Press Releases

This morning in Milan, sunny skies and over 3000 children and students from Lombardy welcomed the World March for Peace and Nonviolence with a celebratory parade, carrying thousands of blue balloons. Waiting for them on the stage in Piazza Duomo were Ivan Ramiro Cordoba, the celebrity footballer and supporter of the March, and Alessandro Cattelan of Radio 105.

After having crossed Oceania, Asia, the Middle East, northern Europe and the Balkans, the World March for Peace and Nonviolence arrived in Italy today, where it will remain until November 12. Trieste, the first Italian stop, welcomed the March with official greetings from the Mayor and the Provincial President, and a huge symbol of peace in the evocative Piazza dell’Unità.

After being received by the Hungarian delegation of the World March for Peace and Non-violence and its representative Balazs Szigeti, the marchers completed a section of the route that – despite the rain – was memorable and full of surprises. Fire jugglers, dancers and choristers wowed the marchers before their arrival at the forecourt of Buda Castle in Budapest.

An important press conference with participants such as Alena Gajdusova, First Vice-president of the Senate, Rafael de La Rubia, president of World Without Wars, and Otakar Mika, expert in nuclear arms issues. They all emphasized that it is important for countries to choose to reduce armaments and assign new roles for their armies.

The press conference to present the 2009 Report was held on last Monday. The data is surprising: long stays, very high rates of education and employment. Results that undermine the rhetoric on irregular immigration and which throw light on an unknown universe that is viewed with mistrust.
The report analyses data collected between 2000 and 2008.

On the road from Salonicco to Skopje, the coach carrying the World March of the Balkans was welcomed by mayors, councillors for culture and hundreds of children and teachers in the towns of the Republic of Macedonia. The march, organised by the humanist organisation, World Without Wars, this time passed through Bitola, Resen, Ohrid, Struga, Gostivar, Tetovo and Skopje.

In Stockholm, for the third time on its journey, the delegates of the World March have been welcomed by members of a National Parliament. Per Bolund, member of the Green Party, declared *“by passing through Sweden the World March has given us the real push to work on the theme of peace and nonviolence in our Parliament”*.

The institutions of Salonicco came together at the Aristotelous University to welcome the World March delegation on its arrival in the city. During the ceremony, March spokesman Schultze presented the Charter for a World without Violence, written by Nobel Peace Prize winners, to the President of UNESCO, who undertook to disseminate it widely.

Finnish President Tarja Halonen received a delegation of the World March for Peace and Non-Violence that had recently arrived from Estonia in the official presidential residence in Helsinki. Halonen expressed her public support for the March, saying, “The government of Finland supports the total elimination of nuclear arms”.

A group made up of Estonian Liberal and Green Party MPs, led by Toomas Trapido, welcomed the World March base team to Tallinn. Rafael de la Rubia, spokesperson for the march, presented the Parliament with the March Manifesto, the Hiroshima-Nagasaki Protocol and the *Charter for a World without Violence* drafted by Nobel Peace Laureates.