As a national, nonpartisan, independent Institute, the U.S. Institute of Peace draws on our exceptional convening power to create opportunities for diverse audiences to exchange knowledge, experiences, and ideas necessary for creative solutions to difficult challenges. We serve as an important, neutral platform for bringing together government and nongovernment, diplomacy, security, and development actors, and participants across political views. The Institute’s events help shape public policy and priorities to advance peaceful solutions to conflict and strengthen international security.
At the same time, literacy rates and primary school enrollment are falling. On June 9, the U.S. Institute of Peace hosted a discussion of these trends and others that contribute to extremist narratives, and some potential approaches to address these critical factors.
On April 17, Pakistani legislators visiting Washington met with their American counterparts and discussed their country’s challenges and the role that the National Assembly can play in meeting them.
Every day in Burma, monks, doctors, teachers, even a popular reggae singer from Yangon, set examples of unity and cooperation, in contrast to headlines about violence between Buddhists and Muslims. On April 9, the U.S. Institute of Peace, in partnership with the Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, held a screening of a film series highlighting such stories, Portraits of Diversity, followed by a discussion of how these examples can inform support for the country’s transition.
The Atlantic Council and the U.S. Institute of Peace welcomed the President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, His Excellency Mohammad Ashraf Ghani, on the occasion of his first official visit to Washington, D.C. since being sworn in as president on September 21, 2014. The public address, with questions and answers from the invite-only audience and via Twitter, took place on March 25, 2015 at USIP headquarters in Washington, D.C.
The devastating attack on the Peshawar Army Public School in December spurred Pakistan’s government, led by the Ministry of the Interior, to draft a 20-point National Action Plan against terrorism. The Honorable Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, Pakistan’s minister of the interior, outlined the plan and his country’s terrorism challenge on February 18, his first public appearance in Washington since taking office in June 2013.
Pakistan’s expression of alarm at President Obama’s recent visit to India became another example of how relations between the two South Asian nations have turned increasingly sour in the past year. On February 9, the U.S. Institute of Peace hosted a panel discussion to explore the deteriorating India-Pakistan ties and the ramifications for the region and beyond.
USIP and the Alliance in Support of the Afghan People were pleased to host Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR), a U.S. Army veteran who served in both Afghanistan and Iraq and a newly elected member of the U.S. Senate, to provide his views on the shape of future U.S.-Afghan relations.
December 16, 2014, may well have been Pakistan’s September 11. On January 27, the U.S. Institute of Peace held a panel discussion assessing Pakistan’s domestic security situation in the wake of the attack on the Army Public School and Degree College in Peshawar.
On December 16, the U.S. Institute of Peace hosted a discussion on the future of Central Asia as potentially the major geopolitical crossroads of our time.
On November 19, the U.S. Institute of Peace hosted a panel discussion analyzing factors that have contributed to sectarian tension in Pakistan, placing these conflicts in both local context and in the regional context of trends in the greater Middle East and Islamic world.