03rd September 2016 01:59:37 Hours
Dr Ram Manikkalingham, Board Member of the President’s Office of National Unity and Reconciliation in Sri Lanka who is also the Director, Dialogue Advisory Group (DAG) in his talk to the session on ‘Influence of Soft Power on Global Issues’ at the ‘Colombo Defence Seminar - 2016’ Friday (2) morning said that time has come to say ‘reduce violence and not to achieve peace’.
“We create or advance political dialogues between armed groups, governments and international organizations in conflict situations. You have practical experiences. The aim is to reduce violence and not to achieve peace because we have to look at the whole scenario in a different perspective, away from the stereotype”.
“People do nasty things, even good people do nasty things. ‘Soft Power’ is a dialogue dealing with non-violent extremism and violent extremism and our academic experience to end conflicts teaches many ways of doing things.
The Dialogue Advisory Group (DAG) is an independent organization that facilitates political dialogue to reduce violence. We create or advance political dialogues between armed groups, governments and international organizations in conflict situations, he told about his role in Amerstadam - based DAG.
He later on touched the perspectives that led to the conflict in Basque. Here are the excerpts:
The Basque Country is the name given to the home of the Basque people in the western Pyrenees that straddles the border between France and Spain on the Atlantic coast. Euskal Herria is the oldest documented Basque name for the area they inhabit, dating to the 16th century and thus predates the emergence of Basque nationalism by at least two centuries.
It comprises the Autonomous Communities of the Basque Country and Navarre in Spain and the Northern Basque Country in France.
Even though they are not necessarily synonyms, the concept of a single culturally Basque area spanning various regions and countries has been closely associated with the politics of Basque nationalism. The region is home to the Basque people culture and traditions. The area is neither linguistically nor culturally homogeneous, and certain areas have a majority of people who do not consider themselves Basque, such as the south of Navarre where in 1996 the census reported that 71% of inhabitants did not identify themselves as Basque - although fewer people in the same area (53%) opposed measures to support the Basque language.
The Dialogue Advisory Group (DAG) is an independent organization that facilitates political dialogue to reduce violence.
