Chairman of the Atlantic Initiative Advisory Board, Dr. Nerzuk Ćurak, was part of the conference, The Role of Universities in Peace Building, where he delivered a presentation on Conflict Transformation: From Direct Violence to a Culture of Peace.
The conference, held on May 10-11, 2013, was at the Dr. Lazar Vrkatić Law and Business School in Novi Sad. Participants included students, professors, and intellectuals from the region, along with civil society activists and political figures from Vojvodina and Novi Sad. Topics included human rights, facing the past, the role of art in peace building, conflict resolution in post-conflict societies, and the role of intellectuals in peace building.
The conference is part of a regional project entitled “Build Bridges, Not Walls: The Role of Universities in Peace Building,” supported by the Norwegian Helsinki Committee. Norwegian Helsinki Committee representative Enver Đuliman and the President of the Serbian Helsinki Committee, Sonja Biserko, greeted the students and lecturers at the beginning of the conference.
Professor Ćurak used the opportunity to present the work of the Atlantic Initiative to promote Euro-Atlantic values that support peace and peace building. In that context, he also presented a small donation of materials to the representative of the Dr. Lazar Vrkatić Law and Business School Library, including books and journals written by Atlantic Initiative members and associates.
This donation will be especially useful to students with a Civic-Business Security Management major, because the curriculum includes topics often researched by the AI team and published in AI publications.
During his lecture, Dr Ćurak gave much attention to the “feminization of security” as one of the ways to increase conflict resolution in unstable geopolitical regions. He stressed the importance of a very successful AI project entitled Gender and Security Sector Reform in BiH. This topic attracted a lot of interest, especially from female participants of the conference.
This initial activity by AI in Novi Sad has created an opening for further cooperation, and was strongly aligned with the Atlantic Initiative’s mission and vision.
(May 18, 2013)
