Other

EU High Representative and EC Vice-President Catherine Ashton steps down from leading the European External Action Service (EEAS) in late 2014. She has presented her review of the organisation and how to make it more efficient.

The UN High Level Panel (HLP) on the Post-2015 Development Agenda has  reported.

In both low and middle income countries, well established arguments and solid evidence confirm that there is no real development without peace and only the peace of the graveyard without development. These conclusions have shifted the fulcrum of discussion about development over the past several years. But they have not yet added up to telling anybody how to do it.

To many disinterested observers last week's Kenya elections seem like a victory not only for President-elect Uhuru Kenyatta, for his Jubilee Alliance, and for the Kikuyu and Kalenjin tribes represented by Kenyatta and his running mate William Ruto.

International Alert is included in this year's list of top 100 NGOs in the world by The Global Journal, for the second year running.

Our second Conflict Ideas Forum was on the topic of large-scale violent conflict that neither fits formal and familiar definitions of "armed conflict", nor does it fit into the mandates of international institutions.

The Nobel Lecture when the EU received the 2012 Peace Prize was a speech in two chapters, the first delivered by Herman Van Rompuy, the President of the Council (pictured), and the second by Jose Barroso, President of the Commission. It was van Rompuy who addressed the issues I raised in yesterday’s post and he did it pretty well.

The Nobel Lecture

Today, Monday 10 December, in Oslo City Hall and then in the banqueting rooms of the Grand Hotel in the evening, the European Union receives and celebrates the Nobel Peace Prize 2012.

Euro-phobes and sceptics

‘Now I see it differently’, said one of the participants on our four-day course on conflict analysis and conflict sensitivity in Birmingham, UK last month.

The event, designed to train and prepare civilians for crisis management missions worldwide, brought together members of EU, UN and OSCE missions in Afghanistan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Haiti, Kosovo and elsewhere.

Through a participatory afternoon we will share experiences and approaches to working with young people on issues of conflict both in the UK and abroad. Contributors include the British Red Cross, Marsden Heights Community College, Refugee Youth, International Alert and Y Care International.

For more information and to download a booking form, see the attachments below.

This paper uses Alert’s peacebuilding framework to explore questions about peace and peacebuilding in South Sudan and Sudan.

Important underlying factors of conflict remain unaddressed within both countries, and the paper makes three broad recommendations to those in South Sudan and Sudan who are concerned to build a more comprehensive and more stable peace, and to those in the international community wishing to support their efforts.

Full report (Low-res version)

Full report (High-res version)

From Dan Smith’s blog, which can be found at www.dansmithsblog.com.

International Alert, together with the Bangladesh Institute for Peace and Security Studies (BIPSS) and  the Regional Centre for Security Studies and the Peacebuilding and Development Institute in Sri Lanka, co-hosted an expert roundtable on the Security Implications of Climate Change in South Asia in Dhaka, Bangladesh on 29th-30th March 2010.