Rearmament of Europe Is Not the Way – Peace Is the Way
NOBEL LAUREATES, 10 Mar 2025
Mairead Maguire, Nobel Peace Laureate – TRANSCEND Media Service
7 Mar 2025 – To solve problems, we all know that when one brings a gun (what to say of the threat of nuclear weapons!) into a room, fear rises and people flee. As we, the people of Northern Ireland, have learned after decades of violent ethnic/political conflict, the only way to solve conflict is by dialogue and peacebuilding.
I therefore passionately appeal to the EU political leaders and most importantly to the peoples of Europe, (particularly the youth) to let go of the politics of fear and start disarming and building fraternity among the peoples and between all nations of Europe and the world – after all, that’s why the European Union was set up!
For the past 80 years (since the dropping of the nuclear bombs) humanity has used arms, militarism and wars to kill billions of fellow humans (there are over 55 wars going on in the world today). Surely, as civilized humans we can do better! Time to abolish nuclear weapons and wars and build perpetual peace, through a reformed United Nations, around a table and not around millions of graves of beautiful young men and women. Let us offer our wonderful youth around the world a vision of peace built, not on enmity, hate, weapons and war, but on joy, a celebration of every human life as precious and unique, taking care of our planet, our only home.
The science of peace is known to many, but it has just been drowned out by the noise of war and old, outdated concepts of dealing with problems and conflicts. However, at this historic point in humanity’s history, we are all challenged to let go of fear and reject violence, militarism and war forever by the transforming power of love and forgiveness.
With hope and all my love,
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Mairead Corrigan Maguire, co-founder of Peace People, is a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment. She won the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize for her work for peace in Northern Ireland. Her book, The Vision of Peace, (edited by John Dear with a foreword by Desmond Tutu and a preface by the Dalai Lama) is available from www.wipfandstock.com. She lives in Belfast, Northern Ireland. See: www.peacepeople.com.
Tags: Anti-NATO, Anti-militarism, Arms Industry, Arms Trade, Demilitarization, Europe, European Union, Russia, USA, Violent conflict, Weapons
This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 10 Mar 2025.
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