Peace is an essential and permanent value for cooperative members, who have decided to go further and propose to the world an agenda for Positive Peace.
At our ICA General Assembly and Global Conference in 2019, we made a declaration from Rwanda, in the heart of the beloved African continent, where we made it clear that peace must be the result of cooperation, integration and equity among the various peoples who inhabit our Common Home.
That proposal takes on greater value at times like this, where the armed conflicts that have been shaking different parts of the planet for many years are compounded by the suffering inflicted on the Ukrainian people.
Once again, our role is to build bridges and connect solidarity initiatives to help our members in places besieged by natural disasters or, in this case, by the cruelty of war.
As I expressed a few weeks ago, and as regional and sectoral organisations of the ICA have also done, we reject the use of military force against any civilian population, we demand peace and we advocate diplomatic solutions that prevent the suffering of millions of innocent people.
At the same time, we encourage our members around the world to participate in this vital effort to alleviate the impact on those who suffer directly and indirectly from war.
In this sense, we must prepare ourselves to also respond to all the economic difficulties caused by this situation. For example, access to basic goods such as food and essential supplies such as energy is already becoming a challenge at the international level.
Our long history organising producers, consumers, workers and users puts us in a position of maximum historical responsibility to help our communities and to show national governments and international organisations why cooperation is the best tool to overcome difficulties and build a world for everyone, leaving no one behind.
As was made clear at our 33rd World Cooperative Congress, we are the proud bearers of an Identity based on values and principles, with more than one billion members on all continents.
Let us continue to build together in each territory, and on a global scale, this solidarity movement that has always been committed to democracy, equality and peace.
