Jordan Times
Thursday, July 15, 2006
Second Nobel laureates conference opens next week
AMMAN (JT) — Nobel laureates and national and religious leaders will convene in Petra next week to discuss and define their roles in responding to global crises.
The second Petra Conference of Nobel Laureates, slated for June 21-22, will be hosted by the King Abdullah II Fund for Development and the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity.
His Majesty King Abdullah will deliver a keynote address at the opening ceremony of the conference, a Royal Court official told the Jordan News Agency, Petra, yesterday.
The King’s speech will focus on establishing a global partnership between Nobel laureates who have achieved significant success and contributed to the making of human history with their thoughts and innovations.
During the two-day conference, participants are scheduled to discuss challenges to global security and development, the strategies and activities of the Nobel Laureates Initiative launched last year, the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and other regional issues.
Nobel laureates from the six fields in which the Nobel Prize is awarded each year — peace, economics, literature, physics, chemistry, and physiology and medicine —are expected to attend.
These include Peter Agre, Aaron Ciechanover, Johann Deisenhofer, Avram Hershko and Yuan T. Lee, in chemistry; Richard Axel, Baruch S. Blumberg, Christian de Duve and Eric R. Kandel in medicine; Georges Charpak, Claude Cohen-Tannoudji, Val Fitch and Donald A. Glaser in physics; Finn E. Kydland and Robert A. Mundell in economics; Wole Soyinka in literature; and Frederik W. de Klerk, Jose Ramos-Horta and Dalai Lama in peace.
World-renowned leaders from the public and private sectors, as well as from civil society, will also attend the conference, including former US ambassador to the UN Richard C. Holbrooke, founder of Medecins sans Frontiers Bernard Kouchner, former US surgeon general David Satcher, Deputy Prime Minister of Thailand Sathirathai Surakiart, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund Representative Stephen Heintz, and Library of Alexandria Representative Ismail Serageldin.
Participants will congregate in the ancient city of Petra, a monument of human ingenuity and creativity, reflected in the symbiosis of the built and natural environments.