Ambassador’s Remarks at 7th Peace Garden Peace Festival

September 21,2020

At the invitation of Dr. Li Ruohong, the President of China World Peace Foundation, Ambassador Moin-ul-Haque participated in 7th Peace Festival at Peace Garden Museum, Beijing on 21 September 2020. The event is held annually to celebrate the United Nations’ International Day of Peace.

The festival was jointly organised by UNESCO, China World Peace Foundation and Beijing International Peace Culture Foundation. It was attended by Ambassadors and diplomatic representatives of several countries including virtual participation by many dignitaries from around the world.

President Li Ruohong read the special message of Ms. Audrey Azoulay, the Director General of UNESCO at the event. Students of Pakistan Embassy College Beijing also participated in the event.

Following is the text of Ambassador’s remarks made during the event:
H.E. Dr. Li Ruohong,
President, China World Peace Foundation
The Organizing Committee of Peace Garden Peace Festival,
Excellencies,
Distinguished Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

I would first like to congratulate China World Peace Foundation and Beijing International Peace Culture Foundation for organizing the 7th Peace Festival in partnership with UNESCO. I am privileged to be invited today.
This year, the event is taking place at an extraordinary time when the entire humanity is in the grip of health crisis of scale and proportion not seen since World War-II.  No one has been spared, from advanced nations to developing countries, rich and poor; from north to south and east to west, everybody is affected equally.  Our economies are shattered, schools are closed and health systems overwhelmed. Amidst this global health crisis, our inherent weakness and fault lines have also been exposed. Many of us remained in denial mode, many of us were ill-prepared, while some chose to look inwards. This naturally put stress on cooperative multilateral architecture built over the years. 

COVID-19 is therefore a clarion call for all of us. We need to cooperate than compete. International solidarity is required. We need to strengthen multilateralism and address these challenges through our collective efforts than going our own unilateral paths.

We must promote regional and international cooperation to be able to address challenges of health pandemics, climate change and poverty together. As Preamble of UNESCO’s constitution stresses, we must also have intellectual and moral solidarity of mankind to ensure global peace.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The choices that we make for our people’s security and development are very important. While securing our borders is very critical, ensuring wellbeing and health of our people is essential too. We must invest in our people through creating strong economic base, social safety nets, robust health infrastructure and focused poverty alleviation programs.

Humanity’s inner goodness would always embrace such positive advancements. Health and happiness like conflict and conflagration cannot indefinitely stay localized. The initiative for ensuring health and safety by one section of humanity would not go unnoticed, and become a source of inspiration and emulation for other regions of globe too. This movement would develop a momentum of its own, and bring us a step closer to our shared dream of a global peace rooted in healthy and developed international community.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Our history is replete with examples of various global crises and the collective cost that we had to pay. There is a saying that “whenever history repeats itself, there is a price to pay”.

Let us therefore learn from these lessons of the past, let us not repeat our mistakes, let us be united and let us be prepared. We owe this to our future generations.

Thank You!