On 18 September 2024, the 10th Anniversary of the HWPL World Peace Summit will be celebrated in South Korea and in various locations across 122 countries. Themed ‘Creating World Peace Community Through Regional Collaboration’, the event honours a decade of dedication to peace by global leaders and citizens, while focusing on future strategies to promote global harmony.
In 2014, the Heavenly Culture, World Peace, Restoration of Light (HWPL), an international peace organisation, convened over a thousand leaders from politics, religion, women’s groups, youth organisations, and the media from about 140 countries for the first HWPL World Peace Summit in Seoul. The summit focused on addressing issues such as conflict resolution, religious harmony, and the establishment of legal instruments to secure lasting peace.
HWPL states that the anniversary’s purpose is to reflect on the achievements made since 2014 and to outline future plans. The event aims to gather regional talents and create networks that are crucial for tailored peace strategies, reinforcing regional networks to address local peace threats and utilising collective capacities. Various sessions will be held at different levels in each country to achieve these goals.
With the slogan “Let’s have everyone become a messenger of peace,” HWPL promotes the idea that every individual has a role in advancing peace at all levels. The organisation plans to gather peace messages from people around the world and reveal them at the event, representing the collective aspiration for peace and unity of people from all backgrounds.
Since the agreements were signed in 2014, HWPL and its global partners have committed to tackling global challenges such as military tensions, economic conflicts, climate change, and cyber security threats through strengthened regional cooperation and collective action. HWPL remains dedicated to establishing a strong peace governance framework that links international organisations, governments, and civil society.
At the 9th Anniversary in 2023, Chairman Lee Man-hee of HWPL stated, “Why should the lives of young people be sacrificed in war? What is politics, and for whom is it for? When war breaks out, it is young people who are sacrificed. Peace cannot be achieved through words alone. If peace had won in this world, there would have been no regrettable deaths. We must leave peace as a legacy to the global community where our descendants will live.”
