Caux Forum 2023 Opening Ceremony

Strengthening Democracy: The journey from trauma to trust.
In a world witnessing a rise in conflicts that threaten our democratic values, our speakers shared their insights on confronting the past, address the key challenges facing community trustbuilding and offered their vision on where we can find hope for a stronger democratic future, offering inspiration for us to take action by standing against extremes, promoting dialogue and fostering respect whilst working for a more just, peaceful and sustainable world, one step at a time.
Gerald Pillay, President of Initiatives of Change International and Jacqueline Coté, President of Caux - Initiatives of Change, opened the event with a short welcome address, followed by a distinguished panel of speakers who are dedicated to human rights, peace building and conflict prevention.
Rea Gehring, Minister and Deputy Head of the Peace and Human Rights Division at the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, provided a welcome address, giving the FDFA's perspective on the role Switzerland has played and continues to play in strengthening democracy and supporting individual and national journeys from trauma to trust.
Our keynote speaker was Elena Zhemkova, the Co-founder and Executive Director of Memorial, a human rights organization that was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2022 along with Ales Bialiatski, a pro-democracy activist from Belarus, and the Ukrainian human rights organization Centre for Civil Liberties. Ms Zhemkova talked about honesty as a tool for healing historical wounds, her experience of how that works and the challenges it represents.
Following her speech, Ms. Zhemkova joined a panel discussion with two other important figures in the field of conflict prevention and reconciliation: Corinne Momal-Vanian, the Executive Director of the Kofi Annan Foundation, and Mô Bleeker, Independent Advisor and Former Special Envoy for Peace and Prevention of Atrocities for the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs.
The panel was moderated by Ignacio Packer, Executive Director at Caux - Initiatives of Change.
Music was performed by Sveinung Nygaard