H.E. Mr. Piragibe dos Santos Tarragô, H.E. Mr. Claude Heller, and H.E. Mr. Carsten Staur.
Panel Discussions - Thursday, February 12, 2009
Winner of 2008 UN Human Rights Prize, Dr. Denis Mukwege, Discusses Sexual Violence in the Congo
On February 12th, IPI’s Forum on World Affairs addressed “Sexual Violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo: What Can Be Done?”
Dr. Denis Mukwege, founder of the Panzi Hospital in Bukavu, Democratic Republic of the Congo, was keynote speaker. Also speaking were Betty Bigombe, former Minister of State of Uganda and mediator in the conflict in North Uganda, John Sawers, Permanent Representative of the United Kingdom to the United Nations, and Eve Ensler, founder of V-Day, a movement to end violence against women and girls.
IPI’s discussion followed the adoption by the Security Council in June 2008 of Resolution 1820, which calls for the "immediate and complete cessation by all parties to armed conflict of all acts of sexual violence against civilians."
Dr. Mukwege reported on sexual violence as a tactic of war in eastern Congo, and on the steps that are needed to address such violence. The Panzi Hospital, founded ten years ago, was originally a maternity hospital, but, facing unprecedented cases of rape, torture, and mutilation of women and girls due to the conflict in the Kivus, Dr. Mukwege decided to specialize in the treatment of the victims of rape and sexual violence.
Over the past twelve years, the Panzi Hospital has treated some 21,000 victims of rape and mutilation. Dr. Mukwege's work has been widely recognized internationally, and last year he was awarded a United Nations Human Rights Prize. Previous recipients of the Prize include Nelson Mandela, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Martin Luther King.
For further information on the campaign to end sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, visit V-Day or UN Action Against Sexual Violence in Conflict.
The Forum on World Affairs is a series of high-level roundtable meetings hosted by IPI for a select group of UN ambassadors, senior officials from the UN Secretariat, and other guests by special invitation. Each of these meetings focuses on a major international peace-and-security issue and offers an opportunity for dialogue with leading personalities from around the world. The meetings are held under the Chatham House Rule.
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Ms. Eve Ensler, Dr. Denis Mukwege, and Mr. Warren Hoge. | ||||||
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The Global Observatory
Interview with John Prendergast, Co-Founder, Enough Project
Mr. Prendergast discusses the international justice system and the new ground forged by Invisible Children's Kony2012 campaign.
Key Global Events to Watch in May
A list of key upcoming meetings and events with implications for global affairs.
The Global Observatory is a new website by IPI, providing timely analysis on peace and security issues, interviews with leading policymakers, interactive maps, and more.
Recent Events
May 10, 2012
Arbour: What the Rule of Law Means
“In my understanding of the rule of law, fundamentally, what the rule of law means is that it embraces the principle of equality before the law,” Louise Arbour, president of the International Crisis Group (ICG), told an IPI audience on May 10, 2012. Ms. Arbour outlined that this means that no one is above the law and everyone has both equal protection and equal benefit of the law. 
May 03, 2012
Shachtman: Cyber Threats Akin to South Bronx, Not Pearl Harbor
“There’s not a danger of a cyber Pearl Harbor… it’s more like the South Bronx circa 1999, where there’s a danger that it becomes such a tough neighborhood that no one wants to set up shop there and people move out,” Noah Shachtman, editor of the Danger Room blog at Wired magazine and non-resident fellow at the Brookings Institution, told an IPI audience at a panel on cyber security on May 3, 2011.
April 27, 2012
Preventing Conflicts in Africa: The Role of Early Warning and Response Systems
An April 27th roundtable discussion at IPI titled “Preventing Conflicts in Africa: The Role of Early Warning and Response Systems” examined the progress, prospects and challenges of regional and international early warning and response mechanisms to monitor, anticipate, and mitigate potential conflict situations in Africa.