Monday, April 14, 2014

Where is the hope of Peace?

Peace building is very much an act of community building. Every community is built upon trust or at least an understanding of how general day to day life transpires. When we look at the situations in the Ukraine and Syria, this general understanding was broken on both the individual basis and international basis. The individuals in both Ukraine and Syria had held mass protests to hold government accountable. Now someone in both situations had crossed a line and used violence. This is the exact point where fingers of blame begin to thrust. However the reality within Ukraine and Syria, both Western countries and Eastern countries are to blame for violence. The communal peace had asked for change in both countries. Some level of violence is understandable in such situations. What we as a global community must do is to reach back into the values of the United Nations charter and ensure the peace. So far what we have been doing is ensuring the escalation of violence. We have been doing this with such skill that a corridor of violence has sprung up from the Red Sea half way to the Baltic Sea and getting worse by the day. At what point do our leaders work to bring peace to a country? We have seen enough of the garbage leadership that has been brought destabilization to the world – for what? What has been solved in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Chechnya, Rwanda or a number of other places where violence still rages on? We have focused on the international politics and the leaders have brought very little peace. This method of solving chaos has slowly been shifting towards the community focus of peacebuilding. The individual, the local communities, the families that actually make a country what it is are the first steps that need support. This step is the most important. Globalization has proven a falsehood of hope in terms of peace. Globalization has brought the individual more goods to buy in exchange for peace. The world leaders have spewed rhetoric of economic gains will bring peace. Look at Greece, Egypt, Tunisia and other places. Where is the peace that was promised? Now we are witnessing cold war relations play out again all due to the garbage leadership from all sides. The world is slowly falling apart and what hope is there on the horizon? I see little yet I pray for peace, I live peacefully and I demand a peaceful community. Still the mindset of chaos and violence is proving to be a difficult energy to turn around. Where is the hope? Please show me something to grasp on to?

Monday, April 7, 2014

Peace - Simple to understand difficult to do

Peace is Simple to understand and can be simple to do. However, we live in a time where our closest allies have become untrustworthy. What is even more disturbing is that there are so many people who have solutions to many of our problems but the leadership is unwilling to implement these solutions. For example in Syria, the referendum that was held 26 Feb 2011 was a building block to A peaceful transition of power. For whatever reason on 27 Feb 2011 over 3 million worth of weapons poured through the Iraq and Syrian border. This is the exact situation that has brought Syria into the hell they live with now. Who supplied the money to purchase weapons, who orchestrated the movement/delivery of these weapons? All of these questions come up when violence breaks out. We are seeing the destruction of society take place in Ukraine now. The leaders of the world are doing very little to improve the situation, in fact they are adding fuel to the fire. Knowing that options exist which will improve relations and bring peace to the situation is great. Seeing the disruptive actions of the world leaders that erode peace is frustrating. The illegal invasion of Iraq remains one to the largest post World War II crimes that has taken place. Even more troubling is the hypocrisy which is spewed on similar situations such as Ukraine, Syria, Palestine, Yemen, Bahrain and other countries. At what point do actions meet the words of leaders who talk about peace? We built the United Nations for a reason. Sadly the countries that hold a balance of power are the ones causing most of the problems. We hear these leaders talk of peace yet continue to stand on the neck of those who strive for peace. When opportunities arise to be leaders of peace these leaders find ways to cause more trouble. The recent issue with global communications being tampered with for the sole benefit of one country has shaken the entire world. How can we trust such a country that has acted with such disrespect yet speaks about being a global leader in peace? As individuals we must ask for those we elect to have a greater effort to be peaceful. We must understand that each leader today has started out in small communities. This is the where the future leaders will come from and why we must ask more from our locally elected people and leaders.