By Lowana Veal<\/p>\n\n\n\n
REYKJAVIK, Iceland (IDN) \u2014 While the global media is focusing on the decision of Finland and Sweden to join NATO against the backdrop of the Ukraine War, along with the Israel\u2013Palestine conflict, little attention is paid to the Nordic Council of Ministers and the vision of the Nordic Council \u2014which involves Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, the Faroe Islands, Greenland and \u00c5land\u2014to make the Nordic region the\u00a0most sustainable and integrated region in the world<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This year, Iceland holds the Presidency for the Nordic Council of Ministers. A year ago, it produced its programme for the Presidency, entitled\u00a0A Nordic Region \u2013 A Force for Peace<\/a>, while in 2019 the Nordic Council of Ministers produced\u00a0New Nordic Peace \u2013 Nordic Peace and Conflict Resolution Efforts<\/a>. The latter was written by Anine Hagemann and Isabel Bramsen, who were among the speakers at\u00a0The Imagine Forum: Nordic Solidarity for Peace<\/a>. The Forum was held 10-11 October 2023 in Harpa conference center in Reykjav\u00edk, Iceland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hagermann coined the term \u2018Why war and how peace\u2019 in her presentation, saying there was a necessity for improved communication in peace research, while Bramsen pointed out that countries such as Turkey, China, Syria, Armenia and even Russia were now acting as mediators\u2014this had not been the case in the past.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is perhaps appropriate that the conference be held in Iceland, which has just been ranked as the world\u2019s most peaceful country<\/a> for the 14th year in a row by the Institute of Economics and Peace. \u201cIt\u2019s not easy to talk about peace when there is war elsewhere,\u201d commented Katr\u00edn Jakobsd\u00f3ttir, Prime Minister of Iceland, at the opening of the forum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jakobsd\u00f3ttir from the Left-Green Party pointed out that there is increased strife over climate and resources, along with a huge decrease in women\u2019s rights in Afghanistan and Iran. And \u201cwe can\u2019t do any climate action without peace\u201d, she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe need to double down on the SDGs [Sustainable Development Goals]. \u2026 Without SDGs, peace will always be at risk,\u201d said Amina J Mohammed, Deputy Secretary-General of the UN and Chair of the UN SDG Group, who gave the keynote speech. \u201cWe have only reached 15% of our targets for 2030,\u201d she pointed out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Norwegian Minister of International Development Anne Beathe Tvinnereim, who is also Minister of Nordic Cooperation, pointed out that \u201cclimate change and migration add to the complexities of peace\u201d and that the SDGs are fundamental to the peace process. \u201cTrust is the key,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tvinnereim\u2019s Icelandic counterpart, Gu\u00f0mundur Ingi Gu\u00f0brandsson\u2014who besides being Minister for Nordic Cooperation is also Minister of Social Affairs and the Labour Market\u2014noted: \u201cIf we get more information on climate change and peace, we get a solution\u2026 In some countries we are seeing more environmental refugees. Environmental protection is a key to promoting peace.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mohammed pointed out that \u201cChad is under immense pressure from refugees\u201d while Tobias Etzold from the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs<\/a> (NUPI) noted that there are increased refugee flows due to climate change, although climate migration is usually internal migration or cross-border land migration. \u201cThere is an overlap between climate exposure countries and conflict exposure countries,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jannie Lilja from the Swedish thinktank SIPRI<\/a> said that trust was a key issue and pointed out that peace could also be totalitarian or cold. She said that the role of development aid needs to be subject to scrutiny, and that SIPRI has looked at the composition of aid: \u201cIn post-conflict situations, targeted assistance countries were more likely to keep peace than other countries that were not subject to targeted assistance.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Marko Lehti from the Finnish Tampere Peace Research Institute<\/a> noted that Europe has been a blind spot in peace research, which has been more focused on the global south. \u201cThe Russian war with Ukraine brought the interwar situation back to Europe. Peace cannot be exported,\u201d he stated. Jannie Lilja picked up on this, saying: \u201cWe could have seen indicators if we hadn\u2019t been concentrating on looking at the global south and the violence there,\u201d referring to Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Human rights advocates also had an input into the Imagine forum. Sanam Naraghi Anderlini, CEO of the International Civil Society Action Network<\/a> (ICAN) and leader of the Women\u2019s Alliance for Security Leadership<\/a>, talked about living in an age of extremism\u2014where water is owned by multinationals\u2014and the weaponization of identity, of ethno-national and religious identities where one identity is \u2018over\u2019 another. \u201cWe\u2019re not investing in peace. Much more is invested in war than peace in the US\u201d, she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\nSDGs are fundament<\/strong>al<\/h3>\n\n\n\n