IPB seminar report
This year’s IPB’s GDAMS Geneva seminar, held on 6 April, served also as a prepcomm for the Berlin Congress. The programme included 4 presentations, mainly on humanitarian financing and civil-military coordination, and was followed by a short IPB film about alternatives to violence in dealing with terrorism. The discussion raised important issues about the role of the military and its financing. See full report here.
Brussels Statement on Military Spending
“If we want to give peace a real chance, we have to give it a real budget”.
In 2015 global military spending was 1500 billion euro. This is a disproportionate amount of money, which could be far better spent to ensure security for people. ‘The world is over-armed and peace is underfunded’, stated UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in 2012.
New IPB video: “Challenging ISIS through non-mlitary means”
In this video made by the International Peace Bureau interns in February, students and scholars discuss how we can tackle ISIS through non-violent means. It is part of a broader research we undertook via an opinion survey we conducted in French, Swiss and UK universities, in collaboration with Prof. Ould Mohamedou (Geneva Graduate Institute) who also offers his insights on the matter. The film was first shown at the seminar organised by IPB in Geneva on April 6, as part of the Global Days of Action on Military Spending.
Photos from IPB action in Geneva: April 5, 2016
The IPB team took the message onto the street on the opening day of the Global Days of Action on Military Spending. We unfurled a huge banner outside the headquarters of the UN High Commission for Refugees. For once this was not a scene-of-the-crime protest, but rather a message of support: let’s increase the resources available for humanitarian efforts by moving money from the military! It rained that day, but the wet weather did not dampen our spirits….see photo-gallery here.
