and peace with justice
for all.
Betty WILLIAMS
Countries used to divide the world into their friends and foes. No longer. The foes
now are universal -- poverty, famine, religious radicalisation, desertification, drugs,
proliferation of nuclear weapons, ecological devastation. They threaten all nations, just as
science and information are the potential friends of all nations.
Shimon PERES
Human rights are universal. Human rights are the birthright of every single
individual. No one is excepted, neither man, nor woman, nor child. This was emphasized
in the very title of the first United Nations declaration on human rights - the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights. The full implications of the universality of human rights is
not yet sufficiently recognized. Such recognition would entail a rethinking and revising
of a fundamental principle of international relations - non-interference in the internal
affairs of a state. The application of this principle in the field of human rights is the most
formidable obstacle to the creation of effective implementation machinery. It will require
a major effort of International re-education to extricate human rights from the grip of the
principle of non-interference in internal affairs.
Today also we commemorate and the world commemorates the adoption 50 years
ago of the Universal declaration of Human Rights and it is right and proper, that
today is also a day that is associated internationally with the support of peace and work
for peace because the basis of peace and stability, in any society, has to be the fullest
respect for the human rights of all its people.
John HUME
Thus it was when the newly formed United Nations turned to consideration of the
tap roots of war and the construction of a peaceful society, it began to work on an
International Bill of Rights. The first step was the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, adopted in 1948 in the belief that "recognition of the inherent dignity
and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the
foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world".
Such is the voice of the universal human soul which, in times of great
calamity, ignores the artificial barriers created for reasons of state and testifies to the
goodness and nobility of human nature.
And during the celebration of our national jubilee we did not forget the great
demonstration of compassion and active sympathy that came to our country from your
magnanimous Norway, as indeed from all the civilized nations.
This idea, held by a small number of our fellow citizens, has been rejected by all
those of us who have any human feelings and is contradicted by the history of nearly
every modern nation which has managed to become great, prosperous, and respected in
spite of the fact that its military chronicles record a larger number of defeats than of
victories.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
Just as no two fingerprints are identical, so no two people are alike, and every
country has its own laws and culture, traditions and leaders. But there is one universal
message which can embrace the entire world, one precept which can be common to
different regimes, to races which bear no resemblance, to cultures that are alien to each
other.
It is a message which the Jewish people has carried for thousands of years, the
message found in the Book of Books: 'Ve'nishmartem me'od l'nafshoteichem' --
'Therefore take good heed of yourselves' -- or, in contemporary terms, the message of the
sanctity of life.
Yitzhak Rabin
The question that we must ask is whether we are making progress toward the goal
of universal peace. Or are we caught up on a treadmill of history, turning forever on
the axle of mindless aggression and self-destruction? Has the procession of Nobel Peace
laureates since 1901 reflected a general movement by mankind toward peace?

……………..
…..I re-emphasize my faith in the universal principles of general
international law, however much they may be disregarded. They found binding
expression in the principles of the United Nations Charter: sovereign – territorial integrity
– non-violence – the right of self-determination of nations – human rights.
These principles are inalienable even though their application is often imperfect –
that I know.
Willy BRANDT
Clearly, it is of great importance, therefore, to understand the interrelationship

among these and other phenomena, and to approach and attempt to solve problems in a
balanced way that takes these different aspects into consideration. Of course it is not
easy. But it is of little benefit to try to solve one problem if doing so creates an equally
serious new one. So really we have no alternative: we must develop a sense of
universal responsibility not only in the geographic sense, but also in respect to the
different issues that confront our planet.
Responsibility does not only lie with the leaders of our countries or with those
who have been appointed or elected to do a particular job. It lies with each one of us
individually. Peace, for example, starts with each one of us. When we have inner peace,
we can be at peace with those around us. When our community is in a state of peace, it
can share that peace with neighbouring communities, and so on. When we feel love and
kindness towards others, it not only makes others feel loved and cared for, but it helps us
also to develop inner happiness and peace. And there are ways in which we can
consciously work to develop feelings of love and kindness. For some of us, the most
effective way to do so is through religious practice. For others it may be non-religious
practices. What is important is that we each make a sincere effort to take our
responsibility for each other and for the natural environment we live in seriously.
Lama
For the ethos of science and engineering shares deep and profound similarities
with the 20th century project of international organization. Science and international
organizations alike are constructs of reason, engaged in a permanent struggle against the
forces of unreason.
Science and international organization alike are experimental; both learn by trial
and error and strive to be self-correcting. Lastly, science and international organization
alike speak a universal language and seek universal truths.
Kofi
ANNAN
Many of you are big investors, employers and producers in dozens of different
countries across the world. That power brings with it great opportunities -- and great
responsibilities. You can uphold human rights and decent labour and environmental
standards directly, by your own conduct of your own business.
Indeed, you can use these universal values as the cement binding together
your global corporations, since they are values people all over the world will recognize as
their own. You can make sure that in your own corporate practices you uphold and
respect human rights; and that you are not yourselves complicit in human rights abuses.
Kofi
ANNAN
Peace is a movement towards globality and universality of civilisation.

Never before has the idea that peace is indivisible been so true as it is now.
Peace is not unity in similarity but unity in diversity, in the comparison and
conciliation of differences.
And, ideally, peace means the absence of violence. It is an ethical value.
Mikhail S.
GORBACHEV
As I have picked out one example after another, I have been conscious that many
of them reveal methods and motives shared by all people of goodwill, and the Society of
Friends makes no claim to the monopoly of any of them; rather would we proclaim the
universality of the truth that binds us together and pray that the day may quickly
come when all men will seek first the Kingdom of God.
Quakers)
The university is dedicated to the pursuit of truth and imbued with a passion to
follow the evidence wherever it might lead. Sadly, far too many of the institutions
claiming to be universities in South Africa actually base themselves on a lie, which, if not
consciously espoused, is acquiesced to by what those institutions do. The lie is that
people should be separated because of fundamentally irreconcilable ethnic differences.
How can you say that people are dedicated to the pursuit of truth when they have tried to
provide intellectual respectability to this horrendous lie, which has caused so much
unnecessary suffering to millions. A university must have a social conscience.
Desmond TUTU
If conflicts and wars are an affair of the state, violations of humanitarian law, war
crimes and crimes against humanity apply to all of us.
There is no doubt that this process will be long and complex, but it is no Utopia
and we, the indians, we have now confidence in its implementation.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
But I do not wish to impose any longer on your kind attention. What I have said
represents the thoughts of a practical politician. It is true that I am not one of those who
laugh at utopias. The utopia of today can become the reality of tomorrow. Utopias are
conceived by optimistic logic which regards constant social and political progress as the
ultimate goal of human endeavour; pessimism would plunge a hopeless mankind into a
fresh cataclysm. But though I take my place in the crowded ranks of the optimists, I draw
a distinction between the aims which can be realized immediately and those for which we
are not yet ready.
The service done our cause by Nobel was immense; for here (he ??) was a man of
science, a man of industry, always in search of practical goals, who rejected the old cliché
that peace is an unattainable utopia, capable only of seducing the minds and souls of
sentimental idealists.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
As I said earlier, we are certainly not utopians who believe that the reign of
justice and peace on earth has long been knocking at our door, and that it is only the
obstinate militarists and the plotting diplomats who refuse to open it. If our work has had
some success, it is undoubtedly because of our efforts to "calculate the limits of the
possible", as one great statesman put it; because of our patience in refusing to advocate
premature solutions; and because of our belief in the necessity of developing gradually
and progressively as our statutes bid us.
Ferdinand BUISSON
Furthermore, we are dealing with a goal as yet not perceived by many millions or,
if perceived, regarded as a utopian dream. Also, powerful vested interests are
involved, interests trying to maintain the old order and to prevent the goal's being
reached. The adherents of the old order have a powerful ally in the natural law of inertia
inherent in humanity which is, as it were, a natural defence against change. Thus pacifism
faces no easy struggle. This question of whether violence or law shall prevail between
states is the most vital of the problems of our eventful era, and the most serious in its
repercussions.
Bertha von SUTTNER
What we are advocating in Pugwash, a war-free world, will be seen by many as a

Utopian dream, It is not Utopian. There already exist in the world large regions, for
example, the European Union, within which war is inconceivable. What is needed is to
extend these to cover the world's major powers.
Joseph ROTBLAT
……………..
V
In every great faith and tradition one can find the values of tolerance and
mutual understanding. The Qur'an, for example, tells us that “We created you from
a single pair of male and female and made you into nations and tribes, that you may know
each other.” Confucius urged his followers: “when the good way prevails in the state,
speak boldly and act boldly. When the state has lost the way, act boldly and speak
softly.” In the Jewish tradition, the injunction to “love thy neighbour as thyself,” is
considered to be the very essence of the Torah.
This thought is reflected in the Christian Gospel, which also teaches us to love our
enemies and pray for those who wish to persecute us. Hindus are taught that “truth is one,
the sages give it various names.” And in the Buddhist tradition, individuals are urged to
act with compassion in every facet of life.
Kofi ANNAN
This is because, caught up in the daily struggle, your nation faces ever changing
reality with a clear eye and rejects old practices accordingly. It does not cling to customs
which no longer have a reason for being; it is constantly readjusting itself to new needs
and necessities. That is why your country is today in the vanguard of the world peace
movement. Your Storting was the first parliament to uphold officially the idea of
universal arbitration, to set aside funds for the Inter-parliamentary Union and for the
Bureau in Bern, and, ever since 1890, to encourage the King to lend support to arbitration
treaties between Norway and the small nations. Furthermore, the memory of the recent
attainment of your independence, for which you strove so long in the midst of the gravest
difficulties, is still fresh in all our minds. Your independence, achieved as it was without
violence or bloodshed, is a living example of good sense and wisdom, prudence and great
tenacity, and brings everlasting credit both to you who obtained it and to those who did
not refuse it to you.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
Indeed, all of you here -- leaders from business and civil society organizations
alike -- must come to realize that you represent the vanguard of tomorrow’s
global society, in which markets must be open, but open markets must be fully
underpinned by shared values and global solidarity. You are the first truly global
citizens, and only you can give meaning to that term through your actions and advocacy
to ensure everyone, rich and poor alike, has the chance to benefit from globalisation.
Kofi ANNAN
We are on the threshold of a new century, a new millennium. What will the legacy
of this vanishing century be? How will it be remembered in the new millennium?
Surely it will be judged, and judged severely, in both moral and metaphysical terms.
These failures have cast a dark shadow over humanity: two World Wars, countless civil
wars, the senseless chain of assassinations -- Gandhi, the Kennedys, Martin Luther King,
Sadat, Rabin -- bloodbaths in Cambodia and Nigeria, India and Pakistan, Ireland and
Rwanda, Eritrea and Ethiopia, Sarajevo and Kosovo; the inhumanity in the gulag and the
tragedy of Hiroshima. And, on a different level, of course, Auschwitz and Treblinka. So
much violence, so much indifference.
Elie WIESEL
In varietate unitas ! The more each nation contributes to world society from
the wealth of its own aptitudes, its own race, and its own traditions, the greater the future
development and happiness of mankind will be.
Ernesto Teodoro
MONETA
I always believe that it is much better to have a variety of religions, a

variety of philosophies, rather than one single religion or philosophy. This is
necessary because of the different mental dispositions of each human being. Each
religion has certain unique ideas or techniques, and learning about them can only enrich
one's own faith.

Lama
Let's have no empty talk from this assembly, let's get something done. Remember
the words of St. Francis who lived only to fulfil God's work by repairing the Church:
Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love.
Where there is injury - pardon.
Where there is despair - hope.
Where there is doubt - faith.
Where there is sorrow - joy, and
Where there is darkness - light.
St. Francis suffered much, but he believed and therefore he changed much as the
instrument of God. His life reminds me of some lessons from the Vedic Bhagavad
Gita which hold out a challenge to each of us as we consider how we can change the
United Nations and the world together:
What is Life?
Life is a Challenge - meet it.
Gift - accept it.
Adventure- dare it.
Sorrow - overcome it.
Tragedy - face it.
Duty - perform it.
Mystery - unfold it.
Song - sing it.
Opportunity - take it.
Journey - complete it.
Promise - fulfil it.
Love - enjoy it.
Beauty - praise it.
Spirit - realize it.
Struggle - fight it.
Puzzle - solve it.
Goal - achieve it.
And do it with blessings.
Betty WILLIAMS
Today we are attending vertiginous changes that were unexpected until

recently. The fall of the Berlin Wall the disintegration of the Soviet Union provoked such
an impact on all political, economic and social relationships and even the ideological
plane, that profoundly put in question the actual structures. The East-West polarization
disjoined and new multiethnic, religious and economic conflicts surged that let wars
whose outcome of violence pretend to justify all types violations of Human Rights and
the Rights of the People, let loose.
Adolfo Pérez
ESQUIVEL
Most victims of torture survive. Some however are disfigured or crippled for
life. Others suffer long term psychological disturbance. Those who die are added to the
toll of unexplained suicides in police stations, or of those who fall from windows during
interrogation, or of those whose bodies are never returned to the families.
We proved that aggressors do not necessarily emerge as the victors, but we

learned that victors do not necessarily win peace.
Shimon PERES
There are victories of the soul and spirit. Sometimes, even if you lose, you win.
Elie WIESEL
The wars we fought were forced upon us. Thanks to the Israel Defence Forces, we
won them all, but we did not win the greatest victory that we aspired to: release from
the need to win victories.
Shimon PERES
But I cannot end my speech without reminding you and myself of those who at
this moment are living and suffering in war, especially on the Indian subcontinent and in
Vietnam. I include also the people living in the Middle East and other areas of crises. I
do not feel like making loud appeals, for it is easy to demand moderation, reason and
modesty of others. But this plea comes from the bottom of my heart: May all those who
possess the power to wage war have the mastery of reason to maintain peace.
Willy BRANDT
Certain war has yielded to an uncertain peace in Vietnam, where there was once
only despair and dislocation, today there is hope, however frail. In the Middle East the
resumption of full scale war haunts a fragile ceasefire. In Indo-china, the Middle East and
elsewhere, lasting peace will not have been won until contending nations realise the
futility of replacing political competition with armed conflict.
Henry
KISSINGER
I am deeply moved by the award of the Nobel Peace Prize, which I regard as the
highest honour one could hope to achieve in the pursuit of peace on this earth. When I
consider the list of those who have been so honoured before me, I can only accept this
award with humility.
The people of the United States, and indeed of the whole world, share the hope
expressed by the Nobel Peace Prize Committee that all parties to this conflict will feel
morally responsible for turning the ceasefire in Vietnam into a lasting peace for the
suffering peoples of Indochina. Certainly my Government, for its part, intends to
continue to conduct its policies in such a way as to turn this hope into reality.
Henry
KISSINGER
The information obtained by Amnesty International shows that human rights are
violated in all parts of the world, in all major regions and in all political or ideological
blocs. As many as 117 countries are mentioned in the Amnesty International Report
1977, a region by region, country by country survey of the world human rights situation.
In most of these countries serious violations of human rights have been reported. And this
survey is far from a complete picture: Not only is Amnesty International's work in the
field of human rights limited to prisoners, but the movement does not yet have the
resources to undertake the comprehensive research that is needed on all countries.
If you succumb to the temptation of using violence in the struggle, unborn
generations will be the recipients of a long and desolate night of bitterness, and your chief
legacy to the future will be an endless reign of meaningless chaos.
Martin Luther KING
People everywhere need to be continually reminded that violation of human

rights, whether arbitrary arrest and detention, unjust imprisonment, torture, or political
assassination, are threats to world peace. Each violation, wherever it occurs, can set in
motion a trend towards the debasement of human dignity.
People everywhere need to be continually reminded that violations of human

rights, whether arbitrary arrest and detention, unjust imprisonment, torture, or political
assassination, are threats to world peace. Each violation, wherever it occurs, can set in
motion a trend towards the debasement of human dignity. From individuals to groups,
from groups to nations, from nations to groups of nations, in chain reaction a pattern sets
in, a pattern of violence and repression and a lack of concern for human welfare.
………………
Violence as a way of achieving racial justice is both impractical and immoral. I

am not unmindful of the fact that violence often brings about momentary results. Nations
have frequently won their independence in battle. But in spite of temporary victories,
violence never brings permanent peace. It solves no social problem: it merely creates new
and more complicated ones.
I am opposed to both the violence of those who maintain an unjust system and
the violence of those who seek to overthrow it. The important point to make is that many
people think violence is something that is going to be introduced from the outside by the
so-called terrorists, the people of the liberation movements. The situation in South Africa
is already a violent one. It is the institutional violence, the structural violence of
apartheid, that has caused the answering violence of the liberation movements.
Desmond TUTU
Violence is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction
for all. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his
understanding: it seeks to annihilate rather than convert. Violence is immoral because it
thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys community and makes brotherhood
impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends up
defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers.
Martin Luther KING
Violence by the oppressor is not the same as Violence of the oppressed, who
are obligated to opt for violence when they can't find any other alternatives. The culture
of violence is in our societies. The people resort to the means they know of, and this is
why many times they respond to the oppressive violence with another form of violence in
search of freedom from oppression. The people are not looking for violence in the
contrary; they are subjected to the violence of misery, of hunger, of marginality, the lack
of social, political and economic freedom. In school and in universities, history is taught
as crossed by violence armed power, by war, the revolutions, the exalting of warring
heroes. Therefore, to resort to armed violence in response to violent oppression can be
presented a valid and concrete political decision. There are clear examples of those who
with sincerity gave their lives to the people: Che Guevara, Camilo Torres, among many
in the entire continent, who opted for violent revolutionary action. They deserve our
respect and understanding even though we may not share the same path with them.
Adolfo Pérez
ESQUIVEL
Violence erodes the basis of Israeli democracy. It must be condemned and

isolated.
……………..
The policy I have endeavoured to sketch is big, bold, and far-reaching. It will be
no light and simple task to lay the foundations of a World Commonwealth. It is, on the
contrary, perhaps, the greatest and most difficult enterprise ever imagined by the
audacious mind of man. But it is a task which has become a necessity. It is an enterprise
that is solidly grounded in realities and in the facts of the modern world. If there is still
virtue in our common Western civilization and our faith in democracy - and I believe
there is - then we must dare to announce that policy as a challenge to the world and as the
summons to a great crusade for peace. What greater cause and what more splendid
adventure can be set before the youth of the world than the endeavour to bring into being
that age - old dream of saints and sages - the great Commonwealth of the World as the
visible embodiment of the brotherhood of man?
Arthur HENDERSON
We must fix our vision not merely on the negative expulsion of war, but upon
the positive affirmation of peace and also a solution to the problems of racial injustice,
poverty, and war.
Martin Luther KING
I want to thank everyone, men and women, who worked for peace, like Ciaran
McKeown and Betty Williams, throughout the world; and those also who suffered in
prison for peace and justice on this earth; and those who employ non-violence....I feel
very humble at having received this prize and I'm certain that there are many other people
who deserve it.....To me, the Nobel Peace Prize means that we can change the world
through non-violence; and many people will keep that vision before them, as I will...
Máiread CORRIGAN
The leadership must be statesmanlike. And here let us remind ourselves of the
traits of the true statesman - the genuinely Christian statesman. He simply must be a man
of vision. He sees what the crowd does not see. He takes in a wider sweep, and he sees
before others see. How true it is that where there is no vision the people perish.
John Raleigh MOTT
The integral relationship between the cause of peace and the concern for human
dignity was perhaps an all too obvious and easily reached conclusion in the aftermath of a
universal holocaust. But with the passage of time this vision of the just society as a
precondition to a peaceful world has grown dim. The vision must not be lost.
Some critics complain that I lack "the vision thing". But vision in its pure
meaning is clear sight. That does not mean I have no dreams. I do. But I try to have them
at night. By day I am satisfied if I can see the furthest limit of what is possible.
David TRIMBLE
Started a process which in the space of a few years changed a ban on

antipersonnel mines from a vision to a feasible reality.
Jody WILLIAMS
It is man's vision of a world fit for rational, civilized humanity which leads
him to dare and to suffer to build societies free from want and fear. Concepts such as
truth, justice and compassion cannot be dismissed as trite when these are often the only
bulwarks which stand against ruthless power.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
If humanity is to progress, Gandhi is inescapable. he lived, thought, and acted,

inspired by the vision of humanity evolving toward a world of peace and harmony.
We may ignore him at our own risk.
Martin Luther King
It was understood from the outset that whilst UNICEF could stimulate and
encourage action, From this vision of the role of the United Nations in the next
century flow three key priorities for the future: eradicating poverty, preventing conflict,
and promoting democracy. Only in a world that is rid of poverty can all men and women
make the most of their abilities. Only where individual rights are respected can
differences be channelled politically and resolved peacefully. Only in a democratic
environment, based on respect for diversity and dialogue, can individual self-expression
and self-government be secured, and freedom of association be upheld.
Kofi ANNAN
The vital decisions would need to be taken by governments themselves,

committed to ensuring the welfare of their peoples. UNICEF cannot provide ready-made
motivation nor ensure that the people themselves are inspired to make a supreme effort in
their own behalf. Improving conditions for the child involves a ceaseless, long-term
effort. Neither the capacity nor the will to succeed can be supplied from without. There is
no substitute for an indigenous leadership which understands that real wealth is found in
the happiness and security of individual human beings.

(UNICEF)
I firmly believe that I am here essentially as the voice of the voiceless people
of East Timor
Bishop Carlos BELO
I was just a man of great energy but modest intelligence and offered praise for the
fraternity that has stood on the side of East Timor in its struggle, a fraternity that includes
retired U.S. Senator Claiborne Pell, who for long years was the voice of a voiceless
people, the Catholic Church, and the women and men who have given their lives - the
priests and nuns, the students and teachers, the brave resistance fighters. These are the
true heroes
José RAMOS-HORTA
Some very famous person said that nothing is quite as strong as an idea whose
time has come. I think if I was being honest, that's exactly what happened. I gave a voice
to something that the women of Ireland were feeling at the time. They were sick of losing
their husbands, sons and daughters. They were in enormous pain. I think probably when I
yelled for peace - because that's what I really did, you know-that the women responded
in kind.
I couldn't really say that Betty Williams started the peace movement in Ireland
because that would be another lie. The death of three children started the peace
movement in Ireland. Betty Williams was just the voice-yelling out for them. I'm so
grateful that God allowed me to go through that because it's made me.
Betty WILLIAMS
Another indication that progress is being made was found in the recent
presidential election in the United States. The American people revealed great maturity
by overwhelmingly rejecting a presidential candidate who had become identified with
extremism, racism, and retrogression. The voters of our nation rendered a telling blow
to the radical right. They defeated those elements in our society which seek to pit white
against Negro and lead the nation down a dangerous Fascist path.
Martin Luther KING

……………
We live in a world dedicated to progress and capable of incredible achievement.

Universal declarations, giving lip service to the dignity of man and human justice, have
never been more numerous and more loudly proclaimed. In a world of unbelievable
affluence, millions flounder and struggle for survival, as they suffer indescribable need.
The child, the most vulnerable of human beings and the least able to fend for itself,
surely agitates the conscience of a world that acknowledges the right of every human
being to equal consideration and prospects. To quote again from the Declaration of the
Rights of the Child, "He shall be brought up in a spirit of understanding, tolerance,
friendship among peoples and universal brotherhood, and in the full consciousness that
his energy and talents should be devoted to the service of his fellow men." Would that he
be given the chance!

(UNICEF)
W
We have long possessed the art of war and the science of war, which have been
evolved in the minutest detail. Warfare has been marvellously developed. It will soon be
impossible to raise it to further heights. Indeed, whenever a new idea is developed, as for
example ballooning, warfare immediately takes possession. On the other hand, the
waging of peace as a science, as an art, is in its infancy. But we can trace its growth,
its steady progress, and the time will come when there will be particular individuals
designated to assume responsibility for and leadership of this movement. There are in
most states one or two ministers of war, one of whom is the minister of naval affairs. I
would not wish on any account to abolish them; as long as the status of international law
is no better than it is at present, we cannot very well do without them. But I feel
convinced, and I venture even to prophesy in this regard, that the time will come when
there will also be a minister of peace in the cabinet, seated beside the ministers of war.
Fredrik BAJER
I served in the military for decades. Under my responsibility, young men and
women who wanted to live, wanted to love, went to their deaths instead. They fell in
the defence of our lives.
Yitzhak Rabin
A third great evil confronting our world is that of war. Recent events have
vividly reminded us that nations are not reducing but rather increasing their arsenals of
weapons of mass destruction. The best brains in the highly developed nations of the
world are devoted to military technology. The proliferation of nuclear weapons has not
been halted, in spite of the Limited Test Ban Treaty. On the contrary, the detonation of an
atomic device by the first non-white, non- Western, and so-called underdeveloped power,
namely the Chinese People's Republic, opens new vistas of exposure of vast multitudes,
the whole of humanity, to insidious terrorization by the ever-present threat of
annihilation. The fact that most of the time human beings put the truth about the nature
and risks of the nuclear war out of their minds because it is too painful and therefore not
"acceptable", does not alter the nature and risks of such war. The device of "rejection"
may temporarily cover up anxiety, but it does not bestow peace of mind and emotional
security.
Martin Luther
KING
War dehumanises, war diminishes, war debases all those who wage it.
Elie WIESEL
Occasionally some man with exceptional power of statement or of feeling and

possessed by the true missionary spirit, will deliver a message to the world, putting old
truths in such a way as to bite into the consciousness of civilized peoples and move
mankind forward a little, with a gain never to be altogether lost. But the mere repetition
of the obvious by good people of average intelligence, while not without utility and not
by any means to be despised as an agency for peace, nevertheless is subject to the
drawback that the unregenerate world grows weary of iteration and reacts in the wrong
direction. The limitation upon this mode of promoting peace lies in the fact that it
consists in an appeal to the civilized side of man, while war is the product of forces
proceeding from man's original savage nature. To deal with the true causes of war one
must begin by recognizing as of prime relevancy to the solution of the problem the
familiar fact that civilization is a partial, incomplete, and, to a great extent, superficial
modification of barbarism. The point of departure of the process to which we wish to
contribute is the fact that war is the natural reaction of human nature in the savage state,
while peace is the result of acquired characteristics. War was forced upon mankind in
his original civil and social condition. The law of the survival of the fittest led inevitably
to the survival and predominance of the men who were effective in war and who loved it
because they were effective.
Elihu ROOT
Just as war is a great adventure, peace is a challenge and wager.
Yasser ARAFAT
War must not be a means of achieving political ends. Wars must be

eliminated, not merely limited.
Willy BRANDT
War, we are told, shapes character; it resolves the major questions of

international politics, consolidates nations, and indeed, constitutes the principal factor in
the progress of civilization through its successive stages.
…….
The first theatre of war which history records is the vast expanse of territory
comprising Greece and western Asia. In that area, at frequent intervals, there took place
repeated migrations of armed tribes or hordes whose only thought was to acquire lands
where they might first found tiny monarchies, and then empires.
Law and reason were unknown: force was everything, and its abuse checked
civilization at every turn by accustoming ignorant peoples to bend their heads before the
sabre.
Élie
DUCOMMUN
It is no wonder that war, as a method of conducting human affairs, is in its death
throes, and that the time has come to bury it.
Shimon PERES
War leaves no victors, only victims.
Elie WIESEL
Today, war has assumed quite different proportions. The war which ended ten
years ago has shown, first, that whole nations become involved, and second, that the
present means of destruction "bear no comparison to future probabilities for destroying
industrial centres and of massacring civilian populations".
Ferdinand
BUISSON
The quest for a war-free world has a basic purpose: survival. But if in the
process we learn how to achieve it by love rather than by fear, by kindness rather than by
compulsion; if in the process we learn to combine the essential with the enjoyable; the
expedient with the benevolent, the practical with the beautiful, this will be an extra
incentive to embark on this great task
Joseph
ROTBLAT
As we leave a world of enemies, as we enter a world of dangers, the future wars which
may break out will not be, probably, the wars of the strong against the weak for
conquest, but the wars of the weak against the strong for protest.
Shimon PERES
To help in the most practical and efficient way towards making peace permanent,
it is needful to inquire with some analysis what are the specific motives and impulses, the
proximate causes which, under the present conditions of the civilized world, urge nations
to the point where the war passion seizes upon them. And then we should inquire what
are the influences which naturally tend or may be made to tend towards checking the
impulse, destroying the motive, preventing the proximate cause, before passion has
become supreme and it is too late.
Elihu ROOT
History as a whole, and modern history in particular, has known harrowing times
when national leaders turned their citizens into cannon fodder in the name of wicked
doctrines: vicious Fascism, terrible Nazism. Pictures of children marching to slaughter,
photos of terrified women at the gates of the crematoria must loom before the eyes of
every leader in our generation, and the generations to come. They must serve as a
warning to all who wield power.
Yitzhak Rabin
Each separate act will seem of no effect, but all together they will establish and
maintain a tendency towards the goal of international knowledge and broad human
sympathy. There is a homely English saying, "Leg over leg the dog went to Dover." That
states the method of our true progress. We cannot arrive at our goal per saltum ("by
leaps" for translating). Not by invoking an immediate millennium, but by the
accumulated effects of a multitude of efforts, each insignificant in itself but steadily and
persistently continued, we must win our way along the road to better knowledge and
kindliness among the peoples of the earth which the will of Alfred Nobel describes as
"the fraternity of nations".
Elihu ROOT
The answer as to how such protection might be provided can be found only when
the destructive forces have been identified. Well-publicized catastrophes that rock the
sensibilities of the world have small beginnings, barely discernible from the private and
contained forms of distress which make up the normal quota of everyday suffering. No
man-made disaster suddenly bursts forth from the earth like warring armies sprung from
dragon's teeth. After all, even in the myth the dragon's teeth were procured and sown by a
man for reasons quite unrelated to innocent zoological or agricultural pursuits. Calamities
which are not the result of purely natural phenomena usually have their origins, distant
and obscure though they may be, in common human failings.
But how common need those failings be? In a world which no longer accepts that
"common" germs and diseases should be left unchecked to take their toll of the weak
and defenceless, it would not be inappropriate to ask if more attention should be paid to
correcting "common" attitudes and values that pose a far more lethal threat to humankind.
It is my thoughts on some of these attitudes and values, which seem to be regarded as
inevitable in an increasingly materialistic world, that I would like to communicate to you
on this occasion.
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi
In language lies the main weapon of resistance of those cultures which for
centuries have suffered the imposition of alien cultural values, as is the case of the native
peoples of Latin America; the fact of just employing language for transmitting their
thinking and knowledge implies that the contents of their culture is maintained despite
the efforts made to destroy it. Since oral tradition is a feature of native peoples, language
occupies a privileged place within our culture because, through it, it has been possible to
preserve our historical memory which we pass from one generation to the other. Also,
language is important because oral tradition is a basic aspect in the process of our
upbringing and education.
At that hour, they are still laughing and weeping; still weaving plans and
dreaming about love; still musing about planting a garden or building a house -- and they
have no idea these are their last hours on earth. Which of them is fated to die? Whose
picture will appear in the black frame in tomorrow's newspaper? Whose mother will soon
be in mourning? Whose world will crumble under the weight of the loss?
Yitzhak Rabin
My debt of gratitude to you all has been further increased by the warmth and
friendliness of your welcome, a welcome which has gladdened my heart even more than
it has flattered my vanity. I cannot help adding that I ought also to thank Norway for the
moving experience afforded me by the spectacle of her national festival. It was not by
chance that I was present; guided by friendly advice, I had indeed chosen the date for my
visit here. However, in spite of all I had been told, what I had the good fortune to see
yesterday far surpassed all my expectations.
Louis RENAULT
I was surprised in the West to see so many young boys and girls given into
drugs, and I tried to find out why - why is it like that, and the answer was: Because there
is no one in the family to receive them. Father and mother are so busy they have no time.
Young parents are in some institution and the child takes back to the street and gets
involved in something. We are talking of peace. These are things that break peace, but I
feel the greatest destroyer of peace today is abortion, because it is a direct war, a direct
killing - direct murder by the mother herself.
Mother TERESA
……….
Whenever we solve one single problem we have contributed to peace for the
individual. Whenever we bring peace to the individual we are making our world a
slightly better place in which to live.
Poul HARTLING
Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees
I wonder if the world knows the United Nations?

Many people see it as a "white elephant" but the UN is powerful. Its power is not in
the building, the United Nations building in New York. Its power lies in this room-the
UN is me-the UN is also you. It is all of us.
Why don't we fight and work to make it a better organization instead of just complaining
about it, I know that especially the women of the world can make a difference.
Betty WILLIAMS
Every time my wife leaves, I do not know whether she will be allowed to travel
without hindrance and to return safely. My wife, although formally not under detention,
is in greater danger than I am. I urge those who speak out on my behalf to keep this in
mind. It is impossible to for-see what awaits us. Our only protection is the spotlight of
public attention on our fate by friends around the world.
Andrei SAKHAROV
I never apologized to anyone, especially I say today to heads of States, including

the President of the United States: "Why are we building so many more things to defend
ourselves when we live in a world that can feed itself. This is absolutely unforgivable, in
a world that can feed itself!"
Betty WILLIAMS
In new and wild communities where there is violence, an honest man must
protect himself; and until other means of securing his safety are devised, it is both foolish
and wicked to persuade him to surrender his arms while the men who are dangerous to
the community retain theirs. He should not renounce the right to protect himself by his
own efforts until the community is so organized that it can effectively relieve the
individual of the duty of putting down violence. So it is with nations. Each nation must
keep well prepared to defend itself until the establishment of some form of international
police power, competent and willing to prevent violence as between nations. As things
are now, such power to command peace throughout the world could best be assured by
some combination between those great nations which sincerely desire peace and have no
thought themselves of committing aggressions. The combination might at first be only to
secure peace within certain definite limits and on certain definite conditions; but the ruler
or statesman who should bring about such a combination would have earned his place in
history for all time and his title to the gratitude of all mankind.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
If we have the will and determination to mount such a peace ……….

offensive, we will unlock hitherto tightly sealed doors of hope and transform our
imminent cosmic elegy into a psalm of creative fulfilment.
Martin Luther KING

No amount of force will ever be enough to destroy the will of a people to
survive
José RAMOS-HORTA
If we recognize that the will to peace is genuine, it leads us to recognize a

further truth related to it: war does not continue because men are evil, selfish, avaricious.
It could not continue at all if millions on both sides were not prepared to make sacrifices
which no other activity of man calls out in a similar degree.
Norman ANGELL
I am reminded of a story told in my boyhood, at the time when radio

communication began. Two wise men were arguing about the ancient civilization in their
respective countries. One said: &"my country has a long history of technological
development; we have carried out deep excavations and found a wire, which shows that
already in the old days we had the telegraph.&"; The other man retorted: "we too made
excavations; we dug much deeper than you and found ... nothing, which proves that
already in those days we had wireless communication!";
Joseph ROTBLAT
The time has come for us to make a move, not only from strength, but from
wisdom and from confidence in ourselves; to concentrate on the possibilities of
agreement, rather than on the disagreements and failures, the evils and wrongs, of the
past…
Lester B. PEARSON
So man's proneness to engage in war is still a fact. But wisdom born of
experience should tell us that war is obsolete. There may have been a time when war
served as a negative good by preventing the spread and growth of an evil force, but the
destructive power of modern weapons eliminated even the possibility that war may serve
as a negative good. If we assume that life is worth living and that man has a right to
survive, then we must find an alternative to war. In a day when vehicles hurtle through
outer space and guided ballistic missiles carve highways of death through the
stratosphere, no nation can claim victory in war. A so-called limited war will leave little
more than a calamitous legacy of human suffering, political turmoil, and spiritual
disillusionment. A world war - God forbid! - will leave only smouldering ashes as a mute
testimony of a human race whose folly led inexorably to ultimate death. So if modern
man continues to flirt unhesitatingly with war, he will transform his earthly habitat into
an inferno such as even the mind of Dante could not imagine.
Martin Luther KING
Seek not good from without: seek it within yourselves, or you will never find
it.
Bertha von SUTTNER

A Middle East in which every believer will be free to pray in his own language --
Arabic, Hebrew, Latin, or whatever language he chooses -- and in which the prayers will
reach their destination without censorship, without interference, and without
offending anyone.
Shimon PERES
When Roosevelt received me in the White House on October 17, 1904, he said to
me, "World peace is coming, it certainly is coming, but only step by step." And so it is.
However clearly envisaged, however apparently near and within reach the goal may
be, the road to it must be traversed a step at a time, and countless obstacles surmounted
on the way.
Bertha von SUTTNER
The poor are very wonderful people. One evening we went out and we picked
up four people from the street. And one of them was in a most terrible condition - and I
told the Sisters: You take care of the other three, I take of this one that looked worse. So I
did for her all that my love can do. I put her in bed, and there was such a beautiful smile
on her face. She took hold of my hand, as she said one word only: Thank you - and she
died. I could not help but examine my conscience before her, and I asked what would I
say if I was in her place. And my answer was very simple. I would have tried to draw a
little attention to myself, I would have said I am hungry, that I am dying, I am cold, I am
in pain, or something, but she gave me much more - she gave me her grateful love. And
she died with a smile on her face.
Mother TERESA
I think I shall live for quite a while yet, for, as my grandfather said, an old
woman is as tough as an old owl.
Emily BALCH (on her seventy-fifth
birthday)
One of our defects as a nation is a tendency to use what have been called
"weasel words." When a weasel sucks eggs the meat is sucked out of the egg. If you
use a "weasel words" after another there is nothing left of the other.
Theodore ROOSEVELT
Politicians who seek to make a working peace, not in some perfect world, that
never was, but in this, the flawed world, which is our only workshop.
David TRIMBLE
I come from a world with huge problems, which we shall overcome in freedom.
I come from a world in a hurry, because hunger cannot wait. When hope is forgotten,
violence does not delay. Dogmatism is too impatient for dialogue…. I come from a
world which cannot wait for the guerrilla and the soldier to hold their fire: young people
are dying, brothers are dying, and tomorrow who can tell why. I come from a world
which cannot wait to open prison gates not, as before, for free men to go in, but for those
imprisoned to come out.
Oscar Arias SANCHEZ

A world at peace that could provide consistency, interrelation and
concordance in respect of the economic, social and cultural structures of the societies.
That could have deep roots and sound influence.
Rigoberta MENCHU
TUM
Whatever system of governance is eventually adopted, it is important that it

carries the people with it. We need to convey the message that safeguarding our common
property, humankind, will require developing in each of us a new loyalty,: a loyalty to
mankind. It calls for the nurturing of a feeling of belonging to the human race. We have
to become world citizens
Joseph ROTBLAT
Finally, may I ask, is it possible to stay halfway on the road that leads to total
disarmament and the setting up of a League police force? If we contemplate as our
ultimate end a League which controls the world's economic life and the world's armed
forces, then we must say frankly that our ultimate ideal is the creation of nothing less
than a World Commonwealth. I think we must make this admission. The
establishment of a World Commonwealth is, in the long run, the only alternative to
a relapse into a world war. The psychological obstacles are formidable but not
insurmountable. There is already a group of nations in the world between whom war may
be considered as ruled out forever. Those nations are the British Commonwealth, the
United States, and the surviving European democracies.
Arthur HENDERSON
Indeed, we have been making good progress in promoting such partnerships. You may recall that
two years ago, here at the World Economic Forum, I proposed a Global Compact, inviting
business leaders to play their part in building the missing social infrastructure of the new global economy.
Today I want to return to that theme, and take it further.
I asked business leaders not to wait for governments to impose new laws, but to
take the initiative in improving their own corporate practices. Specifically, I asked you to
embrace and enact, within your own firms, nine core principles derived from universally
accepted agreements on human rights, labour standards and the environment. And I
offered you the help of the appropriate United Nations agencies.
I am glad to say that many business leaders have responded positively. Equally
important, they have recognized the value of working with civil society to achieve these
goals.
Kofi ANNAN
Sometimes what is meant by "world government" is a body modelled more

or less closely on the Swiss or American pattern, with its executive and legislative
branches and its judiciary. Sometimes the idea is a much more modest one, and what is
proposed is merely a delegation of strictly limited powers to a central authority with
especial view to the control of aggression and prevention of war. There is what seems to
me a rather naive hope that the dangerous possibility of having to discipline a nation
which refuses to abide by international legislation can be circumvented by directing
coercive action against individuals not governments.
Emily Greene BALCH
There can be no peace in the world so long as a large proportion of the population
lacks the necessities of life and believes that a change of the political and economic
system will make them available. World peace must be based on world plenty.
John BOYD-ORR
As long as the problem of world reconstruction remains the centre of interest

for all nations, blocs having similar attitudes will form and operate even within the
League itself. There is no reason why agreement on particular points should not be both
possible and advantageous to the so-called neutrals and to one or more of the blocs, either
existing or in the process of formation, within the League of Nations. Allow me one other
observation. The League of Nations is not the only organization, albeit the most official,
which has inscribed the maintenance of peace through law on its banner. Before the war
there were many who were more or less ignorant of the international labour movement
but who nevertheless turned to it for salvation when the threat of war arose. They hoped
that the workers would never permit a war.
Karl Hjalmar BRANTING
Like many such legends in many nations, an old Nordic saga tells of a time when
the streets were paved with gold without tempting anyone to sin, a time when human
beings were good and their customs and laws mild, inspired by the spirit of wisdom. The
whole world lived a life of happiness. This paradise was buried in a mire of conflict and
degraded values. However, the hope of finding it again is not yet lost. The nature of man
provides a guarantee of this. Man's nature is fundamentally good, or perhaps it is neither
good nor evil. In any case, man is something to work on. We must hold fast to this fact -
man is something to work on.
……
Nowadays, to pave the streets with gold would be quite unsafe. It is certain,
however, that the gold which has now been placed in my path shall not rest untouched. It
gives me the opportunity of devoting more work and more time to the idea of the world
referendum which I have proposed here. It also enables me to serve the cause of peace
in yet other ways and with even stronger perseverance. So will I try to carry my burden of
gratitude, and to discharge the mission to which I have been called.
Klas Pontus ARNOLDSON
The two World Wars in the first half of this century unleashed a wave of
previously unthinkable destruction. The toll of human life and the shadow of human
extermination by thermonuclear war led inevitably to the search for a new order in which
armed conflict would never rise again.
The time has come for an all-out world war against poverty. The rich nations
must use their vast resources of wealth to develop the underdeveloped, school the
unschooled, and feed the unfed. Ultimately a great nation is a compassionate nation. No
individual or nation can be great if it does not have a concern for "the least of these".
Deeply etched in the fibre of our religious tradition is the conviction that men are made in
the image of God and that they are souls of infinite metaphysical value, the heirs of a
legacy of dignity and worth. If we feel this as a profound moral fact, we cannot be
content to see men hungry, to see men victimized with starvation and ill health when we
have the means to help them. The wealthy nations must go all out to bridge the gulf
between the rich minority and the poor majority.
Martin Luther KING
Let us make it possible for future generations to look back on this fifty years'
jubilee conference as the prelude to an epoch, an epoch where the instinctive solidarity
between the people of the world is mobilized in a joint worldwide attack on
poverty.
David A. Morse, International Labour Organisation
This call for a worldwide fellowship that lifts neighbourly concern beyond
one's tribe, race, class, and nation is in reality a call for an all-embracing and
unconditional love for all men. This oft misunderstood and misinterpreted concept so
readily dismissed by the Nietzsches of the world as a weak and cowardly force, has now
become an absolute necessity for the survival of man.
Martin Luther KING
Europe must live up to its world-wide responsibility. This means co-

responsibility for world peace, and it must also mean co-responsibility for justice towards
the outside world so that hunger and misery elsewhere can be overcome. Peace is
something more than the absence of war, although some nations would be thankful for
that alone today. A durable and equitable peace system requires equal development
opportunities for all nations.
Willy BRANDT
Granted that we face a world crisis which leaves us standing so often amid the
surging murmur of life's restless sea. But every crisis has both its dangers and its
opportunities. It can spell either salvation or doom. In a dark confused world the kingdom
of God may yet reign in the hearts of men.
Martin Luther KING
I am not against men. The men in my life are gentle, kind and strong. It makes no
difference what gender you are or what flag you were born under. We should stop
worshipping flags and respect the people, remember the people and forget the flags.
Betty WILLIAMS
……………..
It is here, where all hope ended, that we must proclaim to the world that human
beings are worthy of hope.
Elie WIESEL
Y
Our object in this respect is not to pursue far-off abstract targets but to deal with
differences as soberly as possible. I know that to some, especially among the young
generation, this is too little and that to many people the whole process is too slow
anyway. It is not harmful but rather helpful when young people revolt against the
disproportion between outdated structures and new possibilities, and when they protest
against the contradiction of semblance and reality. I do not believe in saying what young
people expect me to say, but I appeal to them to use their unspent energies in critical and
responsible co-operation with us.
Willy BRANDT
Dream! Dream. And then go for it! Young people are idealistic, they believe
this world can become a better place - go for it!
DESMOND
TUTU
Z
The Mayas discovered the mathematic Zero value, at about the same time that it
was discovered in India and later passed on to the Arabs. Their astronomic forecasts
based on mathematic calculations and scientific observations were amazing, and still are.
They prepared a calendar more accurate than the Gregorian, and in the field of medicine
they performed intra-cranial surgical operations.
With respect to the danger of use of the nuclear weapons still deployed, it is most
important that all nations deploying nuclear weapons should move promptly to a "zero
alert" nuclear posture. This would entail making it physically impossible to launch
nuclear weapons except after a time delay of hours or even days (as could be
accomplished, for example, by demounting the warheads from delivery vehicles and
storing them separately). As long as they were invulnerably based, nuclear weapons in
this condition would retain their deterrent capacity against the use of nuclear weapons by
others. (This so-called "minimum deterrent" role is the only rationale for nuclear weapons
for which a halfway persuasive case can be made, and even that case, in the view of the
Pugwash Council, is provisional and temporary; but more about that in a moment.) In any
event, such a deterrent function does not require that the reaction to a nuclear attack
should be instantaneous, and giving up the possibility of an instantaneous reaction has the
great benefit of practically eliminating the danger of accidental nuclear war.
Accompanying the physical implementation of "zero alert" postures should be
unilateral commitments of no-first-use and no threat of use of nuclear weapons by all
nuclear-weapon states, pending early conclusion of a treaty to this effect.
John P. HOLDREN
Affairs
NOBEL PRIZE LAUREATES' BIOGRAPHICAL

NOTES
AMERICAN FRIENDS SERVICE COMMITTEE

( USA )
& FRIENDS SERVICE COUNCIL ( UK ) ( 1947 -
)
Quakers' pacifism and peace
Henry Cadbury and Margaret Backhouse, respectively, represented these Quaker
Organisations, awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1947 for their relief and reconstruction
work during and after the second World War.
…………………….
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL ( founded in 1961 -
)
The long march for the defence of human
rights
This international organisation founded in 1961 that defends the rights of
prisoners of conscience in all the continents was represented at the award ceremony in
1977 by its chairman, Thomas Hammarberg of Sweden who gave the acceptance speech
and its vice-chairman Mûmtaz Soyal of Turkey who delivered the lecture.
ANGELL (LANE), Ralph Norman (December 26, 1872

- October 7, 1967)
Born in Lincolnshire, England. He discovered Mill's «Essay on Liberty» at the
age of twelve and was influenced by reading of such authors as Herbert Spencer, Huxley,
Voltaire, and Darwin.
At seventeen, then, he decided to emigrate to America. After tending to some

family affairs which had called him back to England in 1898, he went to Paris where he
engaged in newspaper work, first as sub-editor of the English language Daily Messenger,
then as staff contributor to Éclair. In 1910 he re-titling his book The Great Illusion. This
book as translated into twenty-five languages, sold over two million copies.
ANNAN Kofi ( 1938 – )
Renewing the United Nations on the long conquest for a

durable peace
Born in Kumasi, Ghana, on 8 April 1938. He completed his undergraduate work

in economics at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, U.S.A., in 1961. From 1961
to 1962, he undertook graduate studies in economics at the Institut Universitaire des
Hautes Etudes Internationales in Geneva. As a 1971-1972 Sloan Fellow at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he received a Master of Science degree in
management.
Kofi Annan of Ghana is the seventh Secretary-General of the United Nations. The
first Secretary-General to be elected from the ranks of United Nations staff, he began his
term on 1 January 1997. As Secretary-General, his first major initiative was his plan for
reform, "Renewing the United Nations", which was presented to the Member States in
July 1997 and has been pursued ever since with an emphasis on improving coherence and
coordination.
ARIAS SÁNCHEZ, Oscar ( 1941 - )
Freedom and Democracy

Born in 1941, he is President of Costa Rica, a democratic country without an
army. As for him, only peace can write a new history. Here is his auto-portrait: " I am a
Latin American. America's scars. Liberty performs miracles. America cannot wait. I
come from Central America. Realising dreams. Freedom: a shared longing. I am come
from Costa Rica. A country of teachers. A new economy. Stronger than a thousand
armies. A peace plan. I am one of five Presidents. Let weapons fall silent. I say to the
poet."
ARAFAT, Yasser ( 1929 - )
The crescent moon of peace and hope

Born in Cairo in 1929 to a Palestinian family, he lived briefly in Jerusalem, but he
has spent most of his life in exile from Palestine. He fought in many ways, including by
arms and terrorism, for freedom and independence of his land and his people. In 1994, he
shared the Nobel Peace prize with Prime Minister Y. Rabin and Foreign Minister S. Peres
of Israel for the efforts of negotiation to create a durable peace in the Middle East. He is
President of the Palestinian National Authority.
ARNOLDSON, Klas Pontus (October 27, 1844 -

February 20, 1916)
Born at Göteborg in a humble family. At the age of sixteen because of family
financial difficulties after the death of his father, he was obliged to discontinue his formal
education. For the next twenty-one years he worked for a railroad. During these years,
Arnoldson continued his studies, reading widely in history, religion, and philosophy.
Throughout his life, he complemented his day-to-day political activity by writing :
The Friend of Peace, Is World Peace Possible?, Religion in the Light of Research, The
Hope of the Centuries….
AUNG SAN Suu Kyi ( 1945 - )
The revolution of spirit

Born in 1945, she is the daughter of General AUNG SAN, founder of Myanmar's
independence. Studying in England and working in abroad, in 1988 she returned her
homeland to lead the democracy movement against the military dictatorship. She was
kept in detention for six years until July 1995, but she has remained the soul of this
movement and the centre of widespread aspirations for freedom and democracy in her
beloved Myanmar. In 1991 her son received the Nobel Peace Prize and delivered the
speech in her behalf. This Prize is awarded for her "non-violent struggle for democracy
and human rights and for one of the most extraordinary examples of civil courage in Asia
in recent decades".
BALCH, Emily Greene (January 8, 1867 - January 9,

1961)
Born in Boston in a prosperous and puritan family of New Englanders. She

inherited from her family tradition the strict self-discipline and energy and desire to make
this world a better place to live in, especially for the less fortunate members of society. In
this environment she acquired a certain idealism, an awareness of her personal
responsibility; yet at the same time she learned to recognize that work for a better world
can be fruitful only if it is based on the hard facts of reality.
She studied economics in Paris in 1890-1891 under Émile Levasseur and wrote
Public Assistance of the Poor in France, published in 1893. In 1896 she joined the
faculty of Wellesley College and became professor of economics and sociology in 1913.
An outstanding teacher, she impressed students by the clarity of her thought, by the
breadth of her experience, by her compassion for the underprivileged, and by her strong-
mindedness.
As a delegate to the International Congress of Women at The Hague in 1915, she
played a prominent role in several important projects: in founding an organization called
the Women's International Committee for Permanent Peace, later named the Women's
International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF). This post she relinquished in
1922, but when the League was hard pressed financially in 1934, she again acted, without
salary, as international secretary for a year and a half. It was to this League that Miss
Balch donated her share of the Nobel Peace Prize money.
Even after receiving the Peace Prize in 1946 at the age of seventy-nine, she
continued, despite frail health, to participate in the cause to which she had given her life.
She maintained her association with the WILPF, acting often in an honorary capacity.
Throughout her life Miss Balch obeyed the call of the humanitarian in her nature, but she
also listened to the promptings of the artist. She liked to paint, and she published a
volume of verse, The Miracle of Living.
BAJER, Fredrik (April 21, 1837 - January 22, 1922)
Born in Vester Egede, Denmark and he entered the Sorø Academy in 1848. He
was one of Denmark's leading spokesmen for women's rights and famous pacifist,
He became especially interested in the efforts of the French peace leader, Frédéric
Passy, and the work of the Ligue Intenationale et Permanente de la Paix founded in 1867.
He rapidly became a major figure in the flourishing international peace movement. He
participated in the European Peace Congress at Bern in 1884, shared the initiative with
those who called the first Scandinavian Peace Meeting in 1885, attended the first regular
World Peace Congress at Paris in 1889 and regularly represented the Danish Peace
Society at the congresses until 1914, and also in 1889 attended the first meeting of the
Inter-parliamentary Union held in Paris. He believed that arbitration was a mechanism
supplanting that of war in settling peace among nations.
After 1907, his health deteriorated and he resigned from active office on the board
of the Peace Bureau to become its honorary president. An invalid in his last years, he still
kept informed on world Peace events and maintained his faith in the pacifist cause.
BORLAUG, Norman Ernest ( March 25 1914 --- )
Pioneer of the Green Revolution, a Peace Soldier with a

noble mission: to alleviate hunger in the whole world
A central figure in the "green revolution", Norman Ernest Borlaug was born on
March 25, 1914 in a farm near Cresco, Iowa, to Henry and Clara Borlaug., the eldest of
three children of parents of Norwegian descent. He worked on the family farm, planting
crops and raising livestock. His first eight grades were spent in a one-room rural
schoolhouse.
He enrolled in the University of Minnesota where he studied forestry. He received
his Bachelor of Science degree in 1937, he worked for the U.S. Forestry Service at
stations in Massachusetts and Idaho. Returning to the University of Minnesota to study
plant pathology, he received the master's degree in 1939 and the doctorate in 1942.
For the past twenty-seven years he has collaborated with scientists from other parts of the
world, especially from Mexico, India and Pakistan, in adapting the new wheat to new
lands and in gaining acceptance for their production.
An eclectic, pragmatic, goal-oriented scientist, he accepts and discards methods or
results in a constant search for more fruitful and effective ones, while at the same time
avoiding the pursuit of what he calls "academic butterflies". A vigorous man who can
perform prodigies of manual labour in the fields, he brings to his work the body and
competitive spirit of the trained athlete, which indeed he was in his high school and
college days.
Borlaug's high-yielding cereals increased agricultural production in the developing

countries to the extent that many became self-sufficient for grain. For his major role in
temporarily alleviating world famine, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970
Dr Norman Ernest Borlaug, Father of the Green Revolution, Scientist,
Agriculturist, Forester, Farmer, but more importantly, a Man with a mission: to alleviate
hunger. To ensure that no one ever dies hungry. Ever.
At 87, he's still got a grip like a vise. And his eyes, despite the glasses, haven't lost
their twinkle, or their fire. He gets calls, letters or e-mails every day from journalists,
scientists, political leaders, farmers and friends all over the world. He is often called upon
to lend his perspective to the emotional debate over the uses of biotechnology.
He, still active at 87, has spent much of his life fighting world hunger. At this age,
Dr. Norman Borlaug is still going strong, working uncounted hours here in Texas, in
Mexico, and in Africa. The life story of Norman Borlaug is a story of hard work and
determination to help farmers produce more abundant food for those most in need of it.
A little about himself …
I grew up in a small town in Cresco, Iowa. It was so small that I went to a one-
room school for eight years... one room in which you had five year olds and seventeen
year olds, and everything in between, all sitting together. My parents owned a small farm,
and I and my brothers would help them.
After school, when I joined the University of Minnesota, it was during the worst
days of the economic depression. I had only enough money for the first five months. But
I got myself jobs, helped out at the labs… and managed to get a first in forestry.
I joined the US Forest Service, and on one of my assignments, I was said to be the
most isolated member of the service, hundreds of miles from civilisation. But though I
love forests and roughing it out in the wilderness, it's wrong to expect poor people to live
that way, and like it.
BUISSON, Ferdinand Édouard (December 20, 1841 -

February 16, 1932)
Born in Paris in 184. He made his undergraduate degree at the University of Paris
and at the age of fifty-one, took his doctorate in literature. In 1897 he became professor
of education at the Sorbonne.
The Dreyfus Affair ignited his desire to enter politics. He threw himself heart and
soul into the struggle waged on behalf of justice and peace. He joined the French League
of the Rights of Man, which, inspired by Zola's J'accuse. The cause of peace first
attracted him when he was still a young man. He took part in the first congress of the
League of Peace and Liberty in 1867 and wrote articles denouncing militarism. From
1902 to 1914 he was the elected deputy for the Seine. He returned to the Chamber in
1919. He criticized the Treaty of Versailles in an open letter in 1919, but in other
publications and in speeches endorsed the League of Nations as a practical instrument in
the effort to achieve international peace.
As the world's most persistent pacifist and as the partisan of a peaceful détente
between France and Germany, he made a speaking tour of Germany to encourage
reconciliation between the two countries. He believed that the essential thing was to win
in order to put an end not only to this war, but to all wars. Convinced that the Allies
would win in the end, he was greatly concerned that they should not misuse their victory
but should take action to lay the foundations for a new, international world by creating a
League of Nations.
Comité International de la Croix Rouge (International

Committee of the Red Cross)
The Red Cross has figured four times in the award of the Nobel Peace Prize
(1917, 1944, and 1963), as well as in the award to Henri Dunant (1901).
In February of 1863 in Geneva, Switzerland, the “Société Genevoise d'Utilité
Publique” - Geneva Public Welfare Society set up a committee of five Swiss citizens to
look into the ideas offered by Henri Dunant in his book “Un Souvenir de Solferino” -
ideas dealing with protection of the sick and wounded during combat.
The International Committee of the Red Cross is international in its activities, but
it is national in its composition, for all its members are Swiss citizens. It is not by mere
coincidence that it has found its home in Switzerland whose very atmosphere must give it
vitality. For this little democracy has learned by experience that it is not impossible to
forge solidarity between peoples of different origin. This lies fundamentally in the fact
that human lives have been saved and in the feeling of solidarity engendered by help that
has penetrated the iron walls erected by war.
In October of 1863, with sixteen nations represented, adopted various pertinent
resolutions and principles and the International Committee of the Red Cross was formed.
The International Red Cross Conference, which met for the first time in 1867, is the
highest legislative body.
CREMER, William Randal (March 18, 1828 - July 22,

1908)
Born into a working class family in the small town of Fareham, Portsmouth,
England.
On one occasion he heard a lecture on peace about international disputes be
settled by arbitration, an idea that he never forgot. He co-founded the International
Working Men's Association but withdrew his support when the Association was taken
over by more revolutionary thinkers.
He was elected to Parliament in 1885, 1886, and 1892. Defeated in 1895, he was
re-elected in 1900, retaining his seat until his death. He founded Workmen's Peace
Association in 1871 and it, in turn, provided the keystone for the International Arbitration
League, an association to which he thereafter contributed both his time and his money.
Cremer, Passy and other French deputies met in Paris in 1888 and as a result of
this meeting the Inter-parliamentary Union was formed in Paris in 1889.
He lived simply and worked long hours. He was also a generous man. The Nobel
Prize cash value in 1903 was about £8,000. He immediately dedicated £7,000 to the
League and later all the rest.
………………….
…………………….
DUCOMMUN, Élie (February 19, 1833-December 7,
1906)
Born in Geneva, Swiss journalist, eloquent lecturer and advocate of peace. In
1865 he moved to Bern where he founded the radical journal, Progress which was also
published in French under the title Progrès. He became coming vice-chancellor in 1857
and chancellor of state of Geneva in 1862.
He took all his time to the work for peace, most notably after 1890 when he
consented to organize and to direct the International Bureau of Peace. From the inception
of the Bureau until his death, He devoted himself, at his own insistence without
remuneration, to carrying out its purposes of uniting the many different peace societies
throughout the world, preserving archives, preparing for the congresses, implementing
their decisions, and acting as a clearinghouse for all kinds of information about peace and
the activities on its behalf.
GOBAT, Charles Albert (May 21, 1843-March 16,

1914)
Born at Tramelan, Switzerland. He took his doctorate in law, summa cum laude,
from Heidelberg in 1867.
For the next fifteen years, he devoted his time and energy to the law. He began his
practice in Bern and, at the same time, lectured on French civil law at Bern University.
After 1882, however, he became increasingly absorbed in politics and education. From
1884 to 1890 he was a member of the Council of States of Switzerland and from 1890
until his death a member of the National Council, the other chamber of the central Swiss
legislative body. In politics as in education, he was a liberal, a moderate reformer.
The Inter-parliamentary Union, which held its first major international conference
in 1889, provided him with an appealing outlet for his advocacy of arbitration and peace.
He died with his boots on. On March 16, 1914, while attending meeting of the
peace conference at Bern, he arose as if to speak but collapsed, dying about an hour later.
GORBACHEV, Mikhail ( 1931 - )
The innovation of political thinking

Born to a peasant family in 1931, Gorbachev studied law at the university and
conquered the political power through the highest ranks of the Communist Party. He
became the party general secretary and chairman of the Soviet Union government at the
age of fifty four. In 1989 he became President of the Soviet Union. With his policies of
perestroika and glasnost, he began important political and economic reforms which
liberate the life and thought in the Soviet Union. His foreign policies , which ended the
Cold War , won him Nobel Peace Prize in 1990.
Henderson, Arthur (September 13, 1863 - October 20,

1935)
Born in Glasgow, the son of a manual worker. When his father died in 1872,
leaving the family in poverty, Arthur left school to work in a photographer's shop.
He had a daughter and three sons. The eldest of the three sons, all of whom served
in the armed forces in World War I, was killed in action; the other two became the
father's colleagues in the House of Commons in the last decade or so of his life.
In 1923 he was chairman of the Labour and Socialist International at Hamburg.
The world was stricken with an economic depression in 1929. Germany, under
Hitler, withdrew from the conference in October, 1933. Henderson was barely able to
hold the conference together in 1934, but even as late as December of that year at the
Nobel ceremonies in Oslo, he optimistically insisted that the conference was still very
much alive. Henderson was a strong man. His powerful physical presence was the outer
counterpart of his inner moral integrity.
Institute of International Law (Institut de droit

international)
Founded by Gustave Rolin-Jaequemyns, a Belgian jurist. In the aftermath of
the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871), he entered into correspondence with some other
leading jurists who were also beginning to consider ways of establishing collective
scientific action for the promotion of international law - inseparable, in their opinion,
from the promotion of peace. The Institute of International Law is a purely scientific and
private association, without official character, whose objective is to promote the progress
of international law by: formulating general principles; cooperating in codification;
seeking official acceptance of principles in harmony with the needs of modern society;
contributing to the maintenance of peace or to the observance of the laws of war;
proffering needed judicial advice in controversial or doubtful cases; and contributing,
through publications, education of the public, and any other means, to the success of the
principles of justice and humanity which should govern international relations. The
preoccupation of the Institute is the objective study of existing international law; and its
abiding concern is that the evolution of international law proceed in a manner that
conforms to the principles of justice and humanity.
…………………….
KING, Martin Luther, JR. ( 1929 – 1968 )
The eternal quest for Peace & Justice

Born in 1929, he was assassinated in 1968 in the decades of terror and violence in
the USA: John Kennedy and Robert Kennedy…He is an eternal leader of the non-violent
movement for civil rights in the North America. His speeches are considered the best
literary works of American oratory. In 1964 he received the Nobel Peace Prize for his
struggle without violence and for his messages of brotherly love…
LE DUC Tho ( October 10th 1911 - October 13th

1990 )
Le Duc Tho was one of the founders of the Indochinese Communist Party in
1930. For his political activities he was imprisoned by the French in 1930-36 and 1939-
44. After his second release he returned to Hanoi in 1945 and helped lead the Viet Minh,
the Vietnamese independence organization, as well as a revived communist party called
the Vietnam Workers' Party. He was the senior Viet Minh official in southern Vietnam
until the Geneva Accords of 1954. From 1955 he was a member of the Politburo of the
Vietnam Workers' Party, or the Communist Party of Vietnam, as it was renamed in 1976.
From 1963 head of the committee for supervision of the South, held secret talks
with Henry Kissinger in Paris from February 1970, and served as the Democratic
Republic of Vietnam's chief negotiator during the peace talks in Paris. Le Duc Tho is best
known for his part in the cease-fire of 1973, when he served as special adviser to the
North Vietnamese delegation to the Paris Peace Conferences in 1968-73. He eventually
became his delegation's principal spokesman, in which capacity he negotiated the cease-
fire agreement that led to the withdrawal of the last American troops from South
Vietnam. The two chief negotiators Le Duc Tho and Kissinger who have been awarded
the Nobel Peace Prize in 1973 but Le Duc Tho refused it on the grounds that peace was
not yet established in South Vietnam.
Le Duc Tho oversaw the North Vietnamese offensive that overthrew the South
Vietnamese government in 1975.
LUTULI, Albert John ( 1898 – 1967 )
Africa & Freedom
Zulu tribal chief in South Africa, he was President of the African National
congress and leader in the non-violent struggle against the apartheid system. He received
the Nobel Peace Prize in 1960.
MANDELA, Nelson Rohihlahia ( 1918 - )
The challenge of the dichotomies of racism and

human rights
Incarcerated for almost 28 years for the activities opposing apartheid system, he is
the most celebrated prisoner of conscience of the 20th Century. Mandela was born in 1918
and shared the Nobel Peace prize with his compatriot, President Frederick W. de Klerk of
the Republic of South Africa in 1993.
Mandela was President of the African National Congress ( ANC ). In 1994
election, Mandela was elected as State President of South Africa. He has just retired from
the long march of struggle for his land and his people in June 1999. He becomes the
Eternal President and great symbol of South Africa and belongs to all the people in the
world longing for liberty, justice and freedom.
MOTT, John Raleigh (May 25, 1865 - January 31, 1955)
Born in New York. He was an enthusiastic student of history and literature there
and a prize-winner in debating and oratory.
In 1886, he represented Cornell University's Young Men's Christian Associations
(Y.M.C.A). at the first international, interdenominational student Christian conference
ever held. He has created worldwide organizations which have united millions of young
people in work for the Christian ideals of peace and tolerance between nations. He has
never been a politician, he has never taken an active part in organized peace work. But he
has always been a living force, a tireless fighter in the service of Christ, opening young
minds to the light which he thinks can lead the world to peace and bring men together in
understanding and goodwill. In 1926 he became president of the World's Alliance of
Young Men's Christian Associations.
His sum of work makes an impressive record: he wrote sixteen books; crossed the
Atlantic over one hundred times and the Pacific fourteen times; delivered thousands of
speeches; chaired innumerable conferences.
NANSEN, Fridtjof (October 10, 1861 - May 13, 1930)
Appeal to world opinion with brotherly love as the

driving and animating force
Born at Store Frøen, near Oslo. He became expert in skating, tumbling, and
swimming. In school, he excelled in the sciences and in drawing and decided to major in
zoology. He made his doctorate at the University of Oslo. Holding a research
professorship at the University of Oslo after 1897, he published six volumes of scientific
observations made between 1893 and 1896. Continuing thereafter to break new ground in
oceanic research, he was appointed professor of oceanography in 1908.
He was an internationally famous adventurer. Once the world was plunged into
war in 1914 and exploration was halted, he became increasingly interested in
international political affairs. In 1919, he became president of the Norwegian Union for
the League of Nations and at the Peace Conference in Paris was an influential lobbyist for
the adoption of the League Covenant and for recognition of the rights of small nations.
From 1920 until his death he was a delegate to the League from Norway.
The Red Cross in 1921 asked Nansen to take on yet a third humanitarian task, that
of directing relief for millions of Russians dying in the famine of 1921-1922. His great
humanitarian effort, at the invitation of the League in 1925, was to save the remnants of
the Armenian people from extinction.
…………………….
Office International Nansen pour les Réfugiés (Nansen
International Office for Refugees)
Nansen International Office for Refugees was the successor of the first
international agency dealing with refugees, the High Commission for Refugees,
established by the League of Nations under the direction of Fridtjof Nansen on June 27,
1921. This Office began active operations on April 1, 1931.
The Nansen Office was beset by overwhelming problems during its existence -
among them, the lack of stable and adequate financing; the onset of the depression which
closed employment opportunities for refugees; the decline of the prestige of the League
after the events of 1931 and 1935; the growing avalanche of refugees, mostly from
Germany, Italy, and Spain…
The accomplishments of the Nansen Office include the adoption by fourteen
countries of the Refugee Convention of 1933, a modest charter of human rights.
PAULING, Linus ( 1901 – 1994 )
Science & Peace

He was the most famous American scientist who received the two undivided
Nobel prizes, one for Chemistry and another for Peace. In 19962, he was awarded the
Nobel Peace Prize for his mobilisation of the scientists of the world in a protest against
nuclear testing in the atmosphere.
PEREZ DE CUÉLLAR, Javier ( 1920 - )
A tangible expression of the world

community's
will to solve conflicts by peaceful means
Secretary - General of the United Nations from 1982 to 1991, he accepted the
Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of the Commander for the " Blue Berets " Peace-keeping
forces in 1988. Now he is President of an International Foundation of Human Rights,
l'Arche de la Fraternité, situated in Paris, France.
RAMOS – HORTA
Dr. Ramos-Horta’s commitment has made it impossible for him to return to his
homeland. After the Indonesian invasion, he lived in the United States for 15 years. He is
currently based in Lisbon and Sydney.
He is now working with Oscar Arias on an International Code of Conduct in
Arms Transfers, which will obligate governments who wish to purchase arms to uphold
internationally recognized standards of democracy, human rights, and peaceful
international relations. He has also proposed an association of Nobel Laureates, including
Burmese activist Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Guatemala’s Rigoberta Menchu, and the Dalai
Lama, to act as a force for peace in response to international concerns.
…………………….
ROOSEVELT, Theodore (October 27, 1858 – January

6, 1919)
Mediator and peacemaker in the Russo-Japanese

war
Born in New York. At eighteen he entered Harvard College and spent four years
there.
He was elected to the Assembly of New York State, holding office for three years
and distinguishing himself as an ardent reformer. In 1884, because of ill health and the
death of his wife, Roosevelt abandoned his political work for some time. In 1886
Roosevelt returned to New York, married again, and once more plunged into politics.
Elected governor of the state of New York in 1898, he invested his two-year
administration with the vigorous and businesslike characteristics which were his
hallmark. He held the vice-presidency for less than a year, succeeding to the presidency
after the assassination of President McKinley on November 14, 1901. In 1904 Roosevelt
was elected to a full term as president.
In 1902 President Roosevelt took the initiative in opening the International Court
of Arbitration at The Hague, which, though founded in 1899, had not been called upon by
any power in its first three years of existence.
Roosevelt was an historian, a biographer, a statesman, a hunter, a naturalist, an orator. In
1919, at the age of sixty, he died in his sleep
Prof. Joseph ROTBLAT ( 40 quotations)
is emeritus professor of physics at the University of London, Emeritus

President of Pugwash, and a recipient of the 1995 Nobel Peace Prize; 8
Asmara Road, London NW2 3ST, UK, Tel. (++44-171) 405-6661, Fax:
(++44-171) 831-5651, E-mail: pugwash@qmw.ac.uk
ROOT, Elihu (February 15, 1845 - February 7, 1937)
Born in New York and was graduated from the Law School of New York
University in 1867. In 1899, President McKinley invited him to become his secretary of
war. In 1905 at President Theodore Roosevelt's invitation, accepted the post of secretary
of state.
He opposed Woodrow Wilson's neutrality policy but supported him during the
war but he accepted Wilson's appointment as ambassador extraordinary to head a special
diplomatic mission to Russia in 1917; on the 1919 Treaty of Versailles and the League of
Nations.
Root was the first president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
He believed that international law, along with its accompanying machinery, represented
mankind's best chance to achieve world peace.
STRESEMANN, Gustav (May 10, 1878 - October 3,

1929)
Born in a prosperous family. During these student days, he discovered that he had
powers of leadership as well as a capacity for literary attainment. He was always
convinced of the relationship between economics and politics.
A month after the armistice of November 11, 1918, he formed the German
People's Party, was elected to the national assembly which gathered at Weimar in 1919 to
frame a new constitution, was elected to the new Reichstag in 1920 and spent the next
three years in opposition. From August 13 to November 23, 1923, he was chancellor of a
coalition government.
After initialling the Locarno Pact on October 16, he hurried home to insure its
acceptance by the government.
Despite his health, which declined rapidly after the Christmas of 1927, and against
medical advice, he retained his position as German foreign minister.
QUIDDE, Ludwig (March 23, 1858 - March 4, 1941)

Born in Bremen, Germany. He studied at the Universities of Strasbourg and
Göttingen, where his professors recognized and furthered his aptitude for historical
research.
He entered politics in Munich. In 1895 he helped to reorganize the German
People's Party which was, in political philosophy and antimilitary. In 1919 he was elected
to the Weimar National Assembly.
He took a position on the Council of the International Peace Bureau in Bern, rose
to a position of leadership in the World Peace Congress in Glasgow in 1901, joined with
Frédéric Passy at the Congress at Lucerne in 1905 to achieve a rapprochement between
German and French, became president of the German Peace Society in 1914.
When Hitler came to power, he fled first to Munich and then to Geneva, where he
lived from March, 1933, until his death in March, 1941. Even in exile, he continued to
attend World Peace Congresses, to publish articles, and to exercise his organizational
talents by founding the Comité de Secours aux Pacifistes Exilés to care for fellow
political exiles from Nazi Germany.
SCHWEITZER, Albert ( 1875 – 1965 )
The ethical spirit and peace

Born in the French of Alsace in 1875, Schweitzer have made several distinguished
careers in music, theology and philosophy. In each of these fields he received a doctorate.
Then he trained as a doctor and spent the rest of his life as a medical missionary in the
jungle of Africa to help the poor in putting into practice his convictions about human
brotherhood.---
SOEDERBLOM, Nathan (January 15, 1866 - July 12,

1931)
Born at Trönö, in Sweden. His father was a pastor.
As a student at Uppsala University, he won respect not only for his intellectual
attainments but also for his personal charm, abundant vitality, and talent as a speaker.
He took his bachelor's degree in 1886, with honours in Greek and competency in
Hebrew, Arabic, and Latin. He had thirteen children. From 1894 to 1901, he preached in
Paris, where his congregation included Alfred Nobel, as well as Swedish and Norwegian
intellectual communities here.
Internationally, he is best known, however, as the architect of the ecumenical
movement of the twentieth century.
…………………….
SUTTNER, Bertha Von (June 9, 1843 - June 21, 1914)
Born in a traditional military family and grew up in an aristocratic society whose
militaristic traditions she accepted without question for the first half of her life and
vigorously opposed for the last half.
In 1876 she left for Paris to become Alfred Nobel's secretary but returned, after
only a brief stay, to marry Baron Arthur von Suttner.
She wrote The Machine Age published early in 1889, was much discussed and
reviewed. This book, criticizing many aspects of the times, was among the first to foretell
the results of exaggerated nationalism and armaments. The effect of her book Lay Down
Your Arms, published late in 1889, had a tremendous impact on the reading public. And
from this time on, its author became an active leader in the peace movement, devoting a
great part of her time, her energy, and her writing to the cause of peace…
In 1892 she promised Alfred Nobel to keep him informed on the progress of the
peace movement. No doubt she felt that she was beginning to succeed when she received
a letter from him in January of 1893, telling her about a peace prize he hoped to found.
Bertha von Suttner, along with her husband, worked hard to gain support for the Czar's
Manifesto and the Hague Peace Conference of 1899, arranging public meetings, forming
committees, lecturing. Although grief-stricken after her husband's death in 1902, she
determined to carry on the work which they had so often done together and which he had
asked her to continue.
She continued to write, but only for the cause of peace. By 1905 when she
received the Nobel Peace Prize. She was widely thought of as sharing the leadership of
the peace movement with the venerable Passy.
She died on June 21, 1914, two months before the erupting of the world war she
had warned and struggled against.
The Dalai Lama ( 1935 - ) or

His Holiness the XIVth Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso or
Dalai Lama XIV of Tibet
The eternal peace on the entire Tibet and in the

world. The aspirations of independence of the Tibetan
people
Born to a peasant family in 1935 in a small village called Takster in north-eastern
Tibet. His Holiness was recognized at the age of two, in accordance with Tibetan
tradition, as the reincarnation of his predecessor the 13th Dalai Lama. Dalai Lama means
Ocean of Wisdom. The Dalai Lamas are the manifestations of the Bodhisattva of
Compassion, who chose to reincarnate to serve the people.
He was enthroned in 1940 as the spiritual leader of Tibet, In 1954 he went to
Peking to talk with Mao Tse-Tung and other Chinese leaders, including Chou En-Lai and
Deng Xiaoping. In 1956, while visiting India to attend the 2500th Buddha Jayanti, he had
a series of meetings with Prime Minister Nehru and Premier Chou about deteriorating
conditions in Tibet. In 1959 he was forced into exile in India after the Chinese military
occupation of Tibet. Since 1960 he has resided in Dharamsala, aptly known as "Little
Lhasa", the seat of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile.
Since then he has struggled untiringly from abroad to liberate his people and his
nation from the Chinese occupation. He is the spiritual symbol and temporal leader of the
Tibetan people. The Nobel Committee awarded him Peace Prize for his championing of
human rights by the means of non-violence, for his Buddhist message of love and
compassion, and for his long struggle for this planet's green peace and environment.
…………………….
TERESA, Mother ( 1910 – 1997 )
The gift of peace

Born to an Albanian family in what is known Macedona in 1910, she joined a
Catholic teaching order to serve in its missionary school in Calcutta, but overwhelmed by
the misery she found there, she heeded the call to leave the convent and to help the poor
while living among them. She founded a new order, the Missionary of Charity, whose
social activities have influenced far beyond Calcutta and India to everywhere of need all
over the world. She was known as the " Saint of Calcutta " for her works of mercy for the
poor in this urban.
…………………….
United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF)
Established by the United Nations General Assembly on December 11, 1946 and
originally known as the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund
(UNICEF), the UN Children's Fund has employed three approaches in discharging its
mandate.
WALESA, Lech ( 1943 – )
Solidarity in the spirit of justice
Born in 1943, this Polish electrician became Head of Solidarity, which was the
free trade union movement. The struggle to establish polish workers' rights and a
democratic society met with the repression of a communist regime, Walesa and other
leaders of Solidarity were arrested. Walesa decided not to go to Norway to receive Nobel
Peace Prize, because he feared that the communist regime would not permit him to return
his homeland. His wife received the prize and read his speech of acceptance.
WILLIAMS, Jody ( 9 October 1950 - )

Model for decisive importance to the international
effort for Peace
In October of 1992, Handicap International, Human Rights Watch, medico
international, Mines Advisory Group, Physicians for Human Rights and Vietnam
Veterans of America Foundation came together to issue a "Joint Call to Ban
Antipersonnel Landmines." Ms. Williams is the founding coordinator of the International
Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) and has overseen the growth of the ICBL to more
than 1,000 NGOs in more than 60 countries to achieve the common goal of a ban of
antipersonnel landmines. These organizations, which became the steering committee of
the International Campaign to Ban Landmines called for an end to the use, production,
trade and stockpiling of antipersonnel landmines.
Ms. Williams has served as the chief strategist and spokesperson for the ICBL
campaign. This international NGO achieved its goal of an international treaty banning
antipersonnel landmines during the diplomatic conference held in Oslo in September
1997.
She began working for the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation at the end of
1991 to bring together a coalition to ban antipersonnel landmines. She has written articles
for journals produced by the United Nations and the ICRC. Her publications include:
After the Guns Fall Silent: The Enduring Legacy of Landmines, Shawn Roberts and Jody
Williams, Vietnam Veterans of America, Washington, D.C., 1995. "Landmines and
measures to eliminate them," International Review of the Red Cross.
Ms. Williams has a Master's Degree in International Relations, a Master's Degree
in Teaching Spanish, and a Bachelor of Arts degree.
ALPHABETICAL LISTING OF NOBEL PEACE PRIZE
LAUREATES
Year
Name or Organism First Name
Awarded
ADDAMS Jane 1931
The American Friends Service Committee 1947
Amnesty International 1977
ANNAN Kofi 2001
ANGELL (Sir) Norman 1933
ARAFAT Yasser 1994
ARNOLDSON Klas Pontus 1908
ASSER Tobias Michael Carel 1911
BAJER Fredrik 1908
BALCH Emily Greene 1946
BEERNAERT Auguste Marie Francois 1909
BEGIN Menachem 1978
BELO Carlos Felipe Ximenes 1996
BORLAUG Norman 1970
BOURGEOIS Leon Victor Auguste 1920
BRANDT Willy 1971
BRANTING Karl Hjalmar 1921
BOYD-ORR of BRECHIN (Lord) John 1949
BRIAND Aristide 1926
BRIDE Sean Mac 1974
BUISSON Ferdinand 1927
BUNCHE Ralph 1950
BUTLER Nicholas Murray 1931
CASSIN René 1968
CECIL (Lord) Edgar Algernon Robert Gascoyne 1937
CHAMBERLAIN (Sir) Austen 1925
Paul Henribenjamin Balluet D'estournelles
CONSTANT 1909
De
CORRIGAN Mairead 1976
CREMER (Sir) William Randal 1903
DALAI LAMA 1989
DAWES Charles Gates 1925
DE KLERK Fredrik Willem 1993
Doctors without Borders (Médecins Sans
1999
Frontières)
DUCOMMUN Elie 1902
DUNANT Jean Henri 1901
ESQUIVEL Adolfo Perez 1980
FONTAINE Henri La 1913
FRIED Alfred Hermann 1911
The Friends Service Council 1947
GOBAT Charles Albert 1902
GORBACHEV Mikhail Sergeyevich 1990
HAMMARSKJOELD Dag Hjalmar Agne Carl 1961
HENDERSON Arthur 1934
HULL Cordell 1945
HUME John 1998
Institute of International Law 1904
International Campaign to Ban Landmines
1997
(ICBL)
International Physicians for The Prevention of
1985
Nuclear War, Inc.
International Committee of The Red Cross 1944
International Labour Organization 1969
JOUHAUX Leon 1951
KING Martin Luther Jr. 1964
KELLOGG Frank Billings 1929
KIM Dae Jung 2000
KISSINGER Henry A. 1973
KYI Aung San Suu 1991
LAMAS Carlos Saavedra 1936
LANGE Christian Lous 1921
LE DUC Tho 1973
League of Red Cross Societies 1963
LUTULI Albert John 1960
MANDELA Nelson 1993
MARSHALL George Catlett 1953
MONETA Ernesto Teodoro 1907
Mother TERESA 1979
MOTT John Raleigh 1946
MYRDAL Alva 1982
NANSEN Fridtjof 1922
Nansen International Office For Refugees 1938
NOEL- BAKER Philip J. 1959
Office of the United Nations High
1954
Commissioner for Refugees
Office of the United Nations High
1981
Commissioner for Refugees
OSSIETZKY Carl Von 1935
PASSY Frederic 1901
PAULING Linus Carl 1962
PEARSON Lester Bowles 1957
PERES Shimon 1994
Permanent International Peace Bureau 1910
PIRE Georges Henri 1958
1995
Affairs
QUIDDE Ludwig 1927
RABIN Yitzhak 1994
RAMOS-HORTA Jose 1996
RENAULT Louis 1907
ROBLES Alfonso Garcia 1982
ROOSEVELT Theodore 1906
ROOT Elihu 1912
ROTBLAT Joseph 1995
SADAT Mohamed Anwar El 1978
SAKHAROV Andrei Dmitrievich 1975
SANCHEZ Oscar Arias 1987
SATO Eisaku 1974
SCHWEITZER Albert 1952
SOEDERBLOM Lars Olof Nathan 1930
STRESEMANN Gustav 1926
VON SUTTNER (Baroness) Bertha Sophie Felicita 1905
TRIMBLE David 1998
TUM Rigoberta Menchu 1992
TUTU Desmond Mpilo 1984
The United Nations 2001
United Nations Children's Fund 1965
The United Nations Peace-keeping Forces 1988
WALESA Lech 1983
WIESEL Elie 1986
WILLIAMS Betty 1976
WILLIAMS Jody 1997
WILSON Thomas Woodrow 1919
CHRONOLOGICAL LISTING OF NOBEL PEACE PRIZE

LAUREATES
Year Birth Death

Name or Organism First Name date date Nationality
Awarded
1901 DUNANT Jean Henri 1
1901 PASSY Frederic 0
1902 DUCOMMUN Elie 10
1902 GOBAT Charles Albert 10
1903 CREMER (Sir) William Randal 13
1904 Institute of International Law
(Baroness) Bertha
1905 VON SUTTNER
Sophie Felicita
14
1906 ROOSEVELT Theodore
1907 MONETA Ernesto Teodoro
1907 RENAULT Louis
1908 ARNOLDSON Klas Pontus
1908 BAJER Fredrik
Auguste Marie
1909 BEERNAERT
Francois
0
Paul Henribenjamin
1909 CONSTANT Balluet
D'estournelles De
Permanent International Peace
1910
Bureau
Tobias Michael
1911 ASSER
Carel
1911 FRIED Alfred Hermann
1912 ROOT Elihu
1913 FONTAINE Henri La
International Committee of
1917
The Red Cross
1919 WILSON Thomas Woodrow
1920 BOURGEOIS Leon Victor Auguste
1921 BRANTING Karl Hjalmar
1921 LANGE Christian Lous
1922 NANSEN Fridtjof
1925 CHAMBERLAIN (Sir) Austen
1925 DAWES Charles Gates
1926 BRIAND Aristide
1926 STRESEMANN Gustav
1927 BUISSON Ferdinand
1927 QUIDDE Ludwig
1929 KELLOGG Frank Billings
1930 SOEDERBLOM Lars Olof Nathan
1931 ADDAMS Jane
1931 BUTLER Nicholas Murray
1933 ANGELL (Sir) Norman
1934 HENDERSON Arthur
1935 OSSIETZKY Carl Von
1936 LAMAS Carlos Saavedra
(Lord) Edgar
1937 CECIL Algernon Robert
Gascoyne
Nansen International Office
1938
for Refugees
1944 International Committee of
The Red Cross
1945 HULL Cordell
1946 BALCH Emily Greene
1946 MOTT John Raleigh
The American Friends Service
1947
Committee
1947 The Friends Service Council
1949 BOYD-ORR of BRECHIN (Lord) John
1950 BUNCHE Ralph
1951 JOUHAUX Leon
1952 SCHWEITZER Albert
1953 MARSHALL George Catlett
Office of the United Nations
1954 High Commissioner for
Refugees
1957 PEARSON Lester Bowles
1958 PIRE Georges Henri
1959 NOEL- BAKER Philip J.
1960 LUTULI Albert John
Dag Hjalmar Agne
1961 HAMMARSKJOELD
Carl
1962 PAULING Linus Carl
International Committee of
1963
The Red Cross
1963 League of Red Cross Societies
1964 KING Martin Luther Jr. 98
United Nations Children's
1965
Fund
1968 CASSIN René
International Labour
1969
Organisation
1970 BORLAUG Norman
1971 BRANDT Willy
1973 KISSINGER Henry A.
1973 LE DUC Tho
1974 BRIDE Sean Mac
1974 SATO Eisaku
1975 SAKHAROV Andrei Dmitrievich
1976 CORRIGAN Mairead
1976 WILLIAMS Betty
1977 Amnesty International
1978 BEGIN Menachem
1978 SADAT Mohamed Anwar El
1979 Mother TERESA
1980 ESQUIVEL Adolfo Perez
Office of The United Nations
1981 High Commissioner for
Refugees
1982 MYRDAL Alva
1982 ROBLES Alfonso Garcia
1983 WALESA Lech
1984 TUTU Desmond Mpilo
International Physicians for
1985 The Prevention of Nuclear
War, Inc.
1986 WIESEL Elie
1987 SANCHEZ Oscar Arias
The United Nations Peace-
1988
keeping Forces
1989 DALAI LAMA
1990 GORBACHEV Mikhail Sergeyevich
1991 KYI Aung San Suu
1992 TUM Rigoberta Menchu
1993 DE KLERK Fredrik Willem
1993 MANDELA Nelson
1994 ARAFAT Yasser
1994 PERES Shimon
1994 RABIN Yitzhak
Pugwash Conferences on
1995
Science and World Affairs
1995 ROTBLAT Joseph 40
Carlos Felipe
1996 BELO
Ximenes
1996 RAMOS-HORTA Jose
International Campaign to
1997
Ban Landmines (ICBL)
1997 WILLIAMS Jody
1998 HUME John
1998 TRIMBLE David
Doctors without Borders
1999
(Médecins Sans Frontières)
2000 KIM Dae Jung 22
2001 ANNAN Kofi 6
2001 The United Nations

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NGUYEN Huu Vien

For my Father who told me tenderly how many

For Hanoi, “the City of Peace” & her Sword

Paris, at the end of Tan Ty 2001

Nguyễn Hữu Viện

" The city has had an impressive course of improvement, especially in

"Chúng ta đang có co may sống trong một kỷ nguyên kỳ diệu, ranh

“The destiny of world civilization depends upon providing a decent

Peace starts with a smile”

I would hope that the nations of the world might say

“The destiny of world civilization depends upon providing a decent

I feel honored and privileged to be asked

The achievement of global peace has

A necessary, but by no means sufficient,

Sadly, despite the tremendous scientific,

I applaud the efforts of Nguyen Huu Vien,

Dr. Norman BORLAUG

1970 Nobel Peace Laureate

Paris/Hanoi Autumn 2001

Rigoberta MENCHU TUM

United Nations Children's Fund

The International Conference on the Economic Aspects of Disarmament, meeting

United Nations Children's Fund

In newly emergent democracies many who have been disappointed in their

The Soviet press, Soviet representatives abroad, and some of my Soviet

The principle of non-violent resistance seeks to reconcile the truths of two

Martin Luther King

Despite grand debates on world order, the act of humanitarianism comes

We achieve everything by our efforts alone. Our fate is not decided by an

Aung San Suu Kyi

Friends Service Council (The

Most certainly, agricultural scientists have a moral obligation to warn the

Albert John LUTULI

As a military man, as a commander, as a minister of defence, I ordered to carry

Christian Louis LANGE

Apartheid is upheld by a phalanx of iniquitous laws, such as the Population

Mohamed Anwar El SADAT

Compulsory arbitration is a practical instrument of pacification and, as such, it

Armaments are necessary - or are maintained on the pretext of necessity -

The economic burden of armaments is now almost overpowering, and where

Poverty Still Haunts Asia. Despite the successes of smallholder Asian

Always one to practise what he preached, AUNG SAN himself constantly

Albert John LUTULI

Frederik Willem DE KLERK

KIM Dae Jung

Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai

In the last 20 years, biotechnology has developed invaluable new scientific

I believe that it is also important for governments to fund significant programs of

I live in an apartment with a policeman stationed at the door round-the-clock. I

And here we come back to history. We must remember the suffering of my

…When religion is manipulated, when ethnicity, rivalries among communities are

José RAMOS – HORTA

The Dalai Lama

Buddhism, the foundation of traditional Burmese culture, places the greatest

The people of Burma had wearied of a precarious state of passive apprehension

Emerald cool we may be

In attempting to bring mankind to a condition of permanent peace in which war

Albert John LUTULI

My eternal gratitude to those who nominated me. I am forever morally indebted to

José RAMOS – HORTA

These declarations, although enforced by no binding stipulation, nevertheless

As war is an adventure, peace is also a challenge and a gamble. If we do not