This is an archived USAID document retained on this web site as a matter of public record.
Administrator J. Brian Atwood
World Vision Forum on Reconciliation
Washington, D.C., April 18, 1997
U.S. Agency for International Development
I am pleased to welcome all of you to the State Department
complex, and to have the opportunity to participate in this World
Vision Conference on Reconciliation. In a fragmented world,
few things are more important than the work of reconciliation.
And few are more difficult.
World Vision is one of our largest worldwide implementing
partners, providing food and other humanitarian relief and
helping people to move from crisis toward sustainable
development. Our collaboration ranges from water development
projects to providing prosthetic services for war and landmine
victims in Vietnam to distributing seed and tool packages and
rebuilding Rwanda's capacity to generate its own seed supplies.
In its work in 90 countries, World Vision is often on the
front lines where conflict continues or threatens to resume .
The great tragedy of our time is that when the threat of
nuclear annihilation eased at the end of the Cold War, neighbor
turned to killing neighbor. Children are orphaned, endangered
and left homeless by the very people they should be able to turn
to in times of trouble.
There are more than 30 wars currently going on in our
world, largely internal conflicts between ethnic, religious, tribal
and political groups within individual states. Civilians are often
the targets as well as the unintended victims in these conflicts,
and mothers and children are as likely to die as soldiers.
Children are the most vulnerable to the ravages of disease
and malnutrition that accompany the chaos and devastation of war
and the mass migrations that often result. They are maimed by
forgotten landmines and bombs left by nameless terrorists on
buses. They are lost in the fleeing crowds of almost 50 million
refugees and persons displaced within their own countries.
Children are turned into soldiers. Guns and grenades are
thrust into the hands of young boys who are not only the victims
of war and violence, but become perpetrators as well.
They spend their youth learning how to kill instead of
learning how to make a living and a life.
If we cannot find ways to bring about reconciliation,
today's children in crisis will become the sources of tomorrow's
crisis in a cycle that will never end.
The tragic breakup of states, mass killings and mass
migrations have dominated the news in much of this decade. Yet
we have also seen progress in many intransigent conflicts where
there had long seemed little hope. Even as the fighting between
Hutus and Tutsis in Rwanda was exploding into Zaire, the
remarkable Guatemalan peace accords were signed.
USAID immediately built demobilization camps in
Guatemala . Former combatants must eventually be reintegrated
into society. Getting them away from their weapons and into
training for jobs in peacetime society are vital first steps.
This program is part of our efforts to bridge the gap
between humanitarian aid in crises and long-term development.
When I came to USAID in 1993, there was nothing in between.
In early 1994, with the support of Congress, we launched
the Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI) to target problems that
can plunge societies attempting to overcome crises back into
chaos. Fragile situations provide brief opportunities that quickly
pass if not pursued immediately.
Until people feel a degree of safety, they are not ready for
political development. That was the lesson of the first, failed
transition in Angola. The second time around, OTI supported
civic training and demobilization for ex-combatants; community
self-governance; and we increased the flow of accurate,
uncensored news. We reached 1.4 million people with mine
awareness education and trained 750 in mine removal techniques.
Significant reductions in mine accidents allowed large areas of the
country to be re-opened to commerce and agriculture. Refugees
and displaced persons were able to return to their homes.
People can begin to forgive the past when they have a stake in the
future.
Back in the mid-1980s, when apartheid was still in place and
Nelson Mandella was still in prison -- when the end of oppression
was not yet in sight -- Archbishop Desmond Tutu said:
"Some people think reconciliation is a soft option, that
it means papering over the cracks. But the Biblical meaning
means looking facts in the face and it can be very costly; it
cost God the death of his own son. We witness by being a
community of reconciliation, a forgiving community of the
forgiven."
Bishop Tutu is still working for reconciliation despite his
own illness. The commission of truth and reconciliation he heads
is an important part of looking facts in the face and forgiving.
President Nelson Mandela himself is a powerful personification of
that spirit of a forgiving community of the forgiven.
Twenty years ago, the Camp David accords were signed
only after Menachim Begin and Anwar Sadat focused on their
beloved grandchildren. Lifetimes of war and terrorism had left
both men with too many memories of the pain inflicted on their
people. Both men had been part of inflicting that pain on the
other. Yet how could they let past history condemn a new
generation of children to an endless repetition of revenge and
retribution?
Last month, King Hussein of Jordan went to Jerusalem to
console grieving mothers and ask for their forgiveness. He was
also asking, "How can the coming generation live?" That makes
peace and reconciliation possible.
Once that is the question, there is clearly no time for
recriminations. There is too much to do. That is when the real
work of rebuilding communities and countries can begin. Then
we can move from trying to keep people alive to helping them
build better lives for themselves and their children.
This is an archived USAID document retained on this web site as a matter of public record.
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Last Updated on: July 18, 2001
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