Online talk: Resisting militarisation, advocating pacifism

Online talk with peace activists from Ukraine, UK and Croatia on 22 March 2022. Organised by the Peace Institute, Ljubljana.

Speakers:

Mr. Yurii Sheliazhenko, Ph.D. in law, executive secretary of the Ukrainian Pacifist Movement, board member of the European Bureau for Conscientious Objection, member of the Board of Directors of the World Beyond War, Master of Mediation and Conflict Management,

Mr. Samuel Perlo-Freeman, Ph.D. in economy, a researcher at the Campaign Against the Arms Trade, based in the UK, previously worked at the World Peace Foundation for the project Global Arms Business and Corruption,

Ms. Vesna Teršelič, director of »Documenta-Center for Dealing with the Past«, based in Croatia; she was director of the Center for Peace Studies and a founder and coordinator of the Anti-war campaign in Croatia.

Main questions:

• Who arms war(s) and who benefits from militarisation?
• How arms business influences international politics and global governance?
• In which way military opposition between global powers have influenced the war in Ukraine (Russian aggression against Ukraine) and a risk of world war?
• How to sustain pacifism in the current circumstances of the war in Ukraine and in long term?
• What is the situation of peace activists in Ukraine today (and what it has been since 2014)? What we can learn from the experience of peace activists during and after the war in Croatia/former Yugoslavia?
• How to build world beyond war, who shall play role in that effort? Can the role of international law and the United Nations be strengthen and role of military alliances diminished?
• What role the media play reporting the war in Ukraine, and on generally in promoting either culture of peace or culture of violence (legitimisation of violence)?