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Die juristische Aufarbeitung des Falls Lauber hat eben erst begonnen. Doch schon jetzt werden Zweifel am Vorgehen des Sonderermittlers laut.

Die Woodward-Enthüllungen können dem US-Präsidenten gar nichts anhaben, sagen Schweizer Forscher. Stattdessen könnte Trump sogar profitieren.

Comme une onde de choc, la nouvelle s’est répandue sur la Toile très tôt ce matin. Comme on peut le lire très en évidence sur sa page Facebook officielle, la jeune influenceuse ivoirienne Sarra Messan a reçu la nouvelle de sa nomination aux trophées PRIMUD dans des conditions qu’elle ne s’imaginait pas. Elle l’a annoncé […]

L’article Sarra Messan nominée aux trophées PRIMUD est apparu en premier sur Afrik.com.

At least 50 million children are on the move in the world today and millions more are affected by migration. Now more than ever, a rescue package is needed for these refugee children. Credit: Miriam Gathigah/IPS

By Miriam Gathigah
NAIROBI, Sep 10 2020 (IPS)

Forced to flee wars and disasters, sometimes without family, and struggling to survive in the worst of circumstances, children on the move have long led very precarious lives. Be they refugees, internally displaced or asylum seekers, vulnerable and marginalised, they lose years of childhood. They are exposed to the worst forms of abuse, such as commercial exploitation and violence. Today, their situation is dire as they remain at the very bottom of the list to receive emergency measures to protect them from the impacts of COVID-19. 

Still, there is a deafening silence on the nature of a rescue package for the ultra-vulnerable child population.

Speaking on the second and final day of the Fair Share of Children Summit held virtually, Nobel laureates, leading international figures and heads of the United Nations agencies, who include the Dalai Lama, 2014 Nobel laureate Kailash Satyarthi, Dr. Rigoberta Menchú Tum, Leymah Gbowee,  and Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven have dispelled all doubt that without this package, the fallout of COVID-19 will be borne by the world’s most marginalised children.

Seme Ludanga Faustino has lived experiences of being a refugee. The co-founder of I CAN South Sudan, a registered refugee-led organisation, stated that the closure of schools and many other child-friendly spaces would be most devastating for displaced children as this is where they learn to cope and heal from traumatic experiences.

“These are children who need structured engagement the most. Even worse, many of them are now separated from their caregivers, who are often fellow refugees. One way to help these children is to support their caregivers to support this child population,” he advised.                                                  

With U.N Children’s Fund (UNICEF) estimates indicating that 50 million children are on the move in the world today and millions more affected by migration, now more than ever, a rescue package is needed for the world’s most marginalised and impoverished children.

Similarly, a newly launched report by the Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation titled “A Fair Share For Children: Preventing the loss of a generation to COVID-19” paints a disturbing picture of the harms and vulnerabilities facing children on the move. The number of children on the move has increased every year for at least a decade, and it is more likely now that the numbers will only grow during and post COVID-19.

The report further indicates that as of the end of March this year, the G20 countries alone had already committed over $5 trillion towards protecting the global economy. Since additional commitments from high-income countries have brought the figure to $8 trillion – a large chunk of this money will be used to protect businesses.

Jody Williams, 1997 Nobel Peace Laureate, stated that real change would begin when resources are directed where they are most needed.

Notably, there is still minimal movement at the national and international levels to address the non-health impacts of COVID-19 on the most marginalised citizens. The report further states that to date, “little is being actively spent on targeted interventions to support the almost 20 percent of children living on two dollars or less per day.”

Against this backdrop, a session, dubbed “Increased Vulnerability of Children on the Move”, examined the increased challenges and risks faced by children on the move due to COVID-19 such as the impact of new legislation imposed due to the pandemic, and explore ways to protect this deeply marginalised child population.

Session moderator Kerry Kennedy, president of Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, emphasised on the need to explore solutions.

Josie Naughton, CEO, Help Refugees, spoke of the need for political will as it is a sure way to the change that is needed for vulnerable child population.

Abraham Keita, a youth activist and 2015 International Children’s Peace Prize Winner, was born during Liberia’s brutal civil war and his father, a driver for a humanitarian organisation was killed in an ambush when he was only five years old.

He grew up in the densely populated informal settlements of West Point, Liberia in extreme poverty and great difficulties. But as those closest to the numbers are often the ones closest to the solutions, he said that beyond statistics are real lives. Keita emphasised that appealing for political will is not enough and that people must appeal to the moral conscience.

The “A Fair Share for Children” report reveals that by mid-April, 167 countries had closed their borders, and at least 57 states made no exception for people seeking asylum.

This is despite ongoing “168 armed conflicts, 15 wars and 23 limited wars. One in 10 children are living in zones of conflict,” said Philip Jennings, co-president, International Peace Bureau, 1910 Nobel Peace Prize-winning organisation.

“We have this peace deficit which COVID-19 only makes worse the conditions of children on the move. I want world leaders and laureates to talk about peace. We need a global ceasefire. Sustainable peace has to be the message from us to the children,” he said.

The U.N. Refugee Agency’s most recent Global Trends report indicates that as of the of 2019, the number of refugees, internally displaced persons (IDPs) and asylum-seekers was at an all-time high with an estimated 79.5 million people, of which 13 million children were refugees.

Equally alarming, 400,000 asylum applications were made by children unaccompanied by any family member. Overall, at least 18 million children were internally displaced by conflicts or disasters.

The “A Fair Share for Children” report warns that as refugee camps are neither designed nor equipped for pandemics such as COVID-19, simple protective measures such as hand washing and social distancing are next to impossible to achieve. The report states that the maximum standards for a typical camp “call for a maximum of 120 people to one water tap and 3.5 square meters of living space per person. Most, if not all, refugee camps are operating beyond this capacity.”

Child rights experts now say that the world is sitting on a catastrophe, as these children will experience even deeper exclusion from any kind of social protection measures or safety nets.

Speakers at the summit, including Prince Ali Bin Al Hussein of Jordan, decried the fact that even before the pandemic, fundamental public services including education, healthcare, hygiene and sanitation, nutrition and child protection not to mention resettlement and asylum services, were already lacking for this extremely vulnerable child population.

He said that poverty had gotten even worse, there is a decline in migrant remittances and that many refugees who had temporary jobs, lost them.

“Extreme poverty is considered an act of violence, so right now, there is violence and injustice committed against children on the move in particular. More government support is needed and direct financial support not just for NGOs but for small businesses, including those owned by refugees. Countries must stop separating families and turning down asylum seekers,” he said today.

Marianna Vardinoyannis, U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation Goodwill Ambassador and 2020 U.N. Nelson Mandela Prize Laureate urged participants and governments to open their eyes to the suffering of children on the move.

“There is so much that we do not see that defines the traumatic lives of these children. As we built better post COVID, education must be a priority for displaced children. Without an education, the children will lack the tools they need to rebuild their lives,” she cautioned.

Related Articles

• Save 70 million Lives Through #FairShare of COVID-19 Response Fund, Youth Urge Governments
• COVID-19 Pandemic an Opportunity to Re-evaluate How we Treat World’s Starving Children
• Exclusive: Kailash Satyarthi Warns over a Million Children Could Die Because of COVID-19 Economic Crisis

The post A New Social Contract Needed for Children on the Move appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Aniamey.com - Le Président de la République, Chef de l’Etat, SEM Issoufou Mahamadou, a présidé, ce jeudi, 10 septembre 2020, au Palais de...

Jede Woche schreibt USA-Korrespondent Nicola Imfeld in seiner Kolumne über ein Thema, das jenseits des Atlantiks für Aufsehen sorgt. Heute geht es um die Enthüllungen von Bob Woodard und deren Auswirkungen auf die Präsidentschaftswahlen.

Lors d'une assemblée générale constitutive tenue à Cotonou ce mercredi 09 septembre 2020, les acteurs de la filière karité ont créé leur interprofession (IKB). Il s'agit d'un creuset qui regroupe les producteurs, transformateurs, acheteurs, exportateurs et autres acteurs de la filière karité au Bénin.

Selon La Nation, un organe composé de 14 membres présidé par Gilles Adamon a été mis en place. Au poste de vice-président, on retrouve Mamadou Djaffo et le poste de secrétaire général est revenu à Irénée Toundé Yebadokpo.
L'IKB selon le ministre de l'agriculture, de l'élevage et de la pêche, Gaston Dossouhoui, est d'abord la plateforme de vérité entre les différentes familles d'acteurs pour la protection de leurs intérêts. Elle doit constituer un bloc compact, un ensemble pour servir d'interface et discuter avec l'administration centrale, a-t-il ajouté.
Les responsables élus, selon le ministre Dossouhoui, doivent servir l'intérêt général et non se servir, eux-mêmes, et plomber l'essor de l'interprofession. Que « chacun passe un temps, laisse le témoin à un autre, pour que dans une course de relais, nous faisions grandir l'interprofession […] », a-t-il recommandé.
Afin de doter la filière karité d'une interprofession forte et compétitive, contribuant au développement économique et social du Bénin, les familles de la filière ont été organisées, une par une, en amont de l'assemblée générale constitutive de l'interprofession.
Les acteurs de la filière karité bénéficient du soutien du Projet d'appui au renforcement des acteurs du secteur privé (PARASEP) financé par l'Union Européenne (UE) et l'Agence française de développement (AFD) puis, mis en œuvre par le ministère du plan et du développement.

F. A. A.

L'Etat a mis en place pour le financement des partis politiques légalement constitués et remplissant les conditions pour en bénéficier la somme de trois milliards de FCFA. Selon le décret nº 2020-362 du 22 juillet 2020 portant financement des partis politiques au Bénin signé du président Patrice Talon, la part des financements à recevoir au titre de l'année 2020 couvre les deux derniers trimestres de l'année et s'élève à 1,5 milliard FCFA.

Lire l'intégralité du communiqué

A la faveur d'une cérémonie présidée par le ministre de l'agriculture, de l'élevage et de la pêche, Gaston C. Dossouhoui, le Fonds National de Développement Agricole (FNDA) a été présenté aux banques et aux Structures Financiers Décentralisées (SFD) mardi 08 septembre dernier. Le fonctionnement global du FNDA, et le rôle opérationnel qu'il joue dans la mise en œuvre des mesures spécifiques au secteur agricole prises par le gouvernement en Conseil des ministres le 29 juillet 2020 ont été exposés.

Au cours de sa session le 29 juillet dernier, le gouvernement selon les informations publiées sur le site officiel, a pris des mesures spécifiques au secteur agricole fortement touché par les effets de la pandémie de la Covid-19. Ces mesures ont un coût total de 100 milliards de francs CFA répartis ainsi qu'il suit :
50 milliards de francs CFA destinés à refinancer les banques et les SFD sur la base de leurs portefeuilles de crédits agricoles ;
35 milliards de francs CFA destinés à garantir à 50% les prêts des promoteurs et entrepreneurs agricoles ;
15 milliards de francs CFA pour la bonification des taux d'intérêt des crédits mis en place au profit des bénéficiaires.
Selon le ministre de l'agriculture, de l'élevage et de la pêche, ces mesures sont une première au Bénin et dans la sous-région. Elles donnent selon lui, une nouvelle dimension au FNDA notamment en son guichet 3 « Accès aux services financiers ».
Observant la présence de responsables de banques et SFD à cette cérémonie, le directeur général du FNDA, Valère Houssou a souligné qu'ensemble, les acteurs peuvent transformer l'agriculture béninoise en innovant à travers les instruments financiers.
Pour Lazare Komi Noulekou, président de l'Association professionnelle des banques et établissements financiers (APBEF), les mesures prises par le gouvernement sont « un signal fort », et un « changement de paradigmes » du modèle économique. Le DG de l'APBEF a réaffirmé l'engagement des banques et établissements financiers à jouer parfaitement et professionnellement leur partition dans les accords-cadres entre le FNDA et leurs différentes structures.
La cérémonie de présentation du FNDA a été également l'occasion de signature d'accords entre l'Association Professionnelle des Banques et Établissements Financiers (APBEF) d'une part, et entre le FNDA et l'Association Professionnelle des Systèmes Financiers Décentralisés (APSFD) d'autre part.
Le FNDA est un instrument public majeur de financement du secteur agricole au Bénin. Il intervient comme un catalyseur de l'investissement privé dans le secteur agricole. Il a été restructuré en 2017.

F. A. A.

Le lundi 21 septembre prochain, le président de l'Assemblée nationale, Louis Vlavonou va procéder au lancement de son ouvrage intitulé ‘'Le contentieux des infractions douanières en République du Bénin''. L'annonce a été faite à travers une publication sur sa page Facebook.

A travers son nouvel ouvrage, le chef du parlement béninois entend partager avec les Béninois, les expériences capitalisées durant toute sa carrière de douanier, et surtout durant ses 25 années dans l'enseignement du contentieux douanier à l'Ecole Nationale des Douanes du Bénin.
« Le droit communautaire ne légiférant pas en matière contentieuse, il laisse à chaque Etat le soin de réprimer les infractions en fonction de ses spécificités », a écrit Louis Vlavonou.
‘'Le contentieux des infractions douanières en République du Bénin'', souligne-t-il, se veut un outil essentiel dans l'exercice professionnel des agents de douanes pour qui l'importance de la maîtrise des divers mécanismes et procédures de gestion des contentieux douaniers, n'est plus à démontrer.

F. A. A.

À l'issue de l'évaluation de la 2ème cohorte de candidats inscrits pour le Programme Spécial d'Insertion dans l'Emploi (PSIE), les présélectionnés ont suivi le mercredi 09 septembre 2020 une séance de formation sur la vie professionnelle en entreprise. La séance a eu lieu à la salle de conférence de la Chambre de Commerce et d'Industrie du Bénin (CCIB).

Organisée par l'Unité de Coordination du Programme Spécial d'Insertion dans l'Emploi à l'endroit des candidats présélectionnés au terme de l'évaluation, la formation a eu pour thème : « Comment se comporter en entreprise ? ». Selon le Coordonnateur du PSIE, Charlemagne Lokossou, « la séance vise essentiellement à doter les chercheurs d'emploi d'aptitudes et de compétences en termes de comportement pour pouvoir réussir la vie en entreprise ».
Au cours de la formation assurée par l'expert dans le domaine de recrutement, M. Alfred Biaou, Directeur Général du Cabinet "Talents Plus Conseil", trois points ont été abordés. Il s'agit de : l'attente des entreprises à l'endroit des salariés, les bons comportements en termes d'éthique professionnelle auxquels les employeurs font attention avant le recrutement et les méthodes de développement des aptitudes pour conquérir et maintenir un emploi.
Cette formation permet « de mieux outiller les candidats présélectionnés avant leur insertion dans les différentes entreprises ciblées ».
Après cette étape, les entreprises vont procéder à la sélection finale parmi les candidats présélectionnés. Cette sélection ouvre la voie à la signature d'un contrat.

A.A.A

Before the COVID-19 pandemic in 2018, 400 million primary school-age children were already facing poor access to quality education leading to a lack of basic reading skills. Young people have added their voice in calling on world leaders to allocate at least 20 percent of the COVID-19 stimulus package to the marginalised children and youth. Credit: Naresh Newar/IPS

By Mantoe Phakathi
MBABANE, Sep 10 2020 (IPS)

Young people have added their voice in calling on world leaders to allocate at least 20 percent of the COVID-19 stimulus package to the marginalised children and youth.

Addressing delegates at the on the final day of the third Fair Share for Children Summit chairperson of the Commonwealth Students’ Association, Dr. Maisha Reza said if 20 percent of the $5 trillion announced by G20 countries in March were allocated to children, it would fully fund the United Nation COVID-19 appeals and save over 70 million lives.

“How humanity responds collectively to the crisis today will determine the future that we build for our children and the future of our people and planet,” said Reza.

The summit, facilitated by the Laureates for Leaders and Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation – both of which were founded by 2014 Nobel laureate Kailash Satyarthi – brought together several laureates, including the Dalai Lama, Tawakkol Karman, Professor Jody Williams, international leaders and heads of United Nations agencies.

Reza challenged world leaders to take responsibility for their actions. They should not blame the pandemic for the global challenges of unemployment, hunger, crime and violence, among others. Instead, she said, COVID-19 amplified the already existing gaps and cracks that were already unresolved and overlooked.

Quoting from recently released A Fair Share for Children Report, Reza said before the pandemic in 2018, 400 million primary school-age children were already facing poor access to quality education leading to a lack of basic reading skills. Moreover, 258 children out-of-school in 2018.

The report further states that as a direct consequence of national lockdowns, school closures were implemented in more than 190 countries.

To date, more than 160 countries have continued to lock children out of school. At the peak of the pandemic 1.6 billion – about 91.3 percent of all enrolled students – were out of school or university, with the vast majority being under 18.

“It is not just COVID-19 that is exacerbated global inequality, but the world’s unjust response to COVID-19 will deepen inequality for a generation,” she said.

Dr. Maisha Reza said if 20 percent of the $5 trillion announced by G20 countries in March were allocated to children, it would fully fund the United Nations COVID-19 appeals and save over 70 million lives.

Reza criticised leaders for focusing more on multinational companies while leaving the marginalised and vulnerable to fend for themselves, adding that millions of children will pay the price with their lives unless action is taken.

She said the youth and students have to choose between fulfilling their economic potential and between contributing to their families’ sustenance.

“This is an extremely unfair choice that they have to make for the poor decisions of world leaders,” she said.

She further invited the youth to make use of alliances through student organisations, NGOs and international platforms such as the summit while using social media to hold their leaders accountable.

While urging governments to invest in education and children, Ulrich Knudsen, Deputy Secretary-General, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), warned that it would be a mistake not to give companies life support during the pandemic.

“It’s in the interest of everyone in society that we also give life support to companies,” he said in response to a question that governments seem to be prioritising corporates over marginalised citizens.

“If we don’t do that, the economy will break, and we’ll have even more inequality that hurts the vulnerable, be they youth, children women.”

He said after this crisis, there would be competing pressures on government budgets. Because they are spending so much now and that the funds have to be paid back governments will be faced with competing priorities such as the elderly, climate change and paying back loans.

“But there are unquestionable benefits of keeping schools open,” he said.

While applauding the youth in taking the lead to ensure that their voices are heard, Knudsen urged governments to create a conducive political environment for these issues.

“At OECD, we have youth- and child-sensitive policymaking. We need governments’ approach to issues that affect children and youth differently than others. We cannot expect that policies made for adults will not have adverse side effects for children and youth,” he said. 

The digital divide and economic inequalities came under sharp focus during the discussion. Knudsen said the significant disparities when it comes to access to technology had resulted in the vulnerable being left behind when doing e-learning or remote learning.

“If you don’t have access to a computer, you’re completely lost during a crisis like this one. There’s the economic inequality, and then there’s the digital divide, we need to address both,” he said.

Adding his voice about the digital divide was Edvardas Vabuolas from the Organising Bureau of European School Student Unions (OBESSU). He said it is a well-established fact that many children are not accessing education during the pandemic because of lack of access to the internet and gadgets such as computers.

Dr Rigoberta Menchú Tum, 1992 Nobel Peace Laureate agreed, adding that it was time to talk about technology because, during the pandemic, fewer children had access to education. She further called for an education system that is multi- and bilingual.

“Budgets have to be devoted to education,” she said, through an interpreter.

She noted that some countries used the curfews as an excuse to become dictatorial states. 

Tum further called people in public office to use the lens of diversity during the post-COVID era so not to leave anyone behind in the future.

Related Articles

• World Risks Losing Entire Generation of Children, Nobel Laureates Warn
• COVID-19 Pandemic an Opportunity to Re-evaluate How we Treat World’s Starving Children
• Exclusive: Kailash Satyarthi Warns over a Million Children Could Die Because of COVID-19 Economic Crisis

The post Save 70 million Lives Through #FairShare of COVID-19 Response Fund, Youth Urge Governments appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Es erinnert an ein Schwein, hat Kaninchenohren und die Zunge von Ameisenbären. Kein Wunder, taucht das Erdferkel regelmässig auf Listen wie «Die 24 hässlichsten Tiere der Welt» auf. Die inneren Werte des kuriosen Wesens gehen vergessen.

Rezept-Videos sind immer das Gleiche? Genug lang zugeschaut, wie die Zwiebel klein gehackt wird? Diese Rezept-Videos sind anders. Willkommen bei den «Spareribs of the Caribbean» oder beim «Spiesschen Liebe».

Johannes Meyer (22) ist der amtierende SwissSkills-Sieger in einem der bekanntesten Berufe der Welt: Er ist Landwirt. Wie arbeitet er in 30 Jahren? Hat er dann noch «dreckige Hände» oder übernehmen die Maschinen alles? Ein Blick in die Zukunft.

La chanson mondiale, Jerusalema, continue de faire parler d’elle, notamment avec ce nouveau débat qui a vu le jour au Sénégal où, si certains sont d’avis qu’Alvin interprète mieux la chanson, d’autres sont convaincus que le duo formé par Master KG et Makhadzi est de loin le meilleur. Si Moussa Kane, 15 ans, vote les […]

L’article Alvin ou Master KG – Makhadzi, qui chante le mieux Jerusalema ? (vidéo) est apparu en premier sur Afrik.com.

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As many as 1.6 billion students worldwide have faced school closures this year or continue to face uncertainty about their education in the coming months due to COVID-19. What will be the long-term impact on these children and youth? And how will it affect social, political, and economic development? Already concerns have been raised that interrupted learning exacerbates inequalities of all kinds, including economic, gender, and nutritional inequalities. What can we do to mitigate these risks?

This global crisis and how to address it in alignment with the principles of the “culture of peace” was the subject of a September 10th virtual policy forum cosponsored by IPI and the Office of the President of the United Nations General Assembly.

In opening remarks, Tijjani Muhammad-Bande, President of the 74th Session of the UN General Assembly, declared that the education sector “has been particularly destabilized by the pandemic. COVID-19 has robbed the world and disrupted learning opportunities of students around the world, particularly those in technologically disadvantaged regions.”

He noted that the world had already been lagging in fulfilling the UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) number four, which is inclusive quality education, with one in three African children not finishing primary school and only 20 million of the 158 million in sub-Saharan Africa meeting minimum proficiency levels in reading and mathematics. “Then came COVID-19, and the education of 1.6 billion children and youth, including those in refugee camps, took a hit. While learning continued in technologically advanced societies, students without access to digital connections either stayed at home while the pandemic lasted or relied on home-tutoring and parental guidance.”

Mr. Muhammad-Bande said that to promote and sustain the culture of peace, “governments must act proactively and creatively to address ongoing and future imbalances in access to quality education. It is important for education to be given primary consideration in all of our efforts to build back better and stronger, to ensure we truly leave no one behind.”

The concept of the culture of peace was introduced into the multilateral system in 1992 in a program of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). In a series of resolutions and programs looking ahead to the twenty-first century, the UN called for a transition from the culture of war to a culture of peace. In 1999, the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration and Program of Action on a Culture of Peace. That program identified eight pillars of the culture of peace that are interrelated and interdependent, and the first of them was education.

Abdul Aziz Saud Al-Babtain, Director and Founder of the Al-Babtain Foundation, said  “COVID-19 has revealed our mutual need to work together and share knowledge, sciences, and researches, …to benefit from the common intellectual knowledge we share between us to find a medical cure for humanity.” He added, the mission was now to “go beyond the previous globalization model and start a new multilateral model of interdependence centrally based on the education of a culture of just peace.”

Rabab Fatima, Permanent Representative of Bangladesh to the UN, said the pandemic and its effect on youth had driven home the cultural centrality of schools. “We realize that schools are simply and crucially places where we learn, but very much more than this, places where there is social protection, there is nutrition, there is health, and there is a social-first relationship with the rest of the world outside the family.”

The responsibility of the international community going forward, she said, was to avoid what the Secretary-General has called a “generational catastrophe.” She estimated that 24 million children from pre-primary school to university level, were at risk of dropping out of education altogether due to the pandemic’s economic impact alone. “A good majority may not be able to return to school for reasons ranging from poverty, child labor, and child marriage.” She cited figures showing that in the developing world, only 30% of people have access to online education. “It is imperative that the COVID response and recovery efforts include adequate measures and resources to ensure the right to education for all children. Both immediate and long-term response plans and programs must be planned and undertaken to address the disruptive situation in the education sector. The pandemic exposed the digital divide that hinders education for all.”

Ambassador Fatima proposed that “to make up for lost ground, we can leverage the focus of culture of peace on education, to review, innovate and restructure conventional education, including research and development.” She said the culture of peace could act as a “force multiplier in our pursuit, it could help bring back the much-needed inclusivity in pandemic response and SDG implementation.”

Stefania Giannini, Assistant Director-General for Education at the UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), called the pandemic the “largest disruption in education since the creation of the UN system, and we can say, in history.” She said that a culture of peace is “intimately linked to a culture of inclusion. This is the starting point for educational recovery, pulling out all the stops to ensure that the most marginalized children return to school and learn in safe environments, with special attention to girls, with special attention to refugees in conflict situations.”

Mrs. Giannini said that “education should be a bulwark against inequality.” Accordingly, she said, the focus ought to be on investing in social and emotional skills like empathy, awareness, and a capacity to manage emotions and to develop positive relationships. “They must be mainstreamed throughout the education systems.”

To reorient education systems around the culture of peace, she asserted, students must be “wired to defend human rights, act for social justice and gender equality, and to take care of the environment. ”

Dr. Robert Jenkins, Chief, Education and Associate Director, Programme Division, United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), pronounced this moment  “a once in a generation opportunity to reopen schools in a new way, to re-look at schools and the critical role they play and to support schools and education systems, to maximize the potential to transform learning that we have now in a new way.” He said the central question now with schools resuming was “how can we maximize the reopening process so that it has the most positive impact on peace that it could potentially have?”

Experience had taught him that speed was essential, Dr. Jenkins said. “ We have seen in previous school closures as a result of Ebola, the longer schools are closed, the more vulnerable children become, and the more risk there is of dropping out and never returning to their learning.”

He listed three key issues around reopening:

• focusing on reaching the most vulnerable.
• transforming the way learning is provided, recognizing that the world was experiencing a learning crisis before the pandemic.
• meeting the emotional, social, nutritional, health, and protection needs of children.

He suggested that teachers were showing the way. “Teachers are better skilled now at recognizing the traumatic situation many children have faced with this disruption and enabling them to bridge back to school. There have been a lot of interventions at a country level around working with parents providing the education skills or ways of coaching their children and supporting their children, both on learning and preparing to bridge back to school.”

The central role of education in sustaining peace was more appreciated now than before, he argued. “I think there’s been an increased recognition of the importance of schools in communities, by parents, by decision makers. I also think there’s a recognition that we have an opportunity to reimagine how the front door is open in a school, and what happens behind that door.” As for the urgency of getting increased funding to support schooling, he said, “We in the education sector are ‘all hands on deck’ reemphasizing that.”

He particularly stressed the importance of “engagement,” repeating the word three times in sequence for emphasis. “Countries that have been most successful in reopening schools are those that had very significant engagement processes, investing heavily in communication.”

In answer to a question about whether there was data on whether remote online education can be effective at spurring personal and emotional development, he said, “My simple answer—and sadly it’s unsatisfactory— is that the evidence is mixed.” He said that “there are some very exciting innovations that are IT-enabled that do indeed target social and emotional health. The most successful are those IT tools that enable interaction, questioning, and engagement.”

Mrs. Giannini commented that one of the key lessons learned from the Ebola crisis was the crucial role of community and families “which usually we don’t consider within the constituency of education. There is a traditional boundary between the school community and what we find outside, including family and parents, especially in the north of the world, they are viewed as the counterparts and not part of the same mission.”

She concluded: “To summarize, some key words: engagement, solidarity, partnership. What we need now is to strongly work together. We are making a big effort on the international organization side, unprecedented, in my opinion, in terms of integrating all out competency and expertise in one common mission, which is about the continuity of learning. It’s about assuring education as a basic human right.”

IPI Vice President Adam Lupel moderated the discussion.

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