CPPCC Vice-Chairman Urges Promotion of Dialogue Among CivilizationsThe promotion of dialogue and the elimination of threats to peace are the hope of all peoples in the world, said Song Jian, vice-chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC),at a UN-organized meeting that ends in Vienna Friday, December 15.Song, also president of the Chinese Academy of Engineering (CAE), was invited to attend the three-day meeting as a member of the Group of Eminent Persons for the UN Dialogue among Civilizations. He and 18 other members, including former German president Roman Herzog, will draft a report over the dialogue among civilizations for UN Secretary-general Kofi Annan to be submitted to the 56th General Assembly. In his speech, Song said that diversity of cultures and civilizations is the endowment of nature at the root of human evolution, and any attempt to deny or diminish the diversity goes against history and science. The goals of dialogue among civilizations are mainly to solve disputes, avoid conflicts and enhance cooperation, advocate peaceful co-existence and common prosperity of countries with different cultural values and ideologies, and establish a new paradigm of international relations conductive to peace and development. The "Clash of civilizations" theory neglects the positive role diversity has played along the road of exchange and integration in the history of mankind, Song emphasized, warning that stirring enmity and antagonism between civilizations is incompatible with the aspiration of the overwhelming majority of peoples and the mainstream of the new century: peace and development. Song also asked the United Nations to play an important role in promoting dialogue among civilizations. In November 1998,the UN Assembly passed a resolution proposed by Iranian President Seyyed Mohammad Khatami to proclaim 2001 as the UN year of dialogue among civilizations. |
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