People building peace Annual Report 2017 About us Conciliation Resources is an independent international organisation working with people in confict to prevent violence, resolve conficts and promote peaceful societies. Our vision is of a world where people Our work together to resolve conficts and visiOn promote peaceful and inclusive societies. Our Our mission is to provide practical support to help people affected by violent confict achieve lasting peace. We draw on our shared missiOn experiences to improve peacebuilding policies and practice worldwide. Collaboration Our We believe that everybody affected by confict has a stake in peace. We work to create peaceful and inclusive change within societies values in partnership with local people, to respond to violence, inequality, injustice and exclusion. Creativity We believe that peacebuilding needs to be fexible and adaptive to the specifc and evolving realities of each confict context. We support innovative ways to infuence change, and we share insights from people’s lived experience globally to build collective knowledge and expertise. Challenge We believe that peace can only come about if people have a chance to better understand their confict and if diffcult conversations are held between allies and adversaries. We stand alongside those who, with courage and integrity, reach out across confict divides. Commitment We believe that building sustainable peace takes time. That’s why we make long-term commitments to support just and resilient transitions from protracted confict to lasting peace. Welcome Visiting ‘Home Place’, a centre dedicated to I refect back on the past year with pride and the life and work of the Irish Nobel laureate concern. Pride at the determined work of poet Seamus Heaney, I was drawn to the Conciliation Resources’ partners and staff in their following words of his: efforts to build a more peaceful world. Concern because we cannot hide from the complexity of History says, don’t hope on this side of confict and the violence it begets around the globe. the grave. But then, once in a lifetime the Yet calling confict complex can hide the brutal longed for tidal wave of justice can rise simplicity of people being killed and communities up, and hope and history rhyme. So hope destroyed by persistent violence. This is simply for a great sea change on the far side of wrong. It can also hide the fact that there are revenge. Believe that a further shore is myriad ways to prevent and resolve confict – reachable from here. Believe in miracles, and this annual report presents some of those. and cures and healing wells. Conciliation Resources works with individuals, This report offers powerful testimony to communities and local, national and international the triumph of hope over history. It bears organisations, to bring about change in over a witness to places where hope and history dozen conficts around the world. Our staff and have rhymed. Poetic though it may sound, the partners demonstrate patience in the face of work of building peace is often demanding, persistent obstacles to peace, and impatience in un-remitting, hidden and frustrating. The the knowledge that efforts to confront violent work is never easy, nor its objectives naïve. confict in creative and new ways must not cease. Resources for peacebuilding remain a fraction of those devoted to military At the heart of this work is a combination of spending. Yet the reality is that resources relationships, ideas and action. Relationships devoted to confict resolution, are both that are tested by the toughest of circumstances practical and cost effective. and ideas that motivate and inspire people to seek change. We see people taking action to In a recent Conciliation Resources survey, cross physical and psychological boundaries; to 60% of the UK public indicated they would analyse and advocate for new approaches. We support more investment in peacebuilding. hold dear the need to constantly learn from In our crisis ridden world, we do need faith what we and others do, in order to do it better. that the tidal wave of justice can rise up, and hope and history rhyme. But if a further shore is Our work is not done in isolation. I would like to reachable from here, it can only be so through thank all those donors and policymakers, people the continued resourcing of governments and and communities living with confict, for the institutions, and insisted on by each of support they provide us. Ours is without doubt a us committed to a world free from confict. collaborative endeavour. Rt Rev Peter Price Jonathan Cohen Chair of Trustees Executive Director Conciliation Resources | Annual Report 2017 3 2017 in numbers In 2017 Conciliation Resources and partners… Held 13 dialogue events 1,627 on the confict over Jammu and Kashmir Worked with 31 women’s groups Trained 1,627 people through 58 training workshops in northeast Nigeria 84 Reached 3,559 young Resolved 84 local conficts people across 8 contexts in the Democratic Republic of Congo over issues like land and between refugees and host communities Supported 80 local Provided advice peace structures Engaged and insight to across 6 different with 14 confict parties countries armed groups and mediators in 8 peace processes Produced 20 publications and Focused on 17 flms, which were downloaded Worked with 71 partners confict contexts or watched 72,826 times 4 Conciliation Resources | Annual Report 2017 Our goals Causes and drivers of confict GOal 1 are peacefully transformed As a result of our support, relationships, people, academics and experts through facilitating governance practices and structures, and informal dialogue processes in South Asia and the legacies of violence, which are obstacles Caucasus. These platforms brought people together to discuss complex confict challenges and take to sustainable peace, are addressed. practical steps on specifc issues, as well as In order to build sustainable peace, the underlying sometimes linking to the formal peace processes. causes of confict need to be addressed. Throughout We used our experience to provide mediation 2017, we worked in multiple regions to tackle support to peace negotiations in the Philippines the legacies of violence, bring people together in and Colombia, and on the confict over the Ogaden dialogue and transform relationships damaged region in the Horn of Africa. We also sought to by confict. We provided opportunities for people ensure such processes were informed by the from all sides of a divide to meet and work realities of those who experience violence, by together to fnd solutions to the issues they face. feeding the perspectives of people directly affected Building connections between people with different by the conficts into the offcial processes. viewpoints, from different sides of a confict and from different sectors of society – such as Through organising study visits of people from communities that have experienced violence with one confict area to another, such as a group from the military – we contributed to the development Kenya which travelled to Liberia, we ensured that of trust and increased cooperation between them. valuable lessons on successful peacebuilding By establishing and supporting structures for approaches were shared. Contributing to efforts facilitating community-led discussions, we enabled to understand individual and collective memory in the mediation of local conficts in diverse contexts connection to conficts in both the South Caucasus including: West Africa, the Democratic Republic of and with Colombian women of the diaspora, we Congo, the Central African Republic and Kenya. helped address legacies of the past, as well as We connected politicians, civil society, business challenging destructive ongoing narratives. Below: A community meeting, Dungu, the Democratic Republic of Congo © Conciliation Resources Conciliation Resources | Annual Report 2017 5 Approaches to building GOal 2 peace support inclusion As a result of our engagement, expertise activities. In particular, in Jammu and Kashmir, and resources, peacebuilding and confict the Caucasus, the Democratic Republic of Congo prevention practice is more inclusive. and Nigeria, our work with young people enabled us to gain rich insight into their views on confict When laying the foundations for peace, it is and support them to create more peaceful important to respond to the priorities of local communities. In all the contexts where we work, populations in areas of confict. Having a diverse but especially in Colombia and East and Central range of people addressing violent confict, and Africa, we supported women to come together and aiding confict-affected populations to fnd and play a leading role in preventing and responding implement their own solutions, ensures approaches to violence. Through our work on gender and to building peace are more sustainable. peacebuilding, we improved how responsive we are to issues of gender in our own work and In 2017, we supported partners and others affected the work of others – including looking at how to by confict to initiate and direct initiatives to build improve the gender-sensitivity of programming peace. Across all the regions in which we work, our within the UN, EU and UK Government. reciprocal approach to partnership ensured that we worked collaboratively to develop networks, Working directly with ex-combatants and armed establish platforms and create programmes that groups from the Central African Republic, were informed by, and responded to, the realities Bougainville