IFPNP IV, 2025-2026
Dr. Ogarit YOUNAN, inaugural speech, October 2nd 2025, IFPNP program, online opening session.
Good day from Beirut, from AUNOHR, the University for Non-Violence and Human Rights, Lebanon and the Arab world.
To our partners,
Dr. Siby K Joseph, Director, JBMLRCGs, Sevagram Ashram Pratishthan, Wardha, MS India
Dr. D John Chelladurai, Dean, FIDS, MGM University, Chh. Sambhajinagar, MS India
Prof. Michael Sonnleitner, Portland Community College, Portland, Oregon, USA
Dr. Dorcas Ettang, Acting Director, ICON., Durban University of Technology, South Africa
Mr. Louis Campana, President, Gandhi International, France
To the Fellows in this Program, the 80 applicants from 20 countries,
Gambia, India, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Kenya, Kwale, Nigeria, Congo, Bangladesh, Sudan, Afghanistan, Zimbabwe, Lebanon, Ethiopia, Egypt, Syria, South Africa, Haiti, Cameroun, USA…
I met Dr. Siby for the first time in 2022, In Sevagram – Wardha in India… and here we are partners in a continuing program of training on nonviolence and Gandhi values…
Dear all,
We are here today, for a day full of lessons, the birthday of the iconic symbol of the Non-Violence, Mahatma GANDHI.
Thank you, Dr. Siby for the initiative of IFPNP, for your invitation, and especially for your persevering in celebrating Gandhi every year with concrete way by organizing this program.
We congratulate everyone around the world celebrating the Non-Violence Day.
October 2nd had become the International Day of Non-Violence. At the initiative of the State of India, a United Nations resolution was issued in 2007 to adopt the date of Gandhi’s birth as a day for the culture of Non-Violence worldwide.
As for Lebanon, October 2nd had become a “National Day for the Culture of Non-Violence”. At the initiative of our university, the Academic University for Non-Violence and Human Rights – AUNOHR, the Council of Ministers issued an official decision in October 2016 to honor this day at the national level. It was a first initiative of its kind not only in Lebanon but in the Arab world.
Gandhi elaborated the word “NON-VIOLENCE” in the mid of 1919, and since 1920 he has devoted this word to history to become a new concept for the civilizations.
On 2020, we celebrated the anniversary of the first century of the word “Non-Violence”, by issuing a beautiful reference book, in Arabic and English, titled “Quotes in Non-Violence”, bringing together for the first time the largest number of pioneers who explained the meanings of nonviolence in all fields, through their famous sayings.
And so, we have already embarked on its second century.
The concept of Non-Violence is a philosophy of humane values and a strategy for social change. It is both of them together. Indeed, it is a great vision, of course in constant conflict with the world of violence, but as Walid SLAIBY said: “We are not in a world where violence has won; We are in a world where Non-Violence has not won enough yet.”
Walid SLAIBY, the nonviolent thinker in the Arab world, my lifelong companion for forty years, passed away two years ago… He left a legacy for generations…
For us, the story began four decades ago…
To spread Non-Violence in Lebanon and in other Arab countries: it was a challenge, an adventure. Especially since we set out when we were young in 1983 in the midst of the civil war in Lebanon (1975-1990). Our path made its way between the war barriers that smashed the country, while we insisted on acting and going to all regions, and on more than one occasion we were exposed to the danger of death or disappearance…
From the very beginning, we understood that it was all about “nurturing” NON-VIOLENCE, marginalized, unknown and even refused by many glorifying violence. Thus, it seems that our hope in Non-Violence was a struggle and daily efforts with a perseverance given the exceptional context of violence in which we embarked in favor of Non-Violence.
It was the Truth we were looking for, just like Gandhi who offered us “Non-Violence” (a-himsa) with the (Satyagraha).
What we have done established Non-Violence forever and made it rooted in society.
It’s done. This is history.
For us, we have made it a choice for life.
Our latest achievement was the creation of a University with a master’s degree in Non-Violence fields: AUNOHR, a first of its kind in Lebanon and the region, and unique in the world, officially recognized since 2014. The university came as the culmination of our founding journey since 1983…
Lately, we concluded an agreement with the Ministry of Education to introduce the culture of Non-Violence into the national curricula for all schools in Lebanon from kindergarten to secondary classes. This is an unprecedented initiative.
On 2022, we were honored, Walid and I, with the Gandhi International Award…
I told the young Indians whom I met in many regions in India, to impress us, and a new Gandhi would appear among them…
We need it, not to be another Gandhi, but to Be nonviolent and to “Be the Change that You want to See in the World” (as Gandhi said).
Let’s imagine together,
What if Gandhi did not exist!?
What if he did not rise up on that day in the train accident in South Africa…
What if he hadn’t invented the word “NON-VIOLENCE”!?
What if he did not live by itself this “Non-Violence”!?
What if!?
It would be a loss to humanity. for history.
How grateful we are to have had Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi!
How wonderful it is that History has won itself and forever by adopting his philosophy and strategy of “Non-Violence” and being inspired by his life experience!
Today we are honoring the dissemination of the culture of Non-Violence, it is a sustainable and continuing path, we are not on a beginning… But, still to do more…
I would like to end by what Gibran Khalil Gibran wrote in his book “The Storm”:
How generous you are, Earth,
and how strong is your yearning for your children
lost between that which they have attained and that which they could not obtain.
We clamor and you smile;
We flit but you stay!
We extract your elements to make cannons and bombs,
but out of our elements you create lilies and roses.
And, to say it in Arabic, in Gibran’s mother language:
ما أكرمك أيتها الأرض وما أطول أناتك.
ما أشدّ حنانك على أبنائك المنصرفين عن حقيقتهم إلى أوهامهم، الضائعين بين ما بلغوا إليه وما قصروا عنه.
نحن نتذمّر وأنتِ تبتسمين.
نحن نعبر ونتلاشى وأنتِ تبقين.
نحن نتناول عناصرك لنصنع منها المدافع والقذائف وأنتِ تتناولين عناصرنا وتكوّنين منها الورود والزنابق.
— جبران خليل جبران؛ كتاب “العواصف”
THANK YOU
Wishing you all successful program.
Ogarit Younan
Founder of the University for Non-Violence and Human Rights – AUNOHR
Beirut, 2 October 2025
