Retrospective/2005
From Never Again
A compilation of the year's events with links and pictures.
In progress: please add any Never Again activities you know about here and links to documents elsewhere on the Wiki
Highlights
- Kigali conference, attended by over 100 youth from the Great Lakes region and around the world as well as experts on genocide and the president of the World Bank
- Publication of an article about Never Again's 2004 Rwanda Forum in History Workshop Journal
- Lauch of our month-long Kick-start Fundraising Campaign which enabled...
- Opening of our Peacebuilding Office in Kigali
- Pilot of our wiki, a groundbreaking way for young people to collaborate on peace
2005 has been a very busy and exciting year for Never Again. Following Christmas sales of Peace Baskets in Britain, we were able to give over £500 to AVEGA, the widows and orphans network in Rwanda. The Peace Baskets were a great success in the UK and we hope to make this link more stable in the future. To buy AVEGA Peacebaskets online please visit Art Works for Africa
In June many members of Never Again went to Kigali for the Global Youth Conference for the Prevention of Genocide organised by the Rwanda chapter. This bought together youth from all over the Great Lakes region to discuss practical ways of preventing genocide in their countries. The conference received a high level of media attention, particularly when the president of the World Bank, Paul Wolfowitz, addressed the conference as part of his visit to Africa.
In September an article entitled 'History, Memory, Hope: The Rwanda Forum 2004' by Marian and Poppy was published in History Workshop Journal. The article was an account of the Rwanda Forum, an international event organised by Never Again and the Imperial War Museum to marked the tenth anniversary of the genocide in Rwanda.
In October this wiki-website was built by new members Martin and Nick with input from the rest of the network. From small beginnings, it is attracting new members to the network who can now be involved wherever they are in the work needed. We need to improve access and use by our African members, but members in countries with better connections in the meantime are feeding information from them into the wiki. Offline, new clubs have been springing up all over the Great Lakes and particularly in the Gisenyi region of Rwanda, where Ladislas has put a great deal of work into building Never Again clubs in schools.
October also saw a highly successful month-long fundraising drive. We are extremely grateful for the generous response from old friends and new supporters of our work. The donations have enabled us to open our Peacebuilding Office in Kigali, Rwanda. January will mark the begining of a new initative to fund a full-time Project Manager position for our peacebuilding work.
This has been the year when Never Again truly became a global network. Founder members Marian and Regina both started new courses in the USA and have been using their learning and new contacts to build the network and improve our working practices for the future. Poppy and Andrew have both spent a lot of time in China, where they hope to build links between youth there and in Rwanda. Poppy also wrote a magnificent tourist article about Rwanda which was published in the British Independent newspaper in November.
