MANIFESTO & ACTIONS
FIRST MOTHERS OF THE EARTH FOR WORLD PEACE SUMMIT
Piacenza, Italy September 22-23, 2006

We begin this Manifesto by thanking Marzio Dallagiovanna, Cristiano Grandi, Vittorio Torrembini and the Gorbachev Foundation Italy for the enormous amount of hard work they did to insure the first Mothers of the Earth for World Peace Summit in Piacenza, Italy was such a resounding success.

Our appreciation goes to the City of Piacenza, both the President of the Region, Gian Luigi Boiardi, and the Mayor of the city, Roberto Reggi, not only for funding but also for attending the event.  They were instrumental in assuring that the Summit was attended by several hundred young people drawn from the Province which was one of the great highlights of the Summit. 

When we first thought about having a summit in Piacenza the question was: “What for? What shall we accomplish through it? To whom are we going to talk?” The answer was: “Youngs are the future of the world, we will talk to them.”

We think that we have achieved our goal and feel and hope that this summit will bring a very creative attitude towards peace and a deep sense of responsibility in the youngs and adults that have participated. The main goal for us is that youngs can tell and promote the peace language of dialogue among the others. As Mahatma Gandhi used to say,” There is no path to PEACE.  PEACE is the path.”

We also feel the youth learned an enormous amount about the work of World Centers of Compassion for Children International and of Nobel Peace Laureates, Betty Williams, Rigoberta Menchu Tum, Shirin Ebadi and Jody Williams. 

All of these women are friends and all work individually and tirelessly not only in their respective countries, but in the world to create a new way of thinking, a way that approaches the issues of violence by teaching non-violence and how this strategy can work to change the death and destruction this world is subjected to on a daily basis and create situations where justice and peace can be achieved using the techniques of non-violence.

Indeed Shirin Ebadi and Jody Williams have created the Nobel Womens Initiative bringing together seven living female Nobel Peace Laureates including Wangari Maathai, Mairead Maguire, Rigoberta Menchu Tum, Betty Williams and our beloved sister Aung San Suu Kyi, who although under house arrest in Burma by the illegal ruling military junta, is included in the initiative but cannot participate.

The summit served to announce for the first time in Italy the creation of this initiative.

In the several sessions with each Nobel Peace Laureate in attendance the main emphasis was on the present situation in the Middle East and the role of the Bush administration.

Jody Williams emphasized the fact that knowing the vast majority of the American people did not support the invasion of Iraq; the Bush administration ignored the facts and called those opposing the war rabble rousers.

Rigoberta Menchu Tum emphasized that a non-violent solution must be found to avoid any further bloodshed in the Middle East.

Shirin Ebadi spoke about the possibility of an invasion of Iran by the United States of America and cautioned very careful approaches as to how the political situation should be handled as the Iranian government were themselves abusers of human rights.  She urged that all diplomatic and political avenues be exhausted to find a solution to what now appears to be a political standoff.

Betty Williams stipulated, as an Irish person, she and the people of Ireland were only too familiar with the result of invasion by the British.  In her remarks she related how the British invasion over 850 years ago was still being dealt with today. 

Mrs. Williams said the pre-emptive strike, as George Bush refers to it, was indeed an invasion and she foresaw this leading to 1,000 years of hostility in the Middle East.

Scott Ritter, former Chief U.N. Weapons Inspector in the Middle East and Advisor to World Centers of Compassion for Children International talked about his recent visit to Iran.  He said that the citizens of Iran treated him, as an American, with great warmth.  In fact, the consensus of opinion was very favourable towards the West.  He visited the facility outside Iran that was ‘supposed’ to be making nuclear weapons.  He was allowed full access and could find no evidence of the manufacture of nuclear weapons.   He also stated that, in his opinion, the people of Iran were good people; it’s the government that is tyrannical. The message to the youngs was clear and loud: “Stop the war! Or they will attack Iran by next March.”  They asked him how?  His answer was, “Peace begins with us, from whatever country, creed or culture you may belong, do whatever you can.”

President De Filippo of the Region Basilicata was represented by Valerio Giambersio who spoke about building of the first City of Peace in the world for children on land given by the Region. 

The medical research center in the first City of Peace in Basilicata will house the proud name of “The Albert Schweitzer Research Center for Children.”  David Ives, Executive Director of The Albert Schweitzer Institute at Quinnipiac University, Hamden, Connecticut, will proudly spread the mantra of the great man with a “Reverence for Life” by joining with WCCCI and overseeing the creation of medical facilities in each City of Peace worldwide that WCCCI intends to build.

The Mothers of the Earth Award 2006, created by renowned artist, Franco Scepi, was given to Jetsun Pema, sister and ambassador of His Holiness the Dalai Lama for her work spanning 40 years in support of the refugee children from Tibet.

We thank everyone involved in the fundraising soccer match between Nazionale Cantanti and Nazionale Sindaci at the Stadio Comunale Garilli which will be used for the project in the Region Basilicata with construction beginning in 2007.

Our deep appreciation also goes to the Mayor of Castell’Arquato, Alberto Fermi, who hosted the closing dinner and the presentation of the “Education to Peace” course by Teresa Campi, under the auspices of World Centers of Compassion for Children International, with fifteen teachers training in the two days following the Summit. 

It is WCCCI’s intention to create peace curriculums in every school in Italy.  This model can then be spread worldwide. This has already started with the international work of WCCCI and the Summit has given to it an even greater input.

For this reason we have established that PeaceJam, involving thousands of young people in 19 established affiliate regions around the world and 12 Nobel Peace Laureates, (His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, President Oscar Arias, Aung San Suu Kyi, Rigoberta Menchu Tum, Mairead Corrigan Maguire, Betty Williams, Jody Williams, Alolfo Perez Esquivel, Jose Ramos-Horta, Sir Joseph Rotblat (now deceased) and Shirin Ebadi), will hold the first PeaceJam in Italy in the beautiful village of Castell’Arquato.

Dawn Engle and Ivan Suvanjieff, the founders of PeaceJam will travel to Italy in the near future to pave the way for the event.  For more information, log on to their website www.peacejam.org.      

The success of this Summit pushed us to the consideration that Piacenza and the region Emilia Romagna are a perfect setting to create the second City of Compassion for Children in Italy.

It is for this reason, following the closure of the formal Summit, leaders of the WCCCI board and volunteer community met in Piacenza to formalize specific actions to analyze this possibility.