peacebuilding - Rotarian Action Group for Peace

Mujeres con Derechos Wages Peace through Women’s Empowerment

October 15th, 2019 By Mujeres Con Derechos, Menstrual Equality

Charlie Ruth Castro is a Rotarian, founding member of the Rotary E-Club Sogomaoso Global, entrepreneur, and Women's Rights activist. She founded MujeresConDerechos.org ("Women with Rights"), a social movement created by Colombian women and men leaders, where they focus on sharing honest, relevant and current information that promotes knowledge and empowerment of sexual and reproductive rights of girls and women in Latin America. Right now, Mujeres Con Derechos needs your help to deliver 10,000 menstrual cups to girls in rural areas and prisons in Latin Amerca.

My mother’s dream

September 13, 2019, By Reem Ghunaim, Published in Rotary Voices

I am a Rotary Peace Fellow from Palestine. My mother is a Palestinian refugee who fled her home with her family in 1948. My father’s entire village was displaced for two weeks in 1967. In fact, nearly half of my family are Palestinian refugees. I was born and raised in Tulkarem, home of two refugee camps that still exist from the Nakba of 1948. One camp is beside my former high school in the middle of downtown. The other is located at the Eastern entrance of my city. This refugee camp is the first thing I see every time I return home to visit my family. Read More

Help RAGFP Promote Peacebuilding Grants at Geneva Peace Week

August 16, 2019, By Rotarian Action Group For Peace

We are honored to be invited to participate at the Geneva Peace Week to promote Global Peacebuilding Grants. As you know, Global Grants provide many opportunities for Rotary clubs and districts to advance important causes. Of the different Global Grants available, Peacebuilding projects comprise the fewest number of Global Grants awarded. This isn’t because peacebuilding is less important to Rotarians, but that many Rotarians have difficulty conceptualizing what peace projects actually entail. One of the RAGFP's goals is to address this gap by utilizing peace education and convening with partners to create peace projects in conflict zones and beyond.

The power of story to build a better future

August 6, 2019, By Kiran Singh Sirah, Published in Rotary International

Earlier this year, I had the privilege of visiting Hamburg, Germany, to present a series of talks at the Rotary International Convention and Peace Symposium. I always look forward to the symposiums and the chance to reconnect with other Rotary Peace Fellows. The event underscored for me how much better it is to hear people’s stories in real life, in person, as opposed to on the news. That’s not a new idea – in fact it informs all the work we do for our annual National Storytelling Festival (known as the largest and most prestigious storytelling gathering in the world) – but it’s an important one.

Mexican youth to action local plans for peace nationwide

July 10, 2029, by Institute for Economics and Peace, Published in VisionOfHumanity.org

Following the most violent year on record in Mexico, the second national Positive Peace workshop united 150 young peacebuilders in Hidalgo. The aim of the program was to provide both a deep knowledge of peace cycles as well as the skills required to make change within the local system to create and sustain systemic peacefulness. Many participants highlighted their acute awareness for daily acts of normalised violence. While the headline figures about organised crime and trafficking may seem intangible to grassroots peacebuilders, shifting consciousness to micro-violence observed daily offers a new framework for action. Read More

Malala Day 2019

July 12, 2019, by Rotarian Action Group For Peace

Malala Day is commemorated on July 12 each year to honor women and children’s rights around the world. July 12 is the birthday of Malala Yousafzai, a young Pakistani woman who was shot in the head on October 9, 2012, by Taliban gunmen after she publically advocated for the education of girls. Malala recovered from her injuries with even more determination to advocate for women’s education and empowerment. The United Nations proclaimed each July 12 as Malala Day to celebrate her courage and rousing speech to the UN Youth Assembly on her sixteenth birthday. Read More

Rotary World Peace Conference 2020

July 9, 2019, Published in Rotary World Peace Conference 2020

The mission of the World Peace Conference 2020 is to bring together experts with solutions to major issues that are occurring in our personal lives, homes, schools, businesses, and communities, not just in Southern California, but, also, around the world. We are inviting leaders from health care, academia, government, public safety, religions, business, and communities to meet together to share the solutions presented by experts. The format will allow for action plans to be developed such that real and measurable actions can be undertaken when attendees return home. In addition, the conference will showcase learnings and positive change that have occurred in the four years, since the Rotary World Peace Conference 2016.

Turning teens away from crime

By Ryan Hyland, Produced by Andrew Chudzinski, April 9, 2019, Published in Rotary International

Akeem Stephenson wanted to go to jail. He believed it was the only way he could free himself from a life of crime — a life he desperately wanted to change. After being arrested for a fourth time more than 10 years ago, for aggravated robbery, the teenager in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, was set to go to prison. But the judge saw something in Stephenson that suggested that he could redeem himself. So he gave Stephenson a choice: participate in an 18-month youth program, or serve the six-month sentence. For Stephenson, the choice was clear. He decided to transform his life through the PACT Urban Peace Program.

Rotarian Action Groups Unite to Clean The Rivers of the World

By Salvador Rico (RAGFP member)

I began the Cleaning the Rivers of the World project five years ago in México D4140 with the Ameca River Project and it has grown to other countries through Rotary clubs and other service groups. Currently, WASRAG and ESRAG have adopted this project as their own and I'm pleased Rotarian Action Group For Peace is now helping us promote it.

RI District 5300 Announces Garbis Peace Institute Peacebuilding Conference

July 27, 2018