Religions for Peace: Arms Down! Campaign for Shared Security
By | Mar 10, 2010
Arms Down! are a global, youth-led, multi-religious campaign on disarmament for development.
The Campaign for Shared Security works to engage religious leaders and believers around the world to unleash the power of multi-religious cooperation through shared action. It will also reach out to international organizations, governments, national assemblies and parliaments, municipalities, media, and all men and women of good will.
The Peace Foundation (Aotearoa-New Zealand) assisted with the launch of the campaign in Costa Rica in November 2009, when more than 120 young religious leaders of different faiths from forty-nine countries in six regions came together to outline their strategies for meeting the campaign’s three goals: abolishing nuclear weapons, stopping the proliferation and misuse of conventional weapons and redirecting at least 10 percent of military expenditure to achieve the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015. The United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon and Costa Rican President Oscar Arias Sánchez offered their support to this historic initiative.
Over the three days of the event, several panel discussions were held that exposed the youth to valuable insights from international experts on each of the campaign goals. At the same time, capacity building workshops equipped the participants with the practical tools to work on lobbying and advocacy, engaging the media, raising public awareness and working with mayors, parliamentarians and policy makers for the purposes of the campaign. Lastly, participants were divided into regional working groups to develop national, regional and global plans of action that would eventually contribute to the success of the campaign.
At the closing ceremony of the event, the International Youth Committee (IYC) of Religions for Peace presented the Statement and Plan of Action of the Global Level to Mr. Hernando París, the Minister of Justice and Peace of Costa Rica. Each region has also committed to collect signatures on the Arms Down! Disarmament petition, and the Global Youth Network has set a goal of 50 million signatures to be delivered to the United National Secretary General, the permanent members of the Security Council, as well as to Members of Parliaments, in one year’s time.
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