Emeritus Prof Kevin Clements said a letter arrived out of the blue on Wednesday informing him he was to receive the Luxembourg Peace Prize..
He was pleased and excited about the news and was hopeful he would travel to Luxembourg to receive the award in June.
Prof Clements’ message to young people who wanted to support peace was to start early and and go long.
The son of a conscientious objector, at 13 he was campaigning for nuclear disarmament.
He had also opposed the war in Vietnam.
He joked that at 75 he was probably getting the prize for longevity.
It was important to encourage peace education and conflict resolution skills.
All people had the opportunity to contribute to peace.
Peacebuilding was about having a compassionate disposition to suffering, and accepting an obligation to lessen it.
From people’s backyards to the war in Ukraine, peaceful resolutions to disputes were possible.
The war in Ukraine was reminding people of the dangers of nuclear war and the peace movement had a lot of work to do.
The recent Parliament grounds protest in Wellington had shown there were serious fault-lines in New Zealand and mitigating inequalities should be the Government’s priority once the focus came off the Covid-19 response.
Prof Clements had no plans to quit working towards peace anytime soon and was enjoying his "retirement job" as the director of the Tota Peace Institute in Japan.
