Address to the General Assembly
on United Nations Day, 1986

The evidence for our capacity to destroy ourselves is overwhelming.
We feel impotent in the face of such evidence.
Truths that the hands can touch remind us of our real potency.
A minute of peace is a truth that the hands can touch.
(Ben Kingsley)

Mr. President,

In the International Year of Peace, the Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community met in Georgetown and agreed that the Caribbean Region should be preserved as a zone of peace. In taking this decision our leaders took not only a moral commitment to peace in the region, but demonstrated their determination to co-operate on the international scene toward the total elimination of the scourge of war. We in the Caribbean have long recognized that our greatest resource is people and that their development finds it s greatest expression in an atmosphere of peace. And that it shy the tradition in the Region has been to concentrate expenditure of scared resources on education, health services, diversification of agriculture and development of industry rather than on militarization.

The decision of the CARICOM Heads of Government also reflects the attitudes of the general public. Those attitudes were made abundantly clear by the involvement of the non governmental organizations and large sections of the community of all ages in their individual capacities in the Million Minutes of Peace Appeal.

It took only one thought and that thought grew and became a reality. In less than one year The Million Minutes of Peace International Appeal launched by an imaginative international committee has captured the imagination of millions of people in 69 countries, representing all regions of the world. As the largest non-fundraising project for the International Year of Peace, the Appeal has carried the message of peace to a all people of the world. Form children in African villages and American schools, to islanders in the Philippines and the Caribbean, from average citizens of all ages to heads of states and world leaders.

Mr. President over one billion minutes of peace have been donated world-wide thorough prayer, meditation and positive thoughts of peace. That’s a grand total of one billion twenty-four million, four hundred and fourteen thousand, six hundred and thirty seven minutes. From 600 minutes, from one small country to over five hundred million form a large one.

As a patron of the Appeal I had the honour of participating in the launching of the Barbados appeal on September 16 and the pleasure of observing the response by government and public since nearly one million minutes were contributed ot the appeal by the people of Barbados.

This overwhelming response to the International Year of Peace and the various initiatives that developed form the year is a powerful symbol of the deep desire and personal commitment to peace form the peoples of the world. They are anxious to see the advent of peace in the world and are eager to make their own personal contribution towards that end.

Mr. President whatever the detractors of this Organization may say the peoples of the world have demonstrated their confidence in and their support of the Untied Nations and its ideals.

It is our hope Mr. President that 1986 will not be remembered as just another successful ‘International Year’ but that our collective efforts may probe to b e only a beginning and will eventually result in the true attainment of peace.

We must never forget Mr. President, that beyond all else, peace is the purpose for which this Organizations stands.

My remarks can find no better conclusion that the words of actor Mr. Ben Kingsley, another Patron of the International Appeal Committee, whose art put him in touch with Ghandi’s great spirit of Peace: “A minute of peace is a truth that the hands can touch.”

H.E. Dame Nita Barrow, Permanent Representative of Barbados to the Untied Nations Address to the General Assembly on United Nations Day, October 24, 1986