International Peace Bureau

The International Peace Bureau (IPB) (French: Bureau international de la paix), founded in 1891, is one of the world's oldest international peace federations. The organisation was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1910 for acting "as a link between the peace societies of the various countries". Twelve Nobel Peace Prize laureates have been members of the IPB.

Quotes

• The COVID-19 crisis has made clearer than ever the flaws in our system, one that prioritizes military spending and global instability over the well-being of our people... Indeed, global priorities are wrong; it is time for a new era of peace, a global ceasefire as called for by the U.N. and people around the globe. Let us demilitarize the world and invest in global peace and diplomacy.
  • Quoted in US Drove Last Year’s Over $1.9 Trillion in Global Military Spending, by Jessica Corbett, Consortium News, (April 27, 2020)

• We are witnessing the consequences of irresponsible political decisions that have led to dramatic under-investment in healthcare. All over the world, health systems are reaching the limits of their strength and heroic front-line staff are under massive pressure. The coronavirus emergency shows the weakened state that our societies find themselves in: a world driven by financialization, shareholder value, and austerity has weakened our ability to defend the common good and placed human life in danger on a global scale.
• Militarization is the wrong path for the world to take; it fuels tensions and raises the potential for war and conflict. It aggravates already heightened nuclear tensions.
• World leaders must put disarmament and peace at the centre of policy making and develop a new agenda for disarmament that includes banning nuclear weapons. We reiterate our call for governments to sign up to the TPNW treaty.
• Disarmament is a major key to the great transformation of our economies, to ensure that human beings and not profit are most valued; economies in which ecological challenges will be solved and global social justice will be pursued.
  • International Peace Bureau: divert military spending to healthcare, now! PRESSENZA, Text also published in IPB's online petition: Invest in Healthcare Instead of Militarization (31 March 2020)

• The world youth congress is a youth-led congress, contributing to the vision of a world in peace and without war and to the vision of a more peaceful, just and sustainable future. The idea of the youth congress derives from the preparatory process of the youth gathering of the IPB World Congress “Disarm! For a Climate of Peace – Creating an Action Agenda”
  • IPB Youth Network Conference Transform! Towards a Culture of Peace (16 August 2019)

• The overall objective of the world youth congress is to build bridges and foster discussions among youth with different perspectives on and approaches to peace, justice and sustainability alongside non-youth stakeholders active in the peace movement and in the various fields. Voices of youth against war and for peace should be increasingly and strongly heard. Among others, the specific objectives are:

1. To speak out and act against war, militarism, injustice, and planetary destruction.
2. To equip young people with the confidence and competencies to build peace, sustainability, and justice.
3. To bring young people into regional national and international decision making processes.
4. To facilitate intergenerational and interdisciplinary approaches to a global culture of peace, justice and sustainability.

• IPB Youth Network Conference Transform! Towards a Culture of Peace (16 August 2019)

Quotes about

• In a statement responding to the analysis, the International Peace Bureau (IPB) also pointed to the public health crisis as evidence of the need for a worldwide shift in priorities... Sharing a SIPRI infographic, IPB co-president Philip Jennings tweeted: “The military industry complex is raking it in and we don’t feel safer. Time to halt this madness.”
  • Quoted in US Drove Last Year’s Over $1.9 Trillion in Global Military Spending, by Jessica Corbett, Consortium News, (April 27, 2020)