Club of Rome Pursues Human Security

Club of Rome President Prince El Hassan Bin Talal of Jordan invites the ‘Building a Culture of Peace’ and ‘Gandhi, King, Ikeda’ exhibitions to the organization’s annual meeting in Amman.

Building peace was on people’s minds at the annual meeting of the distinguished gathering of peace-thinkers and doers, the Club of Rome, held in conjunction with the Arab Thought Forum Oct. 8 – 10 in Amman, Jordan. His Royal Highness Prince El Hassan bin Talal of Jordan, president of both institutions, requested that two peace exhibitions, the newly-created “Building a Culture of Peace for the Children of the World” display and the “Gandhi, King, Ikeda: A Legacy of Building Peace” exhibition, be displayed for the occasion.

The two exhibitions opened on the first day of the meeting that had as its theme, “In search of a common ground for peace and development.” Prince Hassan was joined by former South African President and Nobel Peace Laureate F.W. de Klerk, Dr. Lawrence E. Carter Sr., dean of the Martin Luther King Jr. International Chapel of Morehouse College, SGI-USA General Director Danny Nagashima, government and business leaders, diplomats and scholars at the conference site, Amman’s Le Meridien Hotel.

The message of the two exhibitions supported the conference objective of finding ways of achieving human security in the Middle East, particularly as a precondition for social and political stability and peace in the region. As part of its presentation, the “Building a Culture of Peace” exhibition highlights the United Nations Action Areas of promoting sustainable economic and social development; advancing understanding, tolerance and solidarity; and, promoting international peace and security. In conference sessions, delegates discussed topics ranging from alleviating poverty, developing citizenship and empowering women, to adapting education for the information age and developing markets to support intra-regional cooperation and collaboration with the wider world.

At the opening of the “Gandhi, King, Ikeda” exhibition, Dean Carter, who conceptualized the Gandhi, King, Ikeda exhibition, introduced the accomplishments of SGI President Daisaku Ikeda, stating that the SGI leader has “led the nonviolent democratization of Japan’s feudalistic social structures and an international grass-roots initiative of intercultural and interfaith dialogue and cooperation for global peace.” In terms of the philosophy of nonviolence, Dean Carter shared his conviction that the nonviolence espoused and practiced by the three great leaders of peace, Gandhi, King and Ikeda, together with the courageous and tireless initiatives of Prince Hassan can be effective for serving as the foundation for peace in the Middle East.

Prince Hassan observed in his opening address the need to reject ethnocentric thinking, racism and the stranglehold of narrow national interests, and instead build human solidarity and an international order based on human rights and humane ideals. He praised the nonviolence exhibition, observing that the path of mutual understanding and cooperation that the world needs to pursue had been actualized by Gandhi, King and Ikeda.

Prince Hassan has been indefatigable in his pursuit for a lasting peace in this region of the world that has witnessed more than its share of tragedy.

He has worked tirelessly to assist his late brother His Majesty King Hussein and also the current monarch, his nephew, His Majesty King Abdullah to bridge cultural and political differences with other countries through dialogue, and educational and cultural exchange.

The degree of the prince’s commitment and concern for the issue of regional peace and development was apparent in an interview he conducted just two days before the Amman conference with British radio regarding Israel’s bombing of purported Syrian terrorist training camps in retaliation for Syria’s alleged material support for terrorist attacks inside Israel. In it, Prince Hassan observed, “The swamps of terror cannot be dried by bomb craters, but by changing the environment and creating a situation susceptible to sustainable human development and dignity.”

To make this goal possible, the prince proposes the creation of a regional conference on security and cooperation, and a “statesman-like meeting for this region which says that this region is not just unilaterally oil interest and weapons sales, but is a region with people who are not hell’s firewood, whether Jews, Arabs, Christians, Muslims.”

He showed his penchant for pursuing peace through dialogue by stating, “if we can’t make progress on weapons of mass destruction, let’s make progress on the war on terror; if we can’t do either of those, let’s make progress on a poverty elevation program.”

Clearly, the prince is a man of peace who genuinely seeks to help the people of Jordan and the Middle East with a genuine and lasting resolution to the current impasse facing the region based on progress on human security as a necessary first step.

That the newly created “Building a Culture of Peace” exhibition together with the “Gandhi, King, Ikeda” exhibition were able to support him in his leadership of the Club of Rome and the Arab Thought Forum in their noble endeavors for peace bears testimony to the suitability of the two displays for promoting peace in the world today.