By Kinia Adamczyk
GDAŃSK, Poland -- The Gdańsk shipyards basked in a golden glow as the two-day conference "Solidarity for the Future", which commemorated the 25th anniversary of the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Lech Wałęsa in recognition of Solidarity's contribution to building freedom and democracy in Poland, came to a close on December 6, 2008.
The messages of peace and hope delivered by politicians, public figures and peace-builders echoed in the hearts and minds of the 200+ attendees of the conference, which included international youth invited by the Lech Wałęsa Institute for the occasion.
"You young people are all potential peace prize laureates. Do the work and you will make it. (...) You can do it,” encouraged Ole D. Mjøs, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, addressing an audience that included Shirin Ebadi, Frederik Willem de Klerk and (His Holiness the 14th ) Dalai Lama, three Nobel Peace Prize Winners invited for the occasion.
Politicians, including Polish and Hungarian prime ministers Donald Tusk and Ferenc Gyursany and French President Nicolas Sarkozy, and more than two dozen public figures such as economist Leszek Balcerowicz and President of Green Cross International Jan Kulczyk, tried to answer a few "big questions."
Is world peace possible?
Will Europe be a source of stability or will it endanger peaceful development in the 21st century world?
How can we confront the imminent economic crisis?
the cosmopolitan review, in partnership with the College of Europe (Natolin campus, Warsaw), was in Gdańsk for this important conference whose aim, in the words of Lech Wałęsa (right), was to "reflect upon the social and political reality of the contemporary world, and to focus on the regions that most desperately pine for solidarity and international cooperation."
CR decided to highlight a few meaningful quotes from the conference through a photo-reportage. Wałęsa made clear the purpose of the conference but the words spoken in Gdańsk will only have real meaning if acted upon. It is vital that the participants will not remain passive. Peace (in some way, not unlike war,) requires hard work and dedication. For peace to overcome war, nations and their people must show solidarity.
In the 1980s, millions of Poles spent sleepless nights editing and distributing underground press and books, gathering in street demonstrations, laying flowers, carrying banners and shouting their opposition to the authorities. Through the Solidarity movement, they peacefully overcame the Communist regime, which had been imposed on them for more than four decades by the Soviet Union.
The streets and shipyards of Gdańsk deserve the peace its inhabitants fought for in the 80s. They deserve the golden glow they are basking in.
But the words quoted in CR's photoreportage must be backed by action, and their speakers can't afford to merely bask in the reflected glory of Gdańsk. Otherwise, they will just remain pretty political promises. CR
(Kinia would like to thank artist Małgorzata Truszkowska, a gdańsczanka who showed incredible hospitality to the author during her stay in Gdańsk. The young, successful artist's work will be featured in a future issue of CR.)
Article and photos by Kinia Adamczyk for cosmopolitanreview.com by cosmopolitanreview.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 Canada License.
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