PEACE ACTIONThE PEACE DIrECT NEwslETTEr

sPrINg/summEr 2013

suPPOrTINg lOCAl ACTION AgAINsT CONflICT

tell them which candidates to vote for.”To combat these abuses, Gulalai and her organi-

sation Aware Girls have set up election monitoring teams – composed of women. The teams will visit polling stations before the election to check that suitable facilities are provided for women voters. On election day, they will observe the vote to ensure that none are turned away or manipulated in their choice. And afterwards they will evaluate events and provide a detailed report on women’s voting for the national electoral commission.

Gulalai adds: “We want policy makers and the Election Commission of Pakistan to make legisla-

school rivalries and identities ran on late into the evening and was much appreciated by all.

Truce will be visited by Pakistani peacebuilder Saba Ismail on 1 May. Saba is pictured left with Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani schoolgirl shot by the

Taliban, at an event run by Saba’s organisation, Aware Girls. She promotes girls’ and women’s rights, and counters political radicalisation among youth.

Saba will share her insights as a young peacebuilder from a place where extremist

violence is a daily threat.

Pakistan: election warningAs Pakistan gears up for elections this spring,

local peacebuilders have discovered deliberate obstacles to women casting their votes – and are taking action to remove them.

Their concerns focus on Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, a turbulent province on the border with Afghanistan that is heavily affected by violent extremism. Here powerful currents of tribal custom and religious militancy combine. Purda is strictly observed and women are severely limited in their independence.

“At election time, the community elders restrict women from casting their votes, under the influence of religious groups or the political parties,” explains local peacebuilder Gulalai Ismail. “A written agree-ment is signed by the elders, that no woman will be allowed to come out of her home and cast the vote.

“In some cases, these forces compel the political candidates to sign an agreement to prevent women of their groups from coming to the polling station. They may even compel the election staff to stop any woman from casting her vote.”

Voter suppression is not the only problem: “The other issue we witnessed in rural areas is that women do not use their votes according to their own choice. They follow male members of their family, who even

we suPPort local PeoPle who are building Peace in burundi, congo, kashMir, MozaMbique, Pakistan, south sudan, sri lanka, sudan, uk and ziMbabwe.

Youth actiVistsVisit london Young Londoners at our East End youth project

Truce 20/20 have been visited by peacebuilders from three countries this spring.

In March, Truce hosted a visit from young Libyan peacebuilders working on human rights, democracy and community development projects in Benghazi and Tripoli. The young peacebuilders from both countries spent an evening learning about each other’s conflict resolution work, using exercises, presentations and Q&A sessions. The collaboration helped to challenge assumptions and teach young peacebuilders about different creative solutions to the problems they face. Many realised they had more in common than they first thought.

“I was struck by the fact that although they came from very different backgrounds, they immediately connected with each other,” said Paul Steinheuer from Peace Direct, who attended the event.

Also in March, Truce welcomed a group of peacebuilders from Northern Ireland. The North West Youth Forum for Peace and Reconciliation came to learn about Truce’s training and to present their own work countering sectarianism and racism in the north-west of Northern Ireland. An in-depth discussion about each group’s experiences of community relationships,

wOmEN’s COurTs IN wAr-TOrN CONgOOne of the world’s most dangerous countries for women is DR Congo, where guerilla war and sexual violence are widespread in the east. This year, to give women a voice to speak out against the injustice they often face, local peacebuilder Chirezi Foundation have started women-only courts. These tradi-tional courts are run entirely by women and only look at cases brought by women.

They run alongside Chirezi’s nine other village courts, or barazas, which already provide access to justice for 50,000 villagers. The barazas are trusted by communities and by local authorities, who sent 30 cases to them in the past year. Chirezi’s work is supported by our Grow Peace Fund, which helps small organisations.

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£35 can provide training materials for ten truce volunteers in london

£55 can train one young person in Pakistan to challenge extremism

tion and take action to create an environment where women can use their right to vote without any fear and according to their choice.”

The vote is set for May 2013. Funding is now sought by Aware Girls for a follow-on project to create local women’s committees that can discuss and influence political developments.

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PEACE ACTION ThE PEACE DIrECT NEwslETTErPEACE ACTION The Peace Direct newsletter

Making a global iMPact

‘LOCAL FIRST’ LAUNCHeS IN USA

T his March we took the Local First initiative to the UN and other influential agencies in America. In New York, an event for representatives of UN

Agencies and Missions was organised with the UN Peacebuilding Support Office, which co-ordinates UN peacebuilding efforts and provides support, ad-vice and funding for peacebuilding work in countries emerging from conflict. The Rockefeller Foundation hosted this event, and it was chaired by the Director of the Quaker UN Office.

In Washington, Oxfam America hosted a

NeW CHAIRMAN APPOINTeDWe are delighted to welcome our new Chairman, Michael Ryder CMG. The former diplomat, pictured right in Afghanistan, brings extensive experience of working on conflict-relat-ed issues in London and overseas.

Michael began his career in diplomatic service with the British Foreign Office in the 1980s, when he focused on East-West relations during the Cold War, and then was the UK’s Special Representative on International Drugs Issues.

More recently, he was the UK’s Special

Representative to Sudan and South Sudan during the period of South Sudan’s

independence; the UK’s Senior Civilian Representative in Helmand, Afghanistan;

and Deputy Ambassador in Kabul. In 2010 he ran the London Conference on Afghanistan.

Michael has also worked as head of the Foreign Office’s Security Policy department, dealing with international defence and security, and as the UK’s Permanent Representation to the European Union in Brussels, where he was responsible for the EU’s common foreign and security policy.

We look forward to his insight and expertise.

in 2012: 43,500 Villagers were reached bY 326 radio shows in congo. 8,095 PeoPle joined Peace Projects in sri lanka. 72 oPinion-forMers launched ‘local first’ at the house of coMMons.

2

WHeRe We WORKWe support local peacebuilding organisations in 10 countries and showcase hundreds more on our website Insight On Conflict.

Our aim is to help local people to help them-selves – to lead their own programmes and build their own solutions to their countries’ conflicts. We believe they have the knowledge, the networks and the commitment to make peace sustainable for a better future.

So we find effective local peacebuilders, fund them, and promote them to those in the wider world who can assist with funding or influence. For more details, see www.peacedirect.org.

Kashmir

Sri Lanka

Sudan

Pakistan

DR CongoBurundi

Zimbabwe

UK

South Sudan

Mozambique

consultation meeting organised with the Alliance for Peacebuilding, where we presented our locally-led peacebuilding approach to the development and humanitarian community, with Saba Ismail, director of our Pakistani partner, Aware Girls.

The Local First initiative highlights the im-portance of supporting locally-led peacebuilding organisations, because they are sustainable, relevant, efficient and cost-effective. It emphasises that out-side support should strengthen organisations that are already working on the ground, because they are the first to reach the scene of emerging conflicts or problems and the last to leave.

A Zimbabwean activist quoted at the New York event said: ‘Our friends in the international NGO community seem to have a mental block against accepting that however poor or however under-developed our countries are, and however ill managed or unprofes-sional our NGOs are, it is our burden – and ours alone – to develop our own countries.’

If you are interested in follow-ing this initiative, please sub-scribe to the Local First monthly newsletter, a digest of the most interesting writings on this topic from a wide range of sources,

at www.localfirst.org.uk.

Our ANNuAl rEPOrT fOr 2012Our mission is to support local peacebuilding in conflict zones worldwide. We do this by funding peacebuilding organisations and by promoting their work to those with funds or influence in the wider world. The latter activity adds value to our support well beyond the grants that we make.

In 2012 our total income in the UK was £889,018. Our activities also generated the following additional funds which were sent directly to our partners in the field: £93,402 from major donors, and £101,272 from our affiliate offices in Germany and the USA.

This split reflects the fact that donors are increasingly seeking to fund our partners themselves. We welcome this, and in 2012 we put more effort into locating these direct funding sources for our partners.

Such ‘added value’ work is particularly valuable in the challenging economic climate. We were pleased to end the year with a small surplus of £1,049 in unrestricted funds, in contrast to the year before. And we were delighted to see the growing impact of our promotional work, going beyond what we can fund. We were especially encouraged by the reception given to Local First (see right).

Meanwhile our peacebuilding partners continued their remarkable work in stopping violence, saving lives and rebuilding comm-unities affected by conflict. And we are there to support them every step of the way.

WWW.PeACeDIReCT.ORg/RePORT-2012

FUNDRAISINg ART PRIze OPeNS Entries are now invited for the second annual Lumen Prize Exhibition, which raises funds for Peace Direct and showcases the very best of the world’s digital fine art. Entrants compete for a total prize fund of $5,250 and a place in the touring exhibition, which will visit New York and elsewhere. The 2012 exhibition toured London, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Riga. Deadline for en-tries is 31 July. Full details and online gallery of the 2012 longlist are at www.lumenprize.com.

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eINsIghT ON CONflICTTo bring peacebuilders to a wider audience, we publish Insight On Conflict, the leading website of local peacebuilding. In 2012, site traffic grew from 390,000 to 590,000 unique visits, and readership of its newsletter from 4,931 to 5,157. Its blog (see opposite) published 104 articles by policy-makers, academics and professionals. In January alone, visitors sent 72 emails and clicked onto 361 organisations’ websites to find out more.

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Local First is a development approach that looks first for the capacity within countries before bringing in external expertise and resources, recognises that much of this capacity is found outside central government, and understands that local people need to lead their own development.

It’s hard to imagine a simpler or more commonsense idea.

’

‘Edited by Kate McGuinness

local firstDevelopment for the twenty-first century

– Carolyn Hayman, OBE Peace Direct

Published by Peace Direct in association with Building Markets, CEDAC, Centre Résolution Conflits, FOMICRES, Integrity Action, IBJ Cambodia, Luta Hamutuk and Swisspeace

Edited by Kate McGuinness

local firstDevelopment for the twenty-first century

Charitable activities 79%

Costs of generating funds

19%

Governance costs 2% Total expenditure

Charitable activities£642,907

Costs of generating funds£152,828

Governance costs £17,170

Grants 65%

Individual supporters

31%

Donated services

4%

Other 0% Sources of income

Grants £572,258

Individual supporters£278,876

Donated services £36,920

Other £964

AuTumN/wINTEr 2011spring/summer 2013

letters froM the field

3

burundi: a new future beckonsI was fortunate to be offered the opportunity by

Peace Direct to go to Burundi as a volunteer, to help upgrade the financial controls of their partner Action for Peace and Development (APD).

The first thing I did was read up on the country. It is one of the five poorest in the world, with 80% of the population below the poverty line and 65% under 25 years old. Long conflicts between ethnic groups have devastated the economy and, as recently as 2008, rebels were shelling the capital, Bujumbura.

APD have premises in one of the main roads in Bujumbura. They are in a small complex around an open courtyard. They have electricity (most of the time) and their office was a hive of activity. I was in-troduced to Landry, Daphrose the accountant, and Jean Baptiste. I worked mostly with Daphrose, and together we input the whole of the 2012 financial transactions into the latest accounting software.

Daphrose was enthusiastic and embraced the new software easily, and it was that enthusiasm and dedication that impressed me about APD. Despite the difficulties in everyday life, there was never a complaint. When you’re halfway through inputting transactions and the power goes off, it’s just accept-ed: you wait for it to come back on and start again.

in 2012: 30,000 Young PeoPle were trained for Peace in Pakistan. 120 Village leaders were trained against Violence in ziMbabwe. 25 organisations attended a Peace exchange in islaMabad.

APD’s philosophy is that peace and development must come from within the country, initiated and progressed by local people. It is the

same philosophy that giving people food handouts takes away their dignity, but providing them with the tools to produce their own food gives them dignity.

That’s what Peace Direct believes, too. They have provided working finance for APD’s office facili-ties, funded specific projects, and encouraged their entrepreneurial spirit to flourish, which helps them to become self-sufficient.

At the APD office, volunteers have a safe facility with internet access where they can research and develop activities to promote reconciliation between

young people of the different ethnic groups. This is done using debates, sport and

music. They work with students at school, giving them skills for life and encouraging them to participate in debates. They discuss human rights, democracy and good governance.

This will develop a skilled and com-mitted ‘peacebuilder’ generation. Burun-

dians call youth ‘the Burundi of tomorrow’. This inspires the work of APD.

Bujumbura is developing rapidly, but there is still a wide divide between poor and rich. In the centre of town is a new coffee shop, Café Gourmand, with excellent coffee, fantastic patisseries and Western prices. Ten kilometres out to the suburbs and you are in a village with no electricity or water, where the villagers could not imagine having the money to get to the centre, let alone buy a coffee.

This divide will get worse and cause more con-flict, unless we support the initiatives developed by organisations like APD. They are working from the inside to harmonise gender and ethnicity, and promote locals into positions of influence, in order improve the general living conditions of their people.

Would I go again? Like a shot. Just let me at it.

£170 can provide four days’ intensive training for one teacher to run peace clubs in burundian schools

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jOIN ThE DIsCus-sION ON Our blOgJoin the conversation about peacebuilding at our Insight on Conflict blog, featuring expert opinions and field reports. Here are some talking points on today’s issues:

WOMeN SIDeLINeD FROM BURMA’S FLeDgLINg PeACe PROCeSS“Women truly have so much to offer to the peace process and it’s in the interest of peace that their voices be heard.” Burma is going through rapid change. Women could play a key role, but so far they have been sidelined.

LOOKINg FOR jUSTICe IN THe gUATeMALAN HIgHLANDS“The idea of justice in Guatemala is a complicated, elusive thing, and the cycle of violence is persistent and destructive.” Crime and violence continue to threaten Guatemalan communities, but one town is moving towards co-operative justice and conflict resolution.

CIvIL SOCIeTy IN AFgHANISTAN: A DeCADe OF PROgReSS AND CHALLeNgeS“Civil society is proving instrumental in dictating international policy towards Afghanistan.” A progress report on the impact and position of civil society organisations.

DR CONgO: MAgIC SPeLLS, CHICKeN’S BLOOD AND MAKINg PeACe“The people I met this week were exceptional, but it’s a transition that takes bravery and resilience, and involves facing mistrust, poverty and possible arrest or persecution.” Sophie Tholstrup from DfID reports on a workshop in DR Congo on how to demobilise and reintegrate combatants.

BeyOND THe MILLeNIUM gOALS “Labour’s vision for development is clear and puts tackling inequality and promoting sustainability at the heart of any new framework.” Ivan Lewis MP sets out the Labour Party’s vision for a post-2015 development framework.

UK AID NeeDS TO SUPPORT THe LOCALS“It is imperative that post-conflict interventions target the local as well as the national.” Lord Jack McConnell argues that a proportion of the UK aid budget should be ring-fenced for expenditure on peacebuilding at a local level.

yOU CAN ReAD THeSe BLOgS IN FULL AND SIgN UP FOR NeWSLeTTeRS AT WWW.INSIgHTONCONFLICT.ORg/BeST-OF-THe-BLOg

PEACE DIrECT is a global charity that supports locally led peacebuilding in conflict zones worldwide.

UK OFFICeDevelopment House, 56-64 Leonard St, London EC2A 4LT.W www.peacedirect.orgT 020 7549 0285 Reg charity 1123241.

geRMANy OFFICeLahwiesen 8a, 30659 Hannover.W www.peacedirect.deT 0152 533 64 146

USA OFFICe60 East 8th Street, Suite 27P, New York, NY 10003. W www.peacedirectusa.orgT 646 459 2728A registered 501(c)(3) organisation.

PICTurEs fOr PEACE A fresh vision of a unified Sri Lanka is being pieced together by young people in the Young Visionaries project. Brought together by local peacebuilders CPBR, they have been taught key photography skills, trained in how photos can be used for social change, and then sent out to take pictures capturing their diverse experiences of their own country. (Picture by Joy Kishon)

by Bryan Mundy

PEACE ACTION ThE PEACE DIrECT NEwslETTErPEACE ACTION The Peace Direct newsletter

get inVolVed in building Peace

have you ever wondered how you can make a big difference

by supporting our work in conflict zones worldwide? Well you can. In three simple steps you could help stop more conflicts, save more lives and heal more communities. We support local peacebuilders because they can make a small gift go a very long way and ensure it is used where it is needed most. So give monthly, give now and give your support.

give monthly: grow peaceSpring is finally here and now is the time to plant seeds of prosper-ity and hope. The Grow Peace Fund takes small peace organisations and grows them, so they can make a big-ger difference in their communities. This year the Fund is helping three projects: youth in Burundi, women in Kasmir and justice in Congo. A monthly gift of £10 to the Fund will make a real contribution to spreading peace in projects that heal the scars of war and rebuild communities. See www.peacedirect.org/grow-peace.

three stePs You can take todaY to build Peace

give now: women building peaceSupport women like Maliki in DR Congo (left) who are earning

a living by starting a small business. Women

joining together can build the village community – a crucial factor in strengthening peace. A small gift of £24 today can help in a big way for families in Congo. Empowering local people to build sustainable businesses, the project gives loans to start a small business. These might be food stalls or palm oil manufacture or making clothes – anything to build a stable future.

give support: peace and understandingThis summer Peace Direct will be taking part in Peace in the Park, Sheffield. The festival promotes the message of peace and understanding by bringing together communities through artistic, musical and vocal expression. We welcome volunteers to help us share our mission of sup-porting local action against conflict by joining us on the day: Saturday 8 June at 10 am-6 pm.

FOR DeTAILS PLeASe vISIT WWW.PeACeDIReCT.ORg/THRee-STePS

LORD MCCONNeLL ‘LIveS BeLOW THe LINe’This spring Lord Jack McConnell will raise funds for Peace Direct and his McConnell International Foundation, through the Live Below The Line campaign. And you can support him too. He explains: “Peace Direct supports amazing community-based projects in the most difficult environments, working with committed individuals to tackle the grassroots causes of conflict and to foster long-lasting, positive peace. In Burundi, they fund a network of peace clubs for young people that will reduce ethnic and other tensions in advance of adulthood, providing them with life skills that will contribute to the country’s emerging democratic society in the aftermath of civil war. With your help, the funds I raise by ‘living below the line’ will make this happen.” yOU CAN gIve AT WWW.PeACeDIReCT.ORg/MCCONNeLL

Please cut out and Post this forM to us todaY: Peace direct, freePost rlsa-klbc-Yctl, deVeloPMent house, 56-64 leonard street, london ec2a 4lt, uk

1 £24 can buy start-up equipment for a small business like Maliki’s in Congo

£55 can train one young person to challenge extremism like Saba in Pakistan

£170 can train one teacher to run peace clubs like Landry in Burundi

Other £

2 I enclose a cheque/postal order, made payable to Peace DirectORDebit my: VISA Mastercard Maestro Deltacard

Name Name

Address

Postcode Phone number

Email address

Card number Start date/

Expiry date/

Signature Date

3 I would like to make every £1 worth £1.25

Please tick this box to let Peace Direct claim tax on all gifts made from today and in the last four years. By ticking this box you confirm you have paid or will pay income tax or capital gains tax for each tax year

to cover the amount that all the charities or Community Amateur Sports Clubs that you give to will reclaim for that tax year. You understand that other taxes such as VAT and Council Tax do not qualify. You understand the charity will reclaim 28p of tax on every £1 that you gave up to 5 April 2008 and will reclaim 25p of tax on every £1 that you give on or after 6 April 2008.

You can also donate by phone on 020 7549 0285 or online at www.peacedirect.org/donate.Peace Direct is a registered charity number 1123241.

helP us build Peace now

WHy I SUPPORT PeACe DIReCTHelene Richards, pictured at her eightieth birthday party:

“I support Peace Direct rather than the bigger NGOs as, in my view, smaller programmes are more effective than huge, country-wide ones. The word ‘peace’ means more to me, perhaps, than to many who have never experienced the horrors or fears of war. My parents and I came to this country in 1939 as refugees, with only

the clothes we had on during our midnight escape. In England, we were helped with a house, food, clothes, toys and, most importantly,

a good education. It is a matter of gratitude that I want to return any good that I have received – and I do this via organisations which promote peace, understanding, tolerance, co-operation and compassion.”

Join the conversation about local peacebuilding and follow us @peacedirect. Here are some of our recent tweets...

Congratulations to our peace ambassador Gill Hicks, a survivor of the London 7/7 bombings, on the birth of her first child, Amelie Falzon!

Our vision is of a world where local people lead the peaceful resolution of their own conflicts

5 young people from @Truce2020 helped to develop a Metropolitan Police DVD on stop and search

In the turbulent mountain region between #Pakistan and #Afghanistan, our partner has founded a network of #peace activists.

We want the international community to recognise that

without the work of local peacebuilders, peace will never be secure

In #Zimbabwe local peacebuilders Envision are working to prevent political violence in the scheduled 2013 elections

Our partner in #SriLanka is building a community-led movement for #peace and reconciliation.

Our partner in #Kashmir is training teachers in #peace, building a peaceful future in Kashmir

2053 young people & adults reached through peacebuilding projects delivered by @Truce2020 volunteers

Local peacebuilders can create real change in their communities. They urgently need your support.

kEEP uP wITh us ON TwITTEr

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“I am convinced that the women of the world, united, can become a powerful force for internation-al peace.” – Coretta Scott King