Jordan Times
Monday, September 19, 2005
Queen underscores need to
promote cross-cultural dialogue
AMMAN (JT) — Human understanding, interfaith dialogue and tolerance as a medium
through which social progress can be achieved were the core of Her Majesty Queen
Rania's remarks at one of the sessions of the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI)
Inaugural Meeting on Saturday.
Participating in a panel discussion on what it takes to form interfaith
partnerships and work cooperatively on social crises, Queen Rania and other
panelists put forth several answers/solutions aimed at fostering and promoting
cross-cultural dialogue in order to counter societal misconceptions by raising
awareness and creating greater understanding between the world's nations.
Queen Rania said this could be achieved through educating children, having
leaders speak out against intolerance and striving to understand our basic human
commonalities rather than just focus on our differences.
“We need to educate ourselves on our common values. Once we understand the
common values we will then see the differences as an enriching diversity and not
as a dividing antipathy,” said Queen Rania.
Addressing an audience comprising representatives from different interfaith
corporations and organisations, including nongovernmental institutions, Her
Majesty was one of three panelists engaged in the session, which was moderated
by George Stephanopoulos, host of ABC News -This Week. The other two panelists
were William Vendley, secretary general of Religions for Peace/WCRP and Eboo
Patel, head of Interfaith Youth Core,
The Clinton Global Initiative was launched by former US president Bill Clinton
and the William J. Clinton Foundation to focus attention on identifying
immediate solutions to several of the world's most pressing problems. The
initiative will detail successful responses to them and seek the best solutions,
as well as obtain a specific commitment from each participant to take action in
one of the four topics discussed: Poverty; religion, conflict and
reconciliation; climate change; and governance enterprise and investment.
At the end of the three-day conference, which convened in New York on Thursday,
attendees were asked to make a specific pledge to address one of those areas and
will report on their progress to President Clinton over the course of the year.
Current and former heads of state, business leaders, academicians, and key NGO
representatives took part in the conference.
Deliberating the role of governments in promoting interfaith understanding,
Queen Rania said they could create opportunities for interaction between those
of different faiths to help establish human bonds.
“We cannot expect to sit and wait for change and understanding to happen. We
need a dialogue of deeds and not of words,” the Queen stressed.
She said one way this could be done is through educational exchange programmes,
which are “extremely crucial in this day and age.”
Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdogan, President of the Dominican Republic Leonel Fernandez Reyna and
Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko attended the conference. British Prime
Minister Tony Blair, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, Israeli Vice Prime
Minister Shimon Peres and US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice were also
present.
In addition, influential personalities such as Paul Wolfowitz, Elie Wiesel,
Rupert Murdoch, Dr. Muhammad Yunus, Ted Turner, George Soros, James Wolfensohn,
and other global leaders from varying fields attended the event.
Queen Rania, along with His Majesty King Abdullah, also attended the Special
Opening Plenary of the Clinton Global Initiative, “Perspectives of the Global
Challenges of Our Time,” last Thursday, joining other distinguished guests.