*Drawing love for humanity in Gwangju, the city of democracy, human rights, and peaceA message of peace to friends suffering from war: “Please don’t hitchildren even with flowers!”
By Oue Correspondent
A contest was held in which children and teenagers drew their love and desire for peace on white drawing paper. The International Women’s Peace Group (IWPG), a joint effort of the Gwangju Region (Regional Director Seoyeon Lee) and Gwangju South Branch (Branch Manager Seo Hyunmi), held the preliminary round of the 6th ‘International Loving Peace Art Competition’ at the Gwangju May 18 Memorial Park on the 6th to celebrate Patriots and Veterans Month. It was announced on the 7th that it was held.
In particular, the Gwangju May 18 Memorial Park, where this event was held, is a representative symbolic place of peace created in 1998 to inherit and develop the spirit and valuable lessons of the May 18 Democratization Movement.
The International Loving Peace Art Competition, now in its 6th year, provides children and youth with the opportunity to imagine and draw a world of peace every year as part of spreading the culture of peace. It is held every year in major cities around the world to spread the need for an end to global war and the value of a culture of peace and to deliver a message of peace.
Director Seoyeon Lee of Global 2 delivered her greeting, saying, “I hope this will be a precious time to share and practice peace while thinking of friends who have been scarred by war around the world, and I hope it will become a dream and hope for future peace.”
This competition was held under the theme of ‘Sending the heart of peace to friends suffering from war,’ and about 400 students and parents from elementary, middle, and high schools in the Gwangju area attended. In addition to the competition, the ‘Please don’t hit even with flowers’ campaign was also launched, a message containing support and peace wishes for friends currently suffering from war around the world.
Lee Joo-young (15 years old), who participated in the competition that day, said, “I hope that our message of peace is well conveyed and all wars in the world disappear, and although we are physically separated, I hope that we will remember that we are cheering with the same heart and cheer up.
“Park Seo-eun (8 years old) shared her heart with a message of support, saying, “I want to live happily and smile with my friends in a peaceful world.”
Namjun Yoo (43, Gwangsan-gu), a parent who participated with his child, said, “As the saying goes, do not hit children even with flowers, it was a useful time to realize that all violence in the world should disappear, and it was a useful time to enhance the future value of peace education and make the older generation look back again.
“I think it was an opportunity,” he said. “Participating in a meaningful competition with my family on Memorial Day, the month of patriotism, became a valuable memory.”
The preliminary awards ceremony will be held online on July 6, and the four best works selected in the domestic preliminaries will compete with award-winning works from around the world in the finals. The final awards ceremony will be held in November.
Meanwhile, IWPG is a global women’s NGO registered with the United Nations Economic and Social Council(ECOSOC) and the Department of Global Communications (DGC). It is headquartered in Korea and has over 110 branches and 660 partner organizations around the world. With the vision of ‘realizing sustainable world peace’, we are actively working to spread solidarity, propagate a culture of peace, women’s peace education, and enact laws and systems needed in the world.
