Sustainable Peace is Inclusive: Persons with Disabilities as Contributors to Peace Processes (COSP19 Side Event)

Panelists for joining today's discussion.
Peace building cannot be sustainable without inclusion.
In conflict settings, persons with disabilities make up a significant share of the population and are often disproportionately affected.
At the same time, their experience, expertise, and contributions remain overlooked and they are excluded from processes that shape recovery, reconciliation, and the future political order.
Too many times has peace been negotiated without including all parts of society, undermining both the fairness and the durability of peace itself.
The international Normality framework is clear.
UN Security Council Resolution 24 75 underlines both the protection of persons with disabilities in armed conflict and their meaningful participation in peace processes.
The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities obliges states to ensure their participation, decision making and public life.
Our focus today is practical.
How to move from commitments to implementation? How do we ensure full and effective participation in peace processes? How do we strengthen contribution and leadership in mediation, recovery, and sustaining peace? And how do we better support organizations of persons with disabilities as essential partners? For Finland, this is a matter of rights and effectiveness.
Peace processes that do not reflect the diversity of society are less likely to endure.
Ultimately, everyone needs peace.
Without it, the resources, trust, and safety required for everyone to reach their full potential for communities to grow and innovate are destroyed.
Today, next, I will give the floor to Mr.
Taku San, Director General of Services for Persons with Disabilities of Turkey for the second opening remarks.
To guide us today, we are honored to have as keynote speaker, miss Hibajgres, UN Special Rapporteur on the rights of Persons with Disabilities, and later also Her Excellency, miss Hind Kababat, Minister for Social Affairs and and Labor of the Syrian Arab Republic will address us.
And after the first speakers, I will let miss Amu Oren, chairperson of the Abilis Foundation to moderate the actual panel discussion with our distinguished speakers.
But now, without further ado, I will give the floor to our co organizer, co host, Mr.
Tahaku Satin.
You have a floor, sir.
Thank you Chair and Distinguished delegates.
I am very pleased to be with you at this important site event.
I extend my respect all of you.
The topic we are discussing today is highly significant for building a more just, inclusive, and lasting peace.
Because we know that sustainable peace is only possible when all segments of society can participate ely and meaningfully in the process.
Armed conflicts, humanitarian crisis, and forced displacement disproportionately affect persons with disabilities.
However, persons with disabilities are not only among those most affected by crisis.
They are also important actors in seging social resilience, promoting and culture of dialogue, and contributing to peace building.
Turkey approaches the full and effective participation of persons with disabilities in all areas of social life from a right based perspective.
In line with this understanding, we continue our efforts to strangen their participation in decision making process, support the capacity of civil society organizations, and make public policies more inclusive.
Because inclusive societies are rules where difference are respected, where everyone is equally represented, and where everyone's contribution is valued.
In face of increasingly complex global crisis, strategic and inclusive understanding of peace is a shared responsibility for all of us.
Turk continues to play an active role in meditation efforts for peace in its regions.
We hope that this event will contribute to developing a shaded understanding that sets the meaningful participation of persons with disabilities in peace processes.
Before I conclude, I would like to thank the permanent Mission of Finland for organizing this important event, as well as all partners involved.
I also wish all participation of productive discussions.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
I would like to give the floor to miss Heba Jagres UN Special Rapporteur.
You have the floor.
Thank you.
Excellencies, distinguished colleagues, dear friends.
It is a privilege to join you today for this important discussion on the link between disability inclusion and sustainable peace.
I would like to thank the permanent mission of Finland and Turkey, as well as the Abeles Foundation for bringing us together at such a crucial moment.
Peace cannot be sustainable if it is not inclusive.
Yet, far from often, persons with disabilities remained invisible in peace processes despite representing a significant portion of population affected by conflict.
In many such contexts, they may constitute up to 30% of those impacted.
They face heightened risk of violence, displacement, and exclusion, while at the same time being denied the opportunity to contribute to rebuilding their societies.
This exclusion is not due to the lack of capacity or willingness.
It is due to systemic barriers, attitudinal, environmental, and institutional that continues to prevent their meaningful participation.
The international community has already established a strong normative foundation to address this gap.
The Convention of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is clear.
Persons with disabilities must be protected in situations of risk, including armed conflict and must be actively involved in decision making processes affecting them.
Participation in political and public life is not option.
It is a right.
Similarly, Security Council Resolution 24 75 a landmark recognition that persons with disabilities are not merely victims in conflict settings, but essential actors in conflict prevention, resolution, and peace building.
And through the UN disability inclusion strategy, UDS, we have committed to ensure that disability inclusion is mainstreamed across the entire peace continuum from early warning and mediation to peacekeeping and recovery.
Yet, despite this commitment, a persistent gap remains between policy and practice.
We must therefore move from recognition to action.
Inclusive peace processes require deliberate and concrete measures.
They require that mediators and negotiators actively reach out to organizations of persons with disabilities.
They require that peace dialogues are accessible physically, digitally, and communicationally.
They require that funding mechanisms support the participation of persons with disabilities in the representative organizations, particularly at the local level.
We already see inspiring example.
Around the world, organizations of persons with disabilities are contributing to reconciliation, community cohesion, and social recovery.
They are building bridges where others see divisions.
Their life experience bring unique perspectives to peace building perspectives that strengthen resilience and foster more inclusive societies.
We must recognize that support these contribution, not as an afterthought, but as a central pillar of peace efforts.
For inclusion is not a matter of rights.
It is also a matter of effectiveness.
Peace processes that exclude segments of society risk reinforcing inequalities and sowing the seeds of future conflict.
By contrast, inclusive processes are more likely to result in durable agreements and resilient communications.
As a Special Rapporteur, I remain committed to advancing this agenda by promoting accountability, sharing good practices, and supporting states and partners in translating commitments into concrete changes.
Persons with disabilities are not only right holders, they are leaders, mediators, and agents of peace.
If we are serious about building sustainable peace, we must ensure that persons with disabilities are not only present but heard and that their contribution shaped the outcome we seek.
Thank you so much.
Thank you so much for this inspirational intervention.
Now let's move to the panel and I would like to give the floor to Amron to continue from here.
Thank you, Your Excellency.
Hello from my side as well.
It's an honor to be here moderating this panel.
I'm from Abilities Foundation and is a global Disability Rights Foundation.
First of all, I want to advertise our material, as we said, it did about practice very practical things today, and we have made a very practical toolkit about persons with disability in peace building.
But let's get to the panel.
We have four great panelists today.
We have the president of Disabled People International, Abdu Sadar Abdul, then we have Janet Lord from the academic world, maybe.
You have so many titles.
I'm going to skip them.
Then we have Mr.
Brian James Williams from the US Peace Building Fund.
And then we have then we have Idris Maga Izum.
I hope I pronounce that even close, who is the president of the African Disability Forum.
We will have two rounds of questions now, and then after that, the floor will be open to questions and comments if there is time.
Well, we will start with Ambus Can you share an experience of your work where persons with disabilities have impacted and been involved in peace negotiation peace negotiations and peace building? This one.
Go ahead.
Thank you.
Thank you, and thank you very much, all participant and the organizer and I appreciate for adding here as an F analyst.
I work in Bangladesh directly at the grassroot level through the National Assembly of one of the National Assembly of DPI, Bangladesh, BPKS in short, It follow the one for all approach, which is right vest and disabled peoples led in the holistic approach that empowered the person with all types of disabilities to take an active role in development from the grassroot to the national level.
The approach is universal, acceptable, and adoptable across different social, economic, religious, and cultural context.
It demonstrate that with equal opportunities, personal disabilities can make meaningful contribution to society, including in pace building.
By promoting leadership and advocacy among persons with disabilities, once for all process strengthening social harmony, suffce, peace and stability at the grassroot level and contribution to improve quality of life for all.
That is the program we implemented that is increasing the people with disabilities inclusion in the whole society and family society and even in the different development action.
Through that is in society some harmony, some happiness is growth with the action of the disabled people.
They are in many cases, there's many examples they maintain A community leadership to mentor other people with disabilities as an exemplary, action they do in the grassroot level.
And thank you in the first round.
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Al Summa, the UN Security Council resolution number 2475 recognized the critical role of persons with disabilities in armed conflicts and humanitarian crisis and emergency situation as many of us know.
How is this resolution being translated international politics across African countries? What could be done to advance this even more? Bonjour.
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Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, distinguished guest, good morning.
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First, on resolution 24 75, we need to be honest.
Implementation remains far too weak.
Resolution 24 75 was a breakthrough because it recognized persons with disability in armed conflict as right holders, as people entitled to protection, and most important of all as people who must participate in the peace and security work.
This has not yet been translated into national systems.
That is why we need national actions, plans for Resolution 24 75.
We have such plans for United Nations Security Council Resolution 13 25 on Human peace and security and for United Nations Resolution 2022 50 on Youth peace and security.
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The International Disability Alliance and the Africa Disability Forum are now working on examples of national action plans adopted for the Africa region.
This is because we need much stronger implementation.
We also hope that Thailand as it seek a seat on the Security Council for 2029 2030 will help push this agenda forward if elected, and we wish so.
Integration into Security Council mandate might also help, and this has been slow.
But resolution 2779 on South Sudan strengthening disability language by recognizing that safe, meaningful and desired participation of persons with disability is critical to South Sudan's political transition, including elections and public life.
This moves persons with disability from the margins of protection to the center of political participation.
We must dramatically strengthen national level action.
Thank you.
And now we will stay in the same resolution.
Now, Mr.
Williams, now, is this resolution reflected in the funding of the criteria of your peace building fund and this UNDS had an impact on this? Can you share an example maybe or examples where projects have successfully implemented this resolution? Thank you, Madam Chair and let me echo the congratulations to Finland and Turkey for organizing today's event.
Very important.
The, the Peace Building funds is very proud to take the resolution as one of the guiding documents for our work.
And I note that the resolution itself speaks about the protection of people with disabilities, persons with disabilities.
But in fact, it's much more important than just protection.
Protection is a minimum.
It's really about engagement, participation, contributions.
Inside the resolution itself, there are provisions for this.
So there's a provision that says the recognition of critical contributions of persons with disabilities and their representative organizations to conflict prevention, resolution, reconciliation, peace building, and so on.
But I really want to underscore it's this participation, the responsibility, the agency of people with disabilities, persons with disabilities that the Peace Building Fund is really trying to support.
There's a long way to go, so I don't pretend by any means that we're perfect, but we are trying to make a difference in four different ways in our program cycle.
Firstly, everything we do starts with a conflict analysis and we require that that conflict analysis is disability sensitive, let's say.
In our guidelines, we say that conflict analysis should be looking at disability inclusion.
Secondly, in our programming cycle, we're very interested in supporting civil society organizations, and we want those civil society organizations to be inclusive.
We're hopeful and we try to support that our programming through the United Nations system gets to supporting civil society directly, and that includes organizations that address disability if they're not already organizations of persons with disabilities.
Thirdly, in our reporting template, we require dis aggregation of data and we look for reporting specifically around the inclusion of persons with disability.
We know that data is critical for measuring, measuring is critical for advocacy, and advocacy is critical for political engagement.
It might be a bureaucratic thing reporting, but it's important for generating data.
Finally, in evaluations, our evaluation guides also look for the involvement of persons with disability and civil society in general.
Now, I have another couple of minutes.
Yeah.
A couple of examples.
In the Gambia, for example, we have a project that is specifically supportive of civil society organizations.
One of those organizations undertook an initiative about engaging with the Parliament.
It was, I think about 45 stakeholder individuals or organizations had a policy debate with parliament to encourage them, specifically on the question of disability.
This gets to that political element that the special rapporteur spoke about.
Really, all peace building is somehow political and so we need to get into the political space and we want to support persons with disabilities to get into that space.
We have another program also in the Gambia.
This time the entry point is around the network against gender based violence.
They had a whole campaign, a civil society campaign to support the government in a development of a five year strategic plan focused certainly on questions of women's engagement, but specifically on female genital mutilation.
The results of some of these activities are renewed institutional commitments, which includes more resource resource allocations, proposed reforms in the media, how culture speaks is also important and so on.
It's a small step, but we're trying to get into this space.
We also have some activities in Kyrgyzstan.
I'm not sure I'm going to have enough time to really get into it.
But here we've been focused especially on questions of youth, and there have been youth councils and women councils at the very local level who have been working on inclusion of youth and women in the governance process at local level.
But a couple of those activities have included elements of disability in them.
I think This reflects the both top down and bottom up nature of the work.
We need to work on policy and legislation and changing the behavior of donors from the top, but we also need to empower organizations at the bottom because that's where advocacy really starts and that's where you take very personal and emotional examples and through those help to build a movement that can advocate for change.
Thank you.
Thank you.
It was very good to hear concrete examples.
Thank you for that.
Then, Shannon, my first question to you with me because you have spent a lot of time taking or researching disability globally and promoting rights of person with disability all over the world.
So what do we know about the participations of P with disabilities in peace projects so far? Thank you, Madam Chair and thank you Excellencies, distinguished colleagues.
Great thanks to the government of Finland, the government of Turkey, and Abilus Foundation for pulling us all together today in this space to talk about this really important issue.
What do we know? What do we know? I Well, the Vice Minister has already emphasized, as have the special rapporteur, the legal foundation for thinking about talking about peace building and disability.
Article 11 of the Convention on the Rights of people with Disabilities creates a really strong normative bridge connecting disability rights to every point along the peace continuum.
That's important from conflict prevention through post conflict reconstruction.
And of course, the Security Council resolution complements the CRPD, the UN disability inclusion strategy is another really important element in building and strengthening and advancing what I call the disability peace and security agenda, and I think we need to it.
We need to name it.
To make it, to build it, to make it happen.
I think that will be a really key factor in unlocking participation of organizations of people with disabilities.
If we take seriously that there is a disability peace and security agenda, just as there is a gender peace and security agenda or women peace and security and youth peace and security.
What do we know about the actual participation of people with disabilities? Firstly, informal peace processes.
When I had the great privilege of working with the former special rapporteur, Gerard Quinn, we learned because he asked us to find to what extent people with disabilities had been included in formal peace processes.
We learned that there was very little in the way of data.
Unfortunately, we did find one study that indicated that only 6% of peace treaties in the last 30 years had any reference to disability and when they did so, it was usually very much through a narrow medical lens.
He called this a wasted opportunity and he urged that disability become an automatic inflection point in every peace process.
He underscored the moral agency of persons with disabilities in rebuilding post conflict societies.
So it's something of the usual story insofar as people with disabilities like women have not been main players in peace processes, but the picture is not one of total absence and that's really important.
What we do know is that persons with disabilities organizations of persons with disabilities have perhaps in the non formal part of peace building, been engaged.
We can look to Uganda, South Africa, Colombia, Nepal, and we can find examples of persons with disabilities engaging in post conflict transitional justice processes, playing a role in the remaking of constitutions such that disability is actually referenced explicitly, for example, as a priveted ground of discrimination.
We know that when people with disabilities are there engaged, that good things can happen.
Second, we do know that formal peace processes have tended to prioritize people with disabilities who acquired their disability through conflict.
That's one thing, but then that leaves out quite a few of the population of people with disabilities.
We know that there's an emphasis more on vulnerability and protection that can really obscure the full engagement of people with disabilities as agents in peace building.
Then finally, we know that very often post conflict reintegration of ex combatants with disabilities often focuses very narrowly on medical or rehabilitation needs or just leaves people out altogether.
We finally have in the disarmament demobilization reintegration standards, a disability module, that's progress.
I'm not sure if it's being used.
I don't know if anyone knows about it.
I don't think disability organizations know about it.
So we need more in terms of sensitizing things and having OPD is actually playing a role.
We found in one piece of research I did with Professor Michael Stein at Harvard, we found that very often where ex combatants with disabilities were ignored and their needs ignored, they became a disaffected part of the population and returned in some cases to violence because they were so disaffected and they weren't receiving benefits.
That's what we know and we'll talk later about what we can actually do about it.
Thank you, Janet.
So now the second round and I have to ask for a shorter answer this time, and I warned you.
First Abdu Sadardal, what more do we need to do in order to enable more partnerships of peace building actor and OP lead at local level.
Thank you.
Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you all participants.
His living is increasingly under threat at all levels at these days.
Now values such as dignity, justice, equality, respect, and harmony are weakening.
Wild discrimination, violence, intolerance, corruption, and misuse of power are growing.
Climate change, technological change, and emerging health challenges are also influencing people's behavior and social values.
As a result, SASS persons with disabilities are obtained the most affected people.
In Bangladesh, the July August 24 movement, student movement in Bangladesh left thousands of people with disabilities, while many continue to face exclusion, discrimination, and injustice and no participation.
Building lasting peace requires more than pace related activities, such as peace builders training that lead to mentoring and resolution of conflict in society at grassroot level.
Effective approach such as once for all of PPS approach and organization like DPI.
BPS is OPD national AFI, help strengthening human values, dignity, mutual respect, and social inclusion.
That lead to ensure FS.
And greater investment on OPDs in these efforts is essential fis building process.
It will help create a more fisful society, empower productive citizen, and contribute to sustainable economic growth and that lead to ensure the sustainable fis.
Thank you very much.
Thank.
Thank you.
And then to its Maga Al suma.
Now, which roles does the African Disability Forum play in amplifying the void of P with disabilities in conflict affected regions? Are there any success stories you want to share us about disability with disabilities, leading piece or recovery in it in Africa? If you can we know that there is, for example, a risk not a well known risk of that in peace building in a situation of post conflict, persons with disabilities are in very unequal positions depending on whether they have been injured in the war or otherwise disabled.
So do you have examples of a situation like this and how they could have been how they could or have been prevented? Long question.
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Thank you.
Then, Brian Chaves Williams, where have you seen the largest gaps is it funding or political will or technical capacity? What kind of structures? I like structures do we need to make to make sure that persons with disabilities are included in peace process? Yeah.
Thank you very much.
The question about political will or funding or technical capacity is of course a challenging one because all three are needed.
I do think we need to be open about some of the risks.
On the funding side, the collapse globally of funding for global solidarity, development cooperation in general, I think does pose a risk because everybody is forced to prioritize, prioritize, prioritize, and I think there is a risk that in that prioritization, some of the issues that some people consider a luxury and not a necessity will get pushed to the side.
I think advocacy is important on the on the financing side.
Similarly, on the political side, the increased attention to violence and war and the acceptance of violent conflict as a way to resolve problems is a challenge for peace building writ large and with it concerns about inclusion inside peace processes if there are less peace processes to begin with.
On the technical capacity side, I returned to my earlier comments, which is the technical capacity is there and it's largely within organizations of persons with disability.
Really, the answer for me on technical capacity is to do a better job of supporting organizations themselves, persons with disabilities themselves.
On the question of structures, I'm going to return a little bit to my day job, which is with the peace building fund.
For us, what's important is that there's a coordinated system wide United Nations approach.
I think that's also true in an era of declined funding.
It's more important that there is more coordination and more partnership.
The role I'd like to emphasize with this group today is of the resident, the United Nations resident coordinator.
It's the resident coordinator who at country level has the responsibility to coordinate the entire UN system.
Many resident coordinators today have established civil society consultative forums of one kind or another so that there's a larger voice of civil society influencing what is the UN's work at country level.
I think it's really important that the Voices of persons with disabilities is included there.
I would encourage all of the organizations and representatives here today with their country level partners to reach out and build relationships with those resident coordinators because it's through them that you get at the implementation of the UN's disability strategy because we financed the work of the full UN system, UNDP and UNICEF and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and everybody else.
They all have the obligation because of that UN disability strategy to implement it.
We can help finance it.
But let's get those resident coordinators to be reminding the UN system and coordinating the UN system around this important work.
Thank you.
Then, Janet, what strategies might be employed to advance from your knowledge, this participation agenda? Do we need maybe stronger monitoring or enforcement tools within the UN system? Thank you.
Yeah.
If the disability peace and security agenda, not if, but it is.
It is legally operative.
It's not aspirational.
What's the first step? I have about eight ideas.
We'll see if I get through them all.
Organizations of people with disabilities must be brought, as we've heard into peace building processes as early as possible, not consulted after the fact.
This includes cease fire negotiations, it includes DDR programs, constitutional reform, electoral processes, and so forth, and durable recovery really demands their participation.
That's really important.
Number two, Um, and maybe this is already happening.
One of my suggestions is that the UN Peace Building fund and commission develop a dedicated action plan for including people with disabilities in peace building, drawing on the model of used for women and youth.
But maybe that's already underway from what Brian said, you're working hard on it, which is wonderful.
On transitional justice and moral repair, truth telling processes must include what happened to persons with disabilities during conflict.
Their experiences have been systematically absent from transitional justice mechanisms contributing to ongoing impunity.
The current crimes against humanity Treaty process is an opportunity for states to restore the Nuremberg legacy and specify disability as a ground of persecution.
I'm stunned that no government in the comments that were just put online last week, made this very obvious and very easy to suggestion.
I'm stunned, but I'm sure a state will come forward and do so.
Maybe Finland, or maybe Turkey, who knows? People who have committed violations against people with disabilities must be held accountable, but that also means that fact finding bodies and UN mandated commissions of inquiry, for example, need to be much more cognizant of doing a proper analysis of the impact of violence on persons with disabilities.
There's another opportunity there.
Um, yeah, just moving on to my final point on the issue of the scarce data, there really isn't a whole lot of data.
We're maybe starting to collect it, and it's wonderful the Peace Building Fund is doing some of that work.
But we need more data.
It's important to address that data gap, to map inclusion in the current processes that are underway, gather best practices, which you're doing, which is great.
Um, and the gap in disability dis aggregated data on peace building programs that fall outside of the formal peace processes is even larger and arguably more consequential.
So there are peace building programs, thank goodness, still underway.
They are under threat.
There's lots of constraints, but we need to do more to, I guess, bring DPOs into the process so that they can take part in that data gathering.
Thank you.
Thank you, Janet.
Now, thank you for the panelist for your very interesting insights.
Now I will open the floor for a couple of questions and comments.
And first, I will give the floor to Mina Moya.
You can present yourself.
Thank you, Chair.
Is this working? Yes, no.
Thank you so much.
Thanks for the opportunity to speak to the UN disability inclusion strategy building on what Brian paved the way for me to do.
My name is Nina Madahidi.
I'm the disability inclusion team lead at the Executive Office of the Secretary-General, where we monitor and coordinate the UN disability inclusion strategy.
For sake of time, I'm going to just very briefly just say that the strategy is an initiative of the Secretary-General was launched in 2019.
What our team does is that we collect annually progress reports from across the UN system.
I'm going to jump straight to some results which are relevant to this discussion in terms of meaningful engagement and consultation with organizations of persons with disabilities.
So overall, with US implementation, we have really seen significant change across the UN system from a very low starting point.
As the UN system, UN organizations were meeting 16% of the strategy requirements in 2019 when it was launched.
And now that is up to 50%.
So there has been significant change, but we're still only halfway.
Um, specifically on consultation, because we have an indicator in the strategy focusing on consultation, and what it's requiring is that UN organizations and country teams systematically consult with organizations of persons with disabilities in all areas, so not just on disability issues, but included in all areas, and that they have guidelines for consultation and that they develop partnerships at the headquarters level.
So from our data, we see similar trends, low starting point in 2019, 11% of UN organizations were meeting these requirements, and that is up to 45% now in 2025.
That's our most recent data.
And a similar trend with country teams.
As Brian mentioned, they're really in a central role at the country level to engage with those organizations of persons with disabilities.
And at the moment, 52% of country teams are consulting with organizations of persons with disabilities.
Just wanted to highlight a couple of examples.
One is from the UN Interim Security Force for Abaye, which is a territory between South Sudan and Sudan, where the mission has a partnership with Bae Persons with Disabilities Union and through this, the OPD is contributing to the programmatic and operational processes.
Um, likewise, the UN peacekeeping force in Cyprus has engaged with local organizations of persons with disabilities and this has actually resulted in them, planning accessibility better and also their monitoring and evaluation practices better.
But we know that there's a lot more that needs to be done and one of the gaps is the consistency in the engagement with organizations of persons with disabilities and also recognizing the diversity of organizations, and persons with disabilities.
So we've tried to address this through the revision of US.
This was based on a recommendation from an independent evaluation of US and three weeks ago, US 2.0 was approved.
In this revised strategy, the UN reaffirms its commitment to disability inclusion for the next five years.
And specifically around consultation, it's now included as a cross cutting approach to co create with persons with disabilities through their representative organizations.
Intersectionality is also a cross cutting approach.
We have integrated consultation in key areas such as programs and projects, but we also still have the standalone indicator that, for example, um, is requiring at minimum annual consultations and also includes requirements for senior leadership to annually or biannually consult with organizations of persons with disabilities to inform decision making.
We've made progress and we have a lot more to do.
But thank you.
Back to you, Chair.
Thank you, Mina, for your very important points.
Are there any more comments or questions at this point? Because if our panelist want to comment on what Mina said, that's possible now.
No.
Any other comments or questions? Yes, there is a hand raised.
Please introduce yourself first.
Thank you very much.
My name is AV Lap.
I'm one of the youth delegates who's been joining Canada's delegation this year.
This question goes out to Professor Lord, but if anyone has any insights that they'd like to offer I totally welcome them.
I was just wondering if you could speak a little bit more even broadly to the challenges and gaps that have been encountered during DDR processes where persons with disabilities either incurred during the conflict or who had them prior or were left out.
You had mentioned that there had been cases or examples where they had returned to violence in some situations.
So if you had any examples of that just offhand, I would appreciate that as well if you have that around.
Thank you.
It seems like she wants to start.
Sure.
Thank you so much for the great question.
Yeah, we know that often ex combatants with disabilities demobilize, they go back to their home communities and often therefore they are more difficult to reach.
But that's not an insurmountable problem, but that is one of the issues.
Then even when they are included in a DDR process, those programs have not been designed to really meet their specific needs, so that's problematic as well.
Um, and so we know in Mozambique, for example, there were about 100 ex combatants with disabilities who held up in a building in Maputu and threatened to blow it up if their particular benefits that they had been promised were not forthcoming.
Another example of a minister in Sierra Leone being attacked by some ex combatants with disabilities, again, because the benefits promised had not been forthcoming.
So in several instances, the World Bank has had to come in with emergency funding, address these issues.
Had they been designed properly from the get go, they wouldn't have had to come in with the emergency funding.
Those are just a couple of examples.
I'm happy to speak further and point you in the direction of some publications on that project.
Anyone else? No.
No other comment about we have time for one more comment or question at this point.
Yes, please.
I know OPD and DPI Thérèse two organization.
I mean, grassroot level, national level, we work the OPD and international level like DPI is work last 40 years.
And the code of the impact of our work is the pace building.
We are actually pace builders.
We are doing that.
But our challenge is that the development partner, donor, and government is not recognize this organization contribution and due to that, that they are not supporting, they are not given proper funding.
In whole world IPO study, in the civil society, there is not more than $100 million equalize.
It is for 1.3 billion people using $100 million, it is a joke, I want to say.
It is a joke.
You know, in other words, we are saying that OPD will do this, DPI do this, and they will do this, they will do advocacy.
So this is one thing.
And second thing is I want to say that, you know, if we contribute to the this organization, I think this building is process is aggressively as possible to improve at the grassroot level, you know, because there is a mentoring is very important for the FS.
Mentoring is very important.
And second right now we don't have the mentor.
None of the sector, we don't have the mentor, our teacher is lost, our religious leader is lost.
Due to that, reduce the mentor.
Due to that he is now absent, is reducing.
We OPD and DPI is doing that now.
I think I want to share one of the example, if you give me time, no time.
Okay.
Okay.
I'm sorry.
Thank you.
I'm very sorry about not taking more time, but I want to point out that we will all be here in this meeting.
And yes, and you can continue these discussions on the hallway and around the building.
So I was given a very strict timeline.
I'm sorry about that.
But anyway, I want to wrap up.
This discussion a little bit.
We have heard about very practical examples, so we know that disability inclusion can happen and has happened before, so we can make it happen again.
That's a good news.
We also know that we are not quite there yet.
As you said, we need intersectionality.
We need to understand that persons with disability are all kinds of people and the variety of disabilities have to be considered as well.
We need data, as Janet pointed out many times.
We need the best practices.
Well, there was this discussion about whether we need political will or funding or technical skills mostly.
But I think I would say that, Political will is something.
If we have that, if we actually have the political engagement to do this, then the funding will come because that's what politicians do give money.
To be honest and make laws, if we have the political will, there will be also funding and there will be improvement of technical skills.
If we know where that can be found, then we will be able to benefit it better.
I want to thank everybody for taking part of this very interesting question and we all know that this is not the end, but I hope this discussion will continue in other contexts.
I want to thank the Embassy of Finland for organizing this event and letting us to come here.
Thank you from my side at this point.
Now, I am going to give the floor to the Minister for Social Affairs and Labor from the Syrian Arab Republic.
Her Excellency, misses Hind Gabawat.
The floor is yours.
I apologize for being late.
We had another commitment.
First, I want to thank you for inviting me and I want to thank Finland, especially for all your support in the peace building work we're doing.
I just want to give you In our strategy in our Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor, we highlight that the most priority for us is, of course, social protection and the vulnerable people, and then the people with disabilities.
Then we also identify that woman is also one of our priority and civil peace and social cohesion.
I just want to ask now my colleagues here.
While we're watching news and there is a political negotiation, how many times we find women and people with disability at the negotiation table.
Just be honest.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
That's why we're here today, and we need to fight for this.
I'm sorry.
When people will say, I want to begin nothing about us without us, it's happening there.
It's happening because there is less women and now we see when they have this negotiation in Afghanistan because there is no women.
The first thing they did, there is no more education for women because there is a woman there.
Nobody can accept this agreement.
So when we talk about political will, You need, we cannot just wait for the politician to give us money because they're not going to give us money.
I'm sorry.
They have other agenda to do than this.
I'm sorry, I'm supposed to be a politician, but I'm a civil society and I'm a woman and I'm a mother.
And I won't accept anymore to have those negotiation in the world without women and without special needs because I can tell you from my own experience, I teach peace building and I teach mediation, and I'm also a former negotiator.
I can tell you every time we have women at the table and people with special needs, the negotiation is better and the agreement is better.
And when we think about the victim of war, you cannot exclude them.
If you want a peace agreement and the victim of war they feel excluded, and guess what? This is not going to be a sustainable peace because you excluded already the people who got hurt the most in this war.
And I find from my student, people with disability, they can be the best peace building, the best mediators, the best lawyers, and they do their work with commitment and they will do the work because they believe in.
So simply you exclude them because they are women and they are special needs, this is what we want.
Talking about transitional justice.
I'm sorry.
You cannot even think about transitional justice process, and thank you for mentioning this because this is something very important.
You cannot exclude the people who got hurt the most at the war because they are the women and the special needs.
This is so easy and so simple.
Now, we need to think about inclusivity.
Everybody think about inclusion, inclusion, inclusion, inclusion, not only special needs, not only women.
Also, we need to be inclusion in religions and ethnic groups.
This is so important because when you see a negotiation happening, excluding people at the negotiation table from people from certain ethnic groups or certain religion, this is not going to be a sustainable peace.
It's very simple.
I can tell you now, since we have 14 years of war in Syria, we have 27% of people who are we have disability and victim of war, and we cannot just be silent because they are the one.
They're going to build the society and they're the one that are going to build the future with us.
Simply, we include them in every single policy.
We need to do a good policy.
We have to do a new law because our law is 1958, and they don't even mention clearly the special needs right, and this is important and we started with this.
There is no and even in Syria before, they don't have this ramp.
They don't have any facilities for the people with special need.
How do we build a country? Now, we think about rebuilding a country without thinking about building the country with accessible things for the people with special needs.
That is something we have to think about and what we did, we did a conference, we invited all the ministers and we tell them you have to have a commitment with us.
Those special needs, we need to think about them.
We need to take care of them because guess what? They're going to take care of us because they are better mediators.
They are the one they're going to be even in local mediation, they're the one they do the work best.
This is what we did.
We get a commitment from the Minister of Transportation, from the government, to build a new building with all the qualification we need.
Also, we have a center now to teach and train not only management, but leadership and negotiation and mediation because I'm a strong believer that with education, with a great and this doesn't cost too much, by the way.
People think that it doesn't cost too much.
Just if you're doing any workshop, make sure that they are there and you do everything.
In my budget now, I put special budget for transportation for the special need because I don't want to be at home because they cannot arrive to the course.
I don't want them to be behind the screen always.
I want them to come and have this interaction with us.
I can tell you, you need a political will and guess what? You push for this because they have to know that you have a voice and without you, we cannot build a better world, better community, and better future.
Thank you.
Thank you for this very, very inspiring speech.
You should.
Now, I want to thank everybody for this event.
It was very nice to be here with you, even if the topic wasn't that nice in a way.
Anyway, let all push really hard disability inclusion in peace building wherever we can do that.
Okay.
Great.
Thank you.
Thank.