 and welcome to all our friends and colleagues in the room and online. I am Marcia Carlucci and for the last four years actually since the inception of the Women Building Peace Council I have been honored to serve as co-chair along with our moderator Megan Byer. It is fitting that we gather today in March, a month in which the US celebrates women's history and the world acknowledges and observes International Women's Day. We are here to recognize four extraordinary women whose invaluable contribution to peace is an inspiration to us all. We celebrate their courage, their vision, and their unwavering commitment. These four women are from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Syria, and Haiti. These women continue to advance peace by mediating conflicts with armed actors, building systems to holistically address the needs of marginalized women, youth, and persons with disabilities, training networks of peace builders, and adopting creative forms of trauma healing. The world needs the example of the women to learn how to yield to a different kind of power and influence and one that carries us toward a more secure and peaceful world. Yet these women are not alone. Countless women risk their lives to create peace in their communities. This year, as in years past, the Women Building Peace Council and the USIP team has put out a call for nominations. From 42 countries, we received 150 nominations of women from civil society, women working on the front lines. The council then began the very difficult adjudication process that rendered our finalists and our single awardee. And so it is my privilege to introduce the moderator for today's conversation with USIP's 2023 peace builders, Megan Byer. Megan is a journalist, a lifelong advocate of women's rights and gender issues, and co-chair of the Women Building Peace Council. Megan. Thank you so much. Thank you, Marcia. And happy Women's History Month. And if you listened to the UN last year with their report, there is some history that we're not living up to what we should be doing for women and girls all around the world. But you know, sometimes it's those moments of difficulty that have us turned to action. And so there is some hope in that. And in fact, in the year 2000, there was some bad news as well, sort of like the bad news we just got from the UN last year. And that was a threat and an opportunity came to light at the same time. The threat was that suddenly there was this very obvious pivot on the battleground in the places where terrorism and conflict occur, where civilians suddenly were obviously the targets, notably women and children, were the target of the violence. At the same time, we were collecting so much data that the first impression, the first very obvious trend that came out, was that when you integrated women structurally into the peace negotiations, into the peace process, that peace was much more sustainable, and not by a little, by 50%. And so with those two things, the UN Security Council passed a resolution, 1325, it was unanimously accepted and there were promises made in that resolution, but it was only a resolution, to integrate women structurally into the peace and try to get some of that durability dividend that the data showed us that we would have. Because, you know, it was an appreciation of the importance of women, of what women do. You take out the women, you take out the village, the militias and the terrorists knew that. You put women in the lead on peace and you have a stronger peace. You have a durable peace. And so while it's a bad news, good news situation, it's a situation that clearly arises from a recognition that women are really the answer. And that's what you're going to learn about today with our finalists and our winner of our Women Building Peace Award. The stories of the finalists and the winner this year trace the geography of some of the most war-torn, conflict-plagued areas in the world. And we will begin in Syria. Abir Hajj Ibrahim, please join me. What began as protests aimed at Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in 2011 exploded into so many years of civil war with a virtual proxy conflict taking place in Syria between the United States and allies and Iran, the Islamic State, Hezbollah. Add to that 2023's earthquake and Syria has become a place of the largest displacement in the world. Internally, 6.9 million are displaced with more than 5.4 million displaced abroad. Add to that, and I hope the numbers are right, you'll correct me if I'm wrong, but you add to that the attacks in Israel and Gaza and all the tension and violence. It's unimaginable destabilization. So I'm setting the stage. Please let's watch this video before I let you have the opportunity to speak with Abir. Abir Hajj Ibrahim, please join me. Ibrahim, please join me. Abir, you start with listening, it looks like. Is that really where you started? Yes. Tell us about your approach and how you were motivated. It's all about active citizenship. When you feel that your neighbors are fighting, your friends are fighting, people are holding weapons, you might lose your house, there's lots of conflict around you, you cannot do anything except to start a dialogue and to start doing things. And what came of those dialogues that we saw? There were so many outputs for the dialogues. It's according to the groups and it's according to the conflict areas that they are coming from. So it might be around thematic issues related to the resources because we have less resources now in the country. It might be dialogues related to building trust process with the different ethnic groups and it might be also based on political backgrounds. It might be coming like a solution based dialogue. So there are several kind of dialogues that we operate and each one has its own objective. And what comes of that? It comes of that dialogue. Actions. The blah, blah dialogues, it's over. No time for that. There is no time. And even the building trust process at the beginning of the crisis, it's needed lots of patience, tolerance, listening, hearing, coming over our personal conflict and stepping inside an area where we have a common understanding about our vision to the country. So now there is no time to have like any kind of normal dialogues. It has to be based on actions and everyone is involved is taking that actions into the work that he's doing or she's doing. When we hear about the situation in Syria, it just sounds so overwhelming. Is the dialogue process that you've initiated and been involved with? Does that give people the confidence to move towards some kind of positive resolution? I mean, I almost wonder how you could have the faith and the hope to do what you do, given these circumstances. I will be surprised to see that the people have the enough resilience so far, especially the Syrians, 12 years of conflict, COVID, earthquake, regional conflict, and we are still continuing. So that you cannot like say, I'm sitting home. I am tired while you are seeing that the people are engaging and they are coming. They are putting effort. They are paying from their own pocket's money for transportation, which is so expensive in Syria just to be engaged. And they want they want us to listen. And our duty is not only to listen and to do what they want. So it's the only bubble of oxygen that we could provide for the people who were under this conflict for so many years, including me. I need also this bubble of oxygen from time to time. We think of women as having the strengths of relationship and communication. I mean, it's sort of the bottom line of the magic powers that we hold. And it seems that this peace process is, and this peace initiative is driven by that. What actions have come out of the communication and this dialogue that is the oxygen that have have some traction that you have most hope for? Giving more resilience and more hope for people to continue, reduce the level of violence, asking people not to hold weapon against each other, bringing a common understanding about the future, acknowledgement and valuing the diversity in our community. We did not have the chance to listen for each other before. We were like in islands, isolated islands. But unfortunately, there was something good in this conflict where we could come together, listen to the Kurdish case, listen to the religious diversity, bring north with east with south with west together and to think and to have a dream. And we have the right to dream. And these dialogues give us the right to dream. And it looks like it's mostly women in the video. Yes, it is more easier to bring women to dialogue than me. You think? Yes. And I think that women have so much in common, being mothers, for example, and the threat of their children being recruited and by militias. And is that something that binds the women? And frankly speaking, there was an incident during the high level of conflict between women coming from the Costa region and women coming from the inner region. Both women have different political views. But both women came together just to try any effort to stop the war because they don't want more children and more families to be killed. So the women have this kind of peace initiative. Sometimes, and it's a rare percentage that they give arms to their children and they ask them to fight. But not in the case that we met. I did want to make one note about what happened the other night when you got your award. And we do have a woman leader at the United States, Linda Thomas, Ambassador Linda Thomas Greenfield. And I know you had a private conversation with her. And I just wondered how that went. Actually, it went very good because deeply in my heart, I believe that there is something called women for women and women to women. So our duty is to support the women's in all levels on where when there are fragile, when they are displaced, when they are in a decision making positions, making things happening so they can take the right decisions, the peace decisions. And this is I think what you have been doing. And it's the same. So it's our duty all the time to support each other. We don't go against each other. This is like the biggest mistake if a woman do that. I love that. You're ending on sisterhood. We're going to go now from the Middle East to the Caribbean. Our next finalist is Dr. Marie Marcelle Duchamp. Would you mind joining us? Haiti, she is from Haiti. It has a profile that sounds very familiar related what's going on in Syria, the devastating 2010 earthquake, and then Haiti's socio economic, political and economic unrest over the past five years, including the brutal assassination of President Havan al-Muza in 2021, armed gang violence, sexual violence, kidnappings, other crimes have destroyed the social fabric of Haiti in the city of Port-au-Prince, where gangs terrorize and rule over large portions of the population. Women and children are particularly vulnerable, despite it's everything, everywhere, all at once like Syria. Peacemaker Dr. Marie Duchamp's soldiers on and we're going to see a little bit of your story before we start. My name is Marie Marcelle Duchamp. I'm from Port-au-Prince, Haiti. My centre where I am located since 1982 is in the middle of violence and crimes and gangs. We are surrounded by 20 well armed gangs and surrounding us, there's around 120,000 families who live there who need our assistance. Education for me is a priority, primary education, vocational education and health and human development. Those are my four targeted areas. All those people can go through the gangs' lines, the war lines and come to us for a service, for me it's already a huge impact. Kids from four years old to 15, 16 years old can come here and pursue their education. It's priceless. It's the right example of the success of the program. It's courage determination. It's a non-stop. As you start and you have to keep on going, even in a war zone, you can accomplish activities where you bring peace around you. I'm so glad we have that video of the Jess Keo program. Now before you got involved, they hadn't had this 364 pillar approach. Did they, this was your creation? Yes, indeed. Good morning, everyone. Yes, as a physician, I got involved in 1982 in the fight against HIV-AIDS and so I had the approach of communicating a lot with my patients. I do believe in the face-to-face meeting with your patients and it's like you got into intimacy with them and you hear, you communicate. And from there, I was targeting many women because they were more at risk because in Haiti, it's kind of a polygamy, exists a lot. And I realized very early that the women were dependent on their partner and accept domestic violence and other gender-based violence. And I realized very early that I had to integrate more because they were asking for more. And some of them were even saying, doctor, I'm being treated here for HIV, but I have no way to send my kids to school. I have no way to feed my family. I do not have access to jobs. So I went to meet my staff. I said, we're going to create a school. And they looked at me like, she's crazy. And then I said, no, let's start there. And we created a primary school. And then they said, doctor, we would like to find a job. I said, okay, let's start working with vocational school. On the same campus, we find a way to find resources. And the PEPFRA program has been key because it allows us not to worry about the cost of the drugs because the PEPFRA program gave us the opportunity to have access to the drugs. So I had not to worry about the drugs, but I had to worry about the primary school, the vocational school, and also caring for the victims. And that's all it started. And for mouth to mouth, it spread out. And then unfortunately, like you said, in 2021, the president got assassinated. And with no leadership whatsoever. So gangs took over and they use women as their weapon because they need to control sectors. So that's where we are now. It is estimated actually now in Haiti that there would have more than 100, 200 gangs because they are spreading around. There's no police. There's no army. There's no 911 to call. There's no way to report. So we are left alone. But amazingly, every day, I leave home. My family is worried for sure. But I leave home and I go in that slum where there are so many gangs around. But at least they let me go. They know who I am. They recognize my car. And if they are barricades, they just open the barricades and say, let her go. She's going to get you. So in a way, I'm very grateful that I'm able to offer this kind of services and have such a huge impact. And do you think that you have been safe because people know what you're doing and respect even these gangs? Oh, yes, definitely. The only thing there's what they call some territories. So you can't be dealing with gangs from another territory when they are fighting each other. It's mainly, I would say, an issue of poverty as well and lack of leadership in our country where we are left alone, where civil society has to take over and take actions. So women, myself, I realized very early that I had to work with the women, mainly the head of the family, to convince them that being together and working with me, we can change. And now what is amazing is to see beside all these catastrophic situations, the kids can have access to school in my area. But yesterday, I've heard that they were shooting by the campus and they were shooting by the airport. And so all the patients have to run away, staff have to. So the situation is tragic. Well, that's what I was wondering, how do they get to school every day given this violence around them? It certainly reflects that they value what you've done and they're going to risk their lives to try to get some semblance of order and catch that education that could mean hope. I think what you're saying is right is what happened, what do I say, how do I push? I think they're seeing me a model and when a commercial sales worker come to me, I said, you know, the difference between you and I is my level of education. I went to school. My parents insisted that I had to school. So they take it as a model than if they send their kids, they give them access to education. They see the future. They see it better. And women, we care about our children. We care about our family. We want them to do better than us. And so they will go through the guns, the fire, the gangs to make sure the kids go to school. But there's a certain point of time where I said, please be careful. Do not take the risk. So sometimes we have 100% in class, sometimes 60%. So we need to do better to address the security. Without peace, there's no way the country can progress. We need to focus on what we do, without the priorities. You know what I love is that you were saying before this program that you never thought of yourself as a peacemaker before. Yeah. That's the first time I realized this week that I'm a peacemaker. That's strange. You know, you take actions, you do your daily activities, you are sure, you're convinced in what I'm doing. And I was, when I got the award, I said, that's fine. Let me go to DC and I will learn. And then for day one, day two, I said, oh, I'm a peace builder. And it's amazing. And I said, this is what I'm going to bring back to myself 62% of my 500 staff are women. So I'm going to go down. I said, women, we are peace builders. And that's what we're going to do next and next and next and promote it and expand the program of who knows, maybe one day Haiti will be able to have an institute of peace and will be leading the program, learning from each other. And I realized that from Congo. I think we know who could run it. I don't know yet. From Congo to Syria and really Kenya, I think we are a lot of things in common. And the lesson we learned here, thank you. We are very grateful. We learned a lot from this meeting with you. Thank you. Okay, very good. So our next finalist works to empower people with disabilities. She's actually our first finalist who is a woman with disabilities. Hamisa, could you please join us? She had polio as a child and she chairs the Coast Association for Persons with Disabilities in Mombasa, Kenya. And she is committed to building a peaceful society and providing opportunity and security for all who work in Kenya. And her focus is to stop terrorists from Somalia, recruiting young men in her community of Majango. And Hamisa Jaya has supported hundreds of youths in starting their own businesses. Again, we're hearing this theme of education and training to create some hope in the future. And so we'll take a quick look at this video and we'll start our conversation. My name is Hamisa Zaja. I'm a woman peace builder from Mombasa, Kenya. Majango is a cosmopolitan city with so many urban challenges and people from different backgrounds and also religion. It's a place where conflicts cannot miss. I started way back from 2005 to do peace work. My work goes direct to empowerment. Tangible income generating projects that enhance people's life. The resource center is getting out every year more than 1500 youth, women and persons living with disability with empowerment. They move on with different life skills that focuses on building their livelihood. As for today, I'm working away with my machine and I'm going to start my own business to make my own capital and I'm happy. The work I do is coming from a disabled woman focusing on transforming people from one step of being less to the other step of being better. Hamisa, do you think that maybe having a disability has made you sort of the person who would step up to give hope to others? Thank you so much Megan and thank you everyone who is here. My disability was once a disadvantage to me and to my society and even to my family. But my disability today is a very big advantage and an opportunity. What I have done is changing what everyone was saying. I cannot into the icon. And that's something women face generally in the world is that daunting feeling that maybe I am not the leader. I am not the one who can do this. How did you feel when you got the letter that you had been selected? What did you think? I actually thought it was a scam. Until I read it for the fifth time and saw some names that I know that they nominated me. So then I called my son and actually wanted to make sure if maybe I missed some English words that I didn't grab from school. So I told him to read twice and understand and he was also confused and he was like mom this is huge especially that part that said it will remain confidential until when we announce. I said this is huge. Can we call these people and confirm? So we started calling and these people said yeah we received the call for proposal and we proposed you for this because we know you were. I said really? I'm that person who will go to US and said yeah that's what we think. So we decided after a few hours to reply until when the response came up and said now we are going to take the process on then I said oh it's not a scam. It's real. So you know what I find so interesting is both you and Marie seem to have what we kind of think of as the imposter syndrome like oh it could not be me and and yet oh my god what you do every day you should get this attention and more. What do you think this does for people with disabilities? Actually first before I go to the rest of persons living with disability I would say to me this is huge. This is very huge. I would people say all dreams are valid but this one I didn't dream it. I didn't see it coming. I wake up every morning making sure that I have supported as many people in my area as possible but for someone all the way from USIP to to to identify recognize and even say now you're supposed to come for this award I had never seen it coming. So it is huge to my community it's huge to my family it is very huge. To the rest of the disability fraternity in this world this is a platform of recognition that it's something that I miss words to describe because I know even USIP have been nominated women nominating women every year but they've never given it to a woman with a disability and this being my first time and my the first woman to have received this I feel like flying so great well you're not flying yet we have a few more questions for you tomorrow yes I wish I'd actually we'll get into more of this later but tell me about any transformation all your efforts has has put out into the world or an incident of transformation that your work has has created in in Kenya. After realizing that we cannot have peace as persons with disabilities many of our youths and women are being lured into violence extremism radicalization issues of drug and drug abuse I realize that we need to to to reach further to the rest of the community so that we can give economical empowerment so that we can transform them from who they are to some people who are better in the society and this is where I came up with the income generating project for the youth women and persons living with disabilities so that we can all be transformed because if we leave them behind we are still not in an environment that is conducive to be peaceful so we decided now we will involve everyone everyone in my region that is being lured into these activities so this is why we began the income generating project and in fact with the first transformation we did was to change public toilets into income generating projects I know everyone had not thought of this but I usually say I had a dream and my dreams become best when it is very very early in the morning and this is where I dreamed I said we have public toilets but of course we could change them and give them to youths and they become employment so I sick I knocked some doors of the embassy then one of the embassy agreed and they came they gave us some funds we we did renovation of the public toilets in Mombasa and then we hired we hired the youths who would do cashier some would transfer funds if you want to to take bath in our projects you you will pay 10 bob if you want to go to for a long call you need to tell us what you're going to do before so you pay for what you're going to do before you go do it so you pay 20 bob then if it's short call also you also paid 30 bob because then we'll buy detergents we'll buy tissue papers we will buy toiletries so that and others will be washing so we started with 12 young people and also some three women with disabilities and also some four youth with disabilities and now they are more than 400 in that project and also the supplies of the detergents also come from the venerable groups so we have taught them how to make liquid sops we have taught them how to go and purchase other toilet papers so that all the toiletries come from the groups so each group will be supplying us for six months six months six months so we have a long period of getting other groups being transformed so even supply chain strategies and it's all creating hope empowerment and so you can see how hard this was for us to choose among so many amazing women like this and now we're we've come to our selected candidate our 2023 women building piece awardee Petra Nee Vaweka if you could join us Petra Nee is from the Democratic Republic of Congo she grew up in the once peaceful Ituri province there and today it is a humanitarian catastrophe national armies local militias gangs burn villages seize prisoners blight the land companies and gangs attracted by minerals valuable gems natural resources uncontrolled logging stripping forests into moonscapes it is a place that appears to have no hope at all and incredible violence living day to day is a challenge overall Ituri's conflicts have uprooted more than 1.7 million people fully a quarter of the province's estimated population and before we view the video a little background she has said that her peace building courage is multi-generational in her family and she tells the story of her grandmother going out to farm one day from the village and suddenly a huge leopard confronted her and this was in the days when Inna Ituri that was the big danger a leopard the leopard was snarling angrily slowly she bent her knees to lower the hoe and knife and she she told Petra Nee I began to talk to the leopard I looked straight in his eyes and I kept my voice calm and even and I told him leopard you and I we are doing the same thing this morning you are looking for food to eat and I am going to my field to grow crops for my children let us not disturb each other we have nothing to fear you and I and the leopard went away so despite her fear her grandmother showed only calm and you will hear that that is exactly what Petra Nee does she has driven or sometimes even walked into unprotected deep forests ruled by men with guns and grudges she has negotiated ceasefires freed hostages and saved lives standing up to commanders have some of the world's most violent militias and it was her children who told me encouraged her to do it so let's take a look and then we will begin our conversation with our winner I use until today it is the pacific cohabitation that people know how to solve their conflict in amiable and then the social cohesion so that people can get together to develop there was a war between the hema and the lindu they killed people in the morning and evening everyone was and they went home and I couldn't do anything to try to stop this war to stop the theory of women of children of all innocent people the only woman who had to go find the groups of the army in the hidden area where they live but she didn't lose her she had to go speak to every group of the army why do they depend on the weapons the justice, the school, the churches the big problem I face is that they don't like peace those who give money for the groups of the army so that they can fight they are people who have always wanted to kill me when your house is burning you're not going to let your house burn you're going to try to stop the fire and my life is to try to stop the fire to stop the war and to stop the conflict I love that metaphor about a fire and you just have to stop it so you were working for oxfam and it was your idea to use this approach when I worked for oxfam as a humanitarian it was to help the people in displacement people's camps you know if people got displaced then they are sitting under their tents and there is no water because they left their village there is no water there is no food so oxfam had this program and I was the person who was responsible for this program I was the one who has to bring the water to this environment and also to help with hygiene because you know if you're a displaced person then you don't have anything to wash yourself with and I remember that my first assignment as a humanitarian I had to go through the Himat territory and the Lendu territory and they were in conflict now how did I do that you know I went through the territory of the Himat and they said to me well if the enemies are going if the humanitarians are going to pass through that territory to go to their enemies well then we cannot let that happen and so they asked me well Petronik can you help us to reconcile these people so that humanitarian aid can be channeled and I have never done something like that and so I started to reflect I was I was talking and working together with the chief and at the end he said to me okay the humanitarian aid can be channeled through our territory and then my boss said well Petronik can you not work for peace and I said no look at what's going on around me people are killed I have children how do you want me to go to war and at that moment in time the war separated me from my husband for seven years I didn't know where my husband was and my husband didn't know where I was with the children so those are things which happened during war and it took me eight months during eight months I said no no no I'm not going to do this and at the end my boss said to me oh Petronik I really think that you can do it if at the end I asked my children I said to my children this is what they asked of me and I thought that my children would say no no no don't do this I left the decision to my children if my children had said no I would not have done it but strange enough the children said you know mother I think that you can do it God is going to help you and when the children said that then I was proud I said okay I'm going to go and then I started out very slowly and here I am today wow so well those children had confidence in you what is it like what are you like your grandmother appealing to the humanity of a leopard when you're talking about when you're trying to do these negotiations when you're advocating for peace in these very dangerous situations yes I think that what my grandmother told me stayed with me and when she told me this story I didn't know at that point in time how it's going to affect me but later when I was in a scenario of danger when I was facing armed men then I was thinking about what my grandmother told me in the days and you know there were lions there were lepers there were elephants which could run over me and so what is the attitude which I have to have to face these dangers and how am I going to react to face faced with these militias and I think that to bring about peace you have to transform yourself within yourself I was not like you see me today I was and I was getting angry you know I was boom boom boom I didn't have this patient I you know when I waited for somebody and a person didn't come after a few minutes I left and the first step I undertook was to change myself and that was the most difficult thing because you have to say no to what you liked in the past you don't have the same choices in your life because you know if you work for peace that is very difficult because you don't eat when you want to eat sometimes I am not eating for four days you have to do lots of sacrifices and it made me become very humble you know I was an unarmed woman facing armed men why is war continuing because the whole entire world thinks that war is the solution but then after all we see that war is never the solution you have the guns and the bombs and on the other side you have the same thing and people are fighting I understand and I understood that on the other side of these weapons if you have peace within you you will win and this is what my grandmother taught me you look the danger right in the eye and then you are peaceful within yourself and you make peace and this is how I won but sometimes it was very difficult I had to work on myself I had to humiliate myself facing the danger but I was always the winner so you said something when you received your reward the other night and I think we need to listen to you because you were the experts in peace building and you talked about the how the rich minerals gems forests of ituri your beloved ituri that you grew up in that was so beautiful at that time when you grew up and how that has become the reason for so much of the conflict in in ituri now and you you proposed a peaceful unwinding of that yes yes when we grew up we knew that there was gold in our grounds and other minerals but later on it was discovered that especially in ituri in the DRC and in the east of the Congo there are so many minerals extraordinary many minerals you have the feeling that all of the minerals of the world are in our ground your cell phones you know the minerals in your cell phone come from us from our grounds your laptops your electric cars there are people who are also manufacturing bombs and all of these minerals which are used to do all those things are in the grounds and there probably some minerals which have not even been found yet or discovered yet and you know it is because of money and everybody needs the minerals right so there are thieves thieves are coming to steal our minerals and they kill there are so many weapons which are circulating in my province and you know I work with the armed groups and when we work on disarmament then we ask them to give hand over the weapons and they do it once I was a political authority I was a governor and instead of giving the weapons back to the United Nations or to the government or to the military personnel they came to me and gave me all of their weapons they were at home in my house and you know I know that there are weapons which came from the US from Russia these weapons come from all countries in the world and so what is happening these young people they dig for gold and for minerals and those who need these minerals they exchange the minerals with guns and then they rape the women they kill the people and so I use this stay here in the United States to say well you know look the United States it's a it's a huge power and they also need these minerals can they tell the whole world to open a free trade market for these minerals so that the young people don't need their guns anymore so that one can with a free trade agreement buy those minerals wherever you need them in the world and so you could buy them just like any other good so that the population can benefit from it that way we could have a better life for the people who live in our countries you know in the beginning I didn't know I thought that it was a conflict between ethnical groups about after I worked on this I saw that it was because of the minerals and the neighboring countries they have their own visions and it is so strange the international community and even the American government they prefer to work with the thief than to work with the country that has the minerals you know it's a little bit like the lake with the fish instead of coming to fish you are going to give money to the thief to come and steal the fish from our pond that's a little bit what's happening and I'm wondering why if in this pond there are fish just come to the pond and fish yourself instead of sending thieves who kill and then who fish the who fish for you in your name and you know we have this wealth of minerals in our ground the whole world needs these minerals but this should be distributed in a fair way and it should be marketed on in a free trade agreement like it is done with other merchandisers in the world and without people having to die I would have better agree on that governor's race okay so you have created something called the foundation for durable peace is this free trade agreement a part of that no not at all because it was after my work as a humanitarian where they told me that I should work on peace building and so this is the first NGO which I created it was the foundation for sustainable peace and at that point in time I was convinced that the problem was the problems within the ethical communities and I started working with the communities I told the armed groups to hand me the weapons but I did not have the vision that this was a problem of the wealth but it was only later when I was looking at this accumulation of weapons and I saw that these weapons came from everywhere and when on an international level I saw that the international community they prefer our neighbors who don't have one drop of gold or cotton and then the world says that they are the first producer and that's not true we have the cotton but since they come and and are thieves and they come and rob us and they think that they are the producer but they don't have one drop of gold everything comes from now maybe later on they will find some mines in their countries but up to this moment in time it is in our grounds and I had my eyes closed in those days I really thought it was an ethical problem which we had and then later on my eyes opened wide and the armed groups told me this and the armed groups said to me you know the problem is because you know they were talking to me they looked at me as a person they could trust they told me they give us money and then we give them gold and then it is a problem the people who give the money they want to have something in exchange I also would like to add something here when I was governor that this wasn't the case but today you have armed groups they are working in these mines but the mines belong to the Chinese you see you see these mines are on our ground and the armed groups they are in charge of these mines but the mines belong to China so this is very strange and we have to open our eyes we really have to understand and we have to find the solution with the minerals if we had a free trade agreement then it would be clear it would be fair and one could buy the quantity one needs on that market because you know they are sold more at higher prices than what we can offer has been ground level coping with the effects of all this violence and disruption and you have had the opportunity of sort of extrapolating from what was going on the ground and then having an epiphany about the bigger picture and I want to open it up now to all of you to sort of exchange a little and I want those of you in the audience who may have any questions to please join us and particularly with those of you up here our finalists and Petrony to think about are there some collective lessons are there some commonalities that you see are there are the things that we can learn from the experience of all of you being in similar environments really but all over the world in different places does anyone want to start Marie? Yes when you look at it from Africa to Middle East and Kaibyan we are all dealing with a common issue which is violence it's like if the world is focusing more on war than probably even investing more you know going to war than in bringing peace and women we are trapped in this policy then fortunately this institution will try the best to change the dialogue and make them understand instead of investing in war let's invest in bringing and building peace. Yes and that is a conversation that I think every nation has when you look at a cynical peace table and the data shows that this is a phenomenon when you have no gender equality it can be reduced to a division of the spoils of war and seen as through that lens but when you add the women they take the lens we have heard about so vividly today the lens of the family and the community and the economy that keeps families thriving and that's why the peace is more durable. You were about to say something? Yes I have learned and it's actually like this in each community there is something going well and inside each person there is something there is a positive need and women and peace builders in general need to discover these things that are coming well in each of our communities there is a champions for peace and inside us there is a good will that we need to discover and work around it. Okay now there must be somebody who has a question one of our finalists over here yes can someone bring mics to these two individuals and we'll take the question from the one who gets the mic first your name please. Hi my name is Contessa Bourbon of Queen Contessa Bourbon Foundation I'd like to ask Miss Petronell which countries do you want to have free trade agreement and how would this benefit mine workers in Congo? What country? Well as far as I know technology right now needs the minerals that we have and that's that technology is used by all countries any country that wants to evolve. What country exists that I could mention that doesn't have cell phones and doesn't have gold what country isn't thinking about electrical vehicles and those who want to go to war what country doesn't need uranium to make its bombs and that's how can I say this the challenge that isn't just the concern of my country but really should it concerns the world how to come together you know how divided the world is how many wars there are that's why each power comes and takes for itself perhaps we could come together a single market but my country the democratic republic of the Congo should define in its policies how to interact with the various powers and how to organize this market unfortunately I don't work at that level and I'm under the impression that I would dare say this because these are people at higher levels but I would say that the international community and the democratic republic of the Congo need to think about this I think the time has come to begin I think there has not been that reflection otherwise there would be small advances discussions for example if that existed the democratic republic of Congo and Rwanda and Uganda would not be attacking one another or pinching one another that's because they haven't realized that there might be away there might be a way through dialogue through diplomacy to find a path it's a problem that to this date has not been broached positively such that this doesn't lead to death that's all I can say about this that by level I have made I've seen this situation but I am not at the level where these decisions are made thank you your name please my name is Parvasha Hassan I'm from Afghanistan and I'm working as program director with me in this list I must say that I'm so fascinated by all the discussion this morning and your stories but really I think your grandma's story will stay always with me this was very touching listening to all of you my question is to Hajib Rehm you mentioned regarding women and your unity in Syria I my own experience from my background is that the conflict fragmented the societies and women are also not separate from the rest of the society so I like to know what keeps women in Syria glued to each other what are so special that keep their unity together which is very much important and I also have question to sorry I forgot the name madam from from Haiti yes you spoke about like you have been respected by those gangs and groups who are in conflict as Hajib Rehm mentioned before like in every conflict or there is something human in the person which is about peace do you see there are some values that they because of your work that you are doing they still esteem you in respect and that is a potential for peace okay you think Abir will answer her question thank you thank you there's two main factors that helps the Syrian women come together more easily than the men's the first their losses women they don't want to have more losses for other women and that's bring women together on the community level the second the women advisory board in with the office of special envoy the interaction of bringing track two women the middle class women expert in peace building into the international for us where there is a peace negotiations was one of the successes that we managed to do and this is because of the great Syrian women's not me i'm not included actually they did a huge work and advocate to bring the women voices on that level of platform and they were so engaged with the community so it was like bottom-up approach where we worked in with women who have these losses traumatized and to ask them what they see is the best chance to overcome these losses and the women advisory board who also have a lots of inputs in the Geneva talks where the Syrians were coming together for a peace talk yes thank you for the questions regarding guests regarding Haiti and the work i'm doing i think we respond to their needs and not only their needs of the gang but of the community itself of the women of the children of the youth and of the authorities of or the leaders as well so they see our work as an opportunity and i think not only that the communication then we establish with the staff and the field worker on the field they are listening to what we have to say and what we are doing and i think that's probably what's missing the dialogue and communication making sure we understand each other then we are not there for war we are there to bring to respond to their needs and being a health institution a major health institution in the country also we are well known for the work we've been doing for 40 years now and they see the impact are there any other questions and well this will be our last one unfortunately we're wrapping up and if we can get a microphone thank you my name is Stacy Shambur from the International Civil Society Action Network or ICANN thank you very much for all of your remarks and being here today and congratulations to all of you i think it was in the video profiling Petroneal when you said that one of the greatest challenges is speaking with those actors who are funding the armed groups and i think across all of your contacts and all of the conflicts in which you work there are people who have a vested interest in the conflict so my question is how can the international community best intervene or best support you to intervene in trying to bring them to the table and you know Hamisa had sort of referenced that i think so i'll let you start and any others who want to chime in on that Hamisa in many of the the way is that we can stop war many other times that we have three things we either need to come together on the table without any cards below the table put all our cards on the table we either agree disagree or agree to disagree so that all this can be put to a stop and i for example i think she is also asking you about what are those interests and even monetary possibly but the outside uh you're talking about the outside influencer influences that are creating such violence on the ground how can they help to mitigate the influences from outside the community but beyond your peace efforts on the ground uh people who are outside that want to intervene into whatever uh we are doing it's to direct come and support our work and you know what we're gonna have to end on that and i'm very sorry and i didn't mean to interrupt you either but uh this has been an amazing conversation it is the you have seen now the living representation would you like to say one word or two okay go ahead very quickly i think that those who are on the outside first you have to begin by looking or trying to understand what's happening far away from where you are what is happening in syria what is happening in kenya what is happening that's what has to come first and when you know then you can better understand and then read the reports there are many reports by humanitarian workers there are reports from monies school the u n mission that is on the ground there are reports by experts who go do research read these reports you won't get a better understanding for us for me we need to support women whatever the external reasons but if the population has this resilience support us such that women can find her place at the negotiations table so that women can talk they have their vision they have their way of going about things women think with their heads and their hearts support women and we will all win nobody could say a better than that thank you very much for joining us the women building peace council appreciates your support and we will look forward to seeing you next year and we will be in touch and connected to our finalists and petra knee throughout the year here at usip thank you very much