EMBARGOED UNTIL DELIVERY
9.00 AM THURSDAY 24 MAY 2007

Rt Hon Helen Clark
Prime Minister

Opening Address to
ALLIANCE OF CIVILISATIONS SYMPOSIUM

at

Langham Hotel, Auckland

9.00 am
Thursday 24 May 2007
Welcome to New Zealand and to this Alliance of Civilisations high-level Symposium.

The opening sentence of the report by the Alliance of Civilisations High Level Group sums up the current state of our world in one short phrase – that it is "alarmingly out of balance".

The report offers pathways to redress that imbalance.

It offers genuine alternatives to the bleak prophecy of near inevitable conflict between civilisations, popularised by Samuel Huntington in the mid 1990s.

The New Zealand Government also rejects that bleak prophecy. In our small, multicultural society with a bicultural foundation, we work to include all ethnicities, cultures, faiths and beliefs as stakeholders, recognising that each brings the richness of its heritage to the building of our nation.

We New Zealanders live in a region of considerable diversity, in which we have been accepted as genuine and constructive partners by nations vastly different from our own. In turn we believe we contribute to the overall strength and development of our region.

Our experience at home in New Zealand and in our own region leads us to believe that at the global level it is possible to build a world which respects and accommodates difference, and acts on good neighbour principles in promoting development, peace, and security.

It was more than a decade ago that Huntington wrote that: "The clash of civilisations will dominate global politics. The fault lines between civilisations will be the battle lines of the future."

He saw potential for conflict between all civilisations, but he considered the greatest fault line to be between the liberal, democratic, secular West, and conservative, faith-based Islam.

He spoke of the increasing primacy of the West in the mid 1990s, the re-emergence of old east-west divisions within Europe following the end of the Cold War, the emotions aroused by the first Gulf War, and the tensions caused by increased non-Western migration into Europe.

From the outset Huntington had many critics. He was accused of being simplistic and reductive, for providing intellectual justification for ‘them and us’ thinking and militarism, and for underestimating the power of nationalism as a focus for identity.

The changes which have shaken the world since Huntington proposed his theory may be perceived by some to give it a superficial plausibility.

For there can be little doubt that tensions between the West and the Islamic world have been increasing.

Huntington was writing at the height of the war in Bosnia, an aspect of which was conflict between those of Islamic and Christian faiths. In the years since we have witnessed the conflict in Afghanistan and Chechnya, the second Gulf War, the ongoing violence in Israel/Palestine, the events of ‘9/11’ and their aftermath, and the war in Iraq.

But while it is hard to deny that we live in a time of escalating tensions, what we do not have to accept is that there is anything inevitable or unavoidable about these developments, or that future conflict is unavoidable. It is surely up to responsible countries and people of goodwill to build bridges across the divides which have been created.

Tensions between groups have been exacerbated by globalisation. Increasingly through both migration and modern communications, communities are coming into contact with unfamiliar beliefs, cultures and religions, and differences between them are being accentuated. Power and wealth imbalances become much more apparent too.

It could also be true as the UNESCO representative said at the recent Singapore ASEAN Regional Forum meeting on counter-terrorism recently, that the “clash of civilisations” can be seen more realistically as a “clash of ignorances”.

Yet tension which arises from ignorance, unfamiliarity, and lack of understanding can be resolved. It can be overcome by dialogue, by education, and by a willingness to learn from and be tolerant of others. The Alliance of Civilisations Report makes practical proposals on how to move forward on this front.

Already a range of regional and global processes have been put in place to build greater tolerance and understanding. In our region, there is the Asia Pacific Regional Interfaith Dialogue. Next week, multi-faith delegations from the Asia Pacific will hold their third major dialogue here in New Zealand.

This regional Interfaith Dialogue is focused on religious belief, and so is more specific in focus than today’s gathering. But we can be sure that next week’s Dialogue meeting will be taking a very close look at what comes out of this Alliance of Civilisations Symposium. The two processes have much to contribute to each other.

Just as the Interfaith Dialogue is a regional platform from which to build understanding between faiths, so the Alliance of Civilisations initiative offers a global opportunity for overcoming fractures between societies and cultures.

This initiative was launched in 2005 by then UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan. It was sponsored by Spain and Turkey, two countries which have long been at the crossroads of civilisations. The intention was to develop practical proposals to help reduce the polarisation which was developing between civilisations, particularly between the West and Islam.

The most obvious point of tension was and is the Middle East, and that region was identified as a key focus for the Alliance of Civilisations initiative. But conflict in the Middle East and tension between Islam and the Western world has ripple effects all the way to the Asia Pacific.

Here we live at the intersection of many of the world’s great civilisations, faiths, and belief systems. Our region has extremes of wealth and poverty. It includes a wide range of political traditions, all the way from one-party states to liberal western democracies.

We are fortunate that for the most part relationships here are not as troubled as those of the Middle East. But we also have to acknowledge that we are not immune from misunderstanding and discord.

We have seen this, for instance, in the inter-communal violence in the southern Philippines and southern Thailand, in the war in Sri Lanka, and, – perhaps most vividly for many New Zealanders – in the 2002 Bali bombing.

There is a risk in the Asia Pacific as elsewhere that those with a rigid adherence to their own beliefs and principles will overlook the fundamental truth that diversity is one of humanity’s greatest strengths and not a weakness.

Embracing diversity is the most effective means we have for dampening the embers which, when ignited, lead to intolerance, fanaticism and terrorism.

Embracing diversity is a central mission of the Alliance of Civilisations – which brings us to the focus of today’s Symposium. It is co-sponsored by New Zealand and Norway – I had hoped to be able to welcome former Norwegian Prime Minister, Kjell Magne Bondevik, now President of the Oslo Centre for Peace and Human Rights, here today.

Unfortunately due to last minute flight cancellations he is not able to join us but I am grateful to the Government of Norway for all their assistance.

One of the first tasks of the Alliance of Civilisations was to set up a diverse and highly-qualified High Level Group, and to commission it to produce a report and recommendations on the state of relationships between civilisations. We are very fortunate that the Co-Chair of the High Level Group, His Excellency Professor Dr Mehmet Aydin, Minister of State of the Republic of Turkey, is here with us today.

The High Level Group released its Report in November last year. The Report is divided into two parts: the first focuses particularly on the Middle East, and the second covers four key themes:

- ensuring that education gives people an accurate picture of other peoples and cultures;

- encouraging the media to avoid stereotyping and the overstating of conflict and disagreement;

- giving young people more opportunities to understand people from other countries and societies; and

- developing migration policies which avoid creating either resentment or fear.

The recommendations have as their overarching goal the building of tolerance between societies and cultures – the embracing of diversity which I talked about before.

The recommendations put forward by the High-level Group are thoughtful and worthy of close consideration. I hope that as a group we can work through them today in a practical way, assessing which might be most appropriate for our societies and considering ways in which the best of the ideas might be put into practice.

This meeting brings together leaders, ministers, academics, and practitioners with members of the High Level Group, including Co-Chair, Minister Mehmet Aydin; His Excellency Mr Ali Alatas of Indonesia, who addressed us last evening; from Spain and representing the Spanish Co-Chair, Secretary of State Bernardino Léon; and from China, Professor Pan Guang, Director of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences.

This is an impressive gathering, and I would like to thank you all for your participation. I hope we will come away from this meeting with solid and ambitious proposals for future action.

As we begin, I would like to quote the words of one of the members of the High-level Group, Her Highness Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser Al Missned of Qatar, who spoke in February this year at Chatham House in London. She said:

“Choosing to act for peace is not an easy route. It entails that we trust each other and have confidence in ourselves. It requires us to collaborate and seek a cure in creativity. The path to progress is paved with a shared moral vision. It leads us to a place where our words are supported by actions.”

With these words in mind, let us now take a practical step towards forging a stronger alliance of civilisations in the Asia Pacific region.

I’ll hand over now to Minister Mehmet Aydin from Turkey to begin our journey.

Thank you.

ENDS

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