Activities

IPB convened its annual Council Meeting for the first time in Ireland in partnership with the Afri ‘Hedge School’ in Dublin. Held simultaneously at the same venue, the Sean MacBride Peace Prize ceremony, as well as the panels on Activism, Disarmament and Peace Education Initiatives and Climate Change attracted many participants and had fruitful discussions and exchanges of experiences.

President Michael D. Higgins of Ireland  awarded the Sean MacBride Peace Prize to Lina Ben Mhenni, the courageous Tunisian blogger and to Nawal el-Saadawi, the world-famous Egyptian feminist author.

With the help of its many partner organizations, IPB was able to bring the disarmament perspective to Rio+20. Through our side events on ‘disarmament for development’ and ‘the linkages between food security and armed conflicts’, we were able to discuss with other stakeholders the importance of disarmament and to encourage them to join our call.
The main attraction of the week, however, was our tank made of bread. Continue reading “IPB at Rio+20”

In the first week of the Non-Proliferation Treaty PrepComm (April 30 -May 11), IPB organised 4 side events, together with our partners INES and Gensuikyo. Continue reading “NPT PrepCom – IPB side events”

On April 17, IPB organised two events to mark the second GDAMS.

What we did:

Lunchtime seminar at the UN

Diplomats and NGOs participated in this event. The panel was composed of:

– Mr. Kassym-Jomaert Tokayev, Director-General of UNOG, who highlighted the role of the civil society in drawing attention to military spending and its impact on human security. Continue reading “Global Day of Action on Military Spending 2012 – IPB activities”

IPB worked with several other organisations to organise three very successful activities to mark the Global Day of Action on Military Spending – a project itself co-coordinated by IPB. Activities included a public action at the Place des Nations, a lunchtime seminar on ‘Military Spending or the MDGs?’, and an evening meeting on militarisation in Burma.

What we did:

1. Public action at the Place des Nations in front of the UN, with 2 famous disarmament monuments, the Landmines Chair and the Twisted Cannon. It was organised by IPB and the Group for Switzerland without an Army/GSSA. A Symbolic installationt shows the vast disparity between global military spending and what is needed for the MDGs – using 160 boxes each representing $10bn, and 30 boxes for the MDGs. Continue reading “Global Day of Action on Military Spending 2011 – IPB activities”