John Reuwer Peace Practitioner And Educator - National Tour February

John Reuwer is a retired emergency physician whose practice convinced him of a crying need for alternatives to violence for resolving tough conflicts.

This led him to the informal study and teaching of nonviolence for the last 35 years, with peace team field experience in Haiti, Colombia, Central America, Palestine/Israel, and several US inner cities.

He has also studied and lectured in peace studies at Virginia Tech, Radford University, St. Michaels College, Elizabethtown College, The University of Vermont, and the US Army War College at Carlisle, PA.

He served for four months as an International Protection Officer with the Nonviolent Peaceforce in South Sudan and most recently worked tirelessly with our Ukrainian board member Yuri Sheliazhenko in Kyiv to create an unarmed civilian protection team to mitigate the danger around the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant, making three trips multiple trips to the front line to do so.

Most recently since John relocated to Washington DC with his wife Laurie from Vermont he has been involved in protests and campaigns with other organisations against the war in Gaza.

He has long wanted to visit New Zealand, hoping to learn more about the contributions New Zealand has made to world peace, particularly the work of Te Whiti and the Maori at Parihaka, the groundbreaking peacekeeping operation in Bougainville, and how the nation was able to free itself from participation in U.S. nuclear war preparations, and become a nuclear-free zone.

This is a great chance to forward the cause and awareness of peace making in Aotearoa in 2023 and we would be grateful for your support.

This tour is being organised by a group of Quakers and others in the peace community and is self funded, with donations going to the World Beyond War organisation.

John can speak on a wide range of topics.

John doesn’t claim to have the answers, but does enjoy presenting enough material to stimulate fruitful discussions. He has been a facilitator for World BEYOND War’s online courses “War Abolition 201” and “Leaving World War II Behind.” John Reuwer is Treasurer and a Member of the Board of Directors of World BEYOND War.

Information on John’s Wife, Laurie Gagne, who has specialised in theology and Peace.

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