wfn.org | Peace Prize Forum Focuses on the Republic of Korea, March 8-9

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ELCA NEWS SERVICE

February 27, 2002

PEACE PRIZE FORUM FOCUSES ON THE REPUBLIC OF KOREA, MARCH 8-9
02-038-MR

     CHICAGO (ELCA) -- David Halberstam and Sung Chul Yang will address
the 14th annual Peace Prize Forum, "Striving for Peace: Who is
Responsible?" March 8-9 at Augustana College, Sioux Falls, S.D.
Augustana is one of 28 colleges and universities of the Evangelical
Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).
     Students attending the Peace Prize Forum will explore personal
obligations and efforts that contribute to peacemaking, including an
examination of the possibility of peace and reunification of the Korean
peninsula.
     Sung Chul Yang, the Republic of Korea's 18th Ambassador to the
United States, will address the forum on March 8.  He will represent Kim
Dae Jung, president of South Korea and recipient of the 2000 Nobel Peace
Prize.
     From 1996 to the time of his posting in Washington, D.C., in 2000,
Yang served as a member of the Korean National Assembly.  He was
president of the Unification and Policy Forum and chair of the
International Cooperation Committee for the National Congress for New
Politics.  He was vice chair of the Unification and Foreign Affairs
Committee, and was a member of the Political Reform Committee.
     From 1987 to 1994 Yang was dean of academic affairs at the
Graduate Institute of Peace Studies, Kyunghee University, Seoul,
Republic of Korea.  He served as secretary general of the Association of
Korean Political Scientists in North America and as president of the
Korean Association of International Studies.
     Yang is a member of the advisory committees of the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of National Defense and the National
Unification Board. He has written several books, essays and articles on
Korean issues.
     From 1970 to 1994 Yang taught and held a variety of positions at
several education institutions in the United States and in the Republic
of Korea.  He earned a doctorate in political science at the University
of Kentucky, Lexington, in 1970, and a master's degree in political
science from the University of Hawaii, Honolulu, in 1967.  Yang earned a
bachelor's degree in political science from Seoul National University in
1964.  From 1960 to 1962 he served in the Korean Army.
     Halberstam, a journalist, social and political commentator, will
address the forum March 8.  Halberstam is the author of books about
power in the United States: "The Best and the Brightest," "The Powers
That Be" and "The Reckoning."
     In 1998 Halberstam wrote "The Children," which chronicles the
lives of eight young civil rights activists he met in 1960 as a reporter
for The Nashville Tennessean.  In 1999 he wrote a biography of
basketball player Michael Jordan titled, "Playing for Keeps: Michael
Jordan and the World He Made."  Halberstam's latest book, "War in a Time
of Peace: Bush, Clinton and the Generals," reveals how post-cold-war
U.S. foreign policy has been haunted by the legacy of Vietnam.
     He wrote 11 best-selling books.  At the age of 30 Halberstam was
awarded The Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on Vietnam.  Halberstam
earned a bachelor's degree at Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass., in
1955.
     Craig Kielburger, founder of Free the Children, will address the
forum March 9.  At the age of 12, Kielburger became a spokesperson for
children's rights after he read about the murder of a boy from Pakistan,
who was sold into bondage as a carpet weaver and murdered for speaking
out about child labor.  Now 17, Kielburger has traveled to more than 30
countries visiting street and working children and speaking out in
defense of children's rights.  In 2001, the Jerusalem Post named him one
of the 10 most interesting people to visit Israel.
     Kielburger, who lives with his parents in Toronto, gathered a
group of his friends and founded the organization Free the Children,
which is now the world's largest network of children helping children
with more than 100,000 active youth in 27 countries.  The organization
has initiated many projects around the world, including the construction
of more than 100 schools and two live-in rehabilitation centers for
children, the creation of alternative sources of revenue for poor
families to free children from hazardous work, leadership programs for
youth, and projects linking children on an international level.  Free
the Children has helped convince members of the international business
community to adopt codes of conduct regarding child labor and has helped
governments change laws to better protect children from sexual
exploitation.
     Kielburger's book, "Free the Children," outlines his journey from
the suburbs of Toronto through the slums and sweatshops of South Asia.
The book has been translated into seven languages.
     Other forum speakers include Olav Njolstad, research director of
government, Georgetown University, Washington, D.C.; the Rev. Mark N.
Swanson, associate professor of Islamic studies and director of the
Islamic studies program at Luther Seminary, St. Paul. Minn.; Derek J.
Mitchell, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International
Studies, Washington, D.C.; and Ann Pederson, associate professor and
chair of Augustana's Department of Religion.  The Honorable Robert
Flaten, former ambassador to Rwanda and chair of the Peace Prize Forum
committee, will convene the 2002 Forum.
     In addition to addresses, the Peace Prize Forum will feature 30
one-hour workshops on a variety of topics designed to address the
conference theme.  Other highlights of the forum include a town hall
meeting on terrorism in America, a peace fair exhibiting peacemaking
organizations from around the world, and conversation sessions with the
forum's keynote speakers.
     The site of the forum rotates annually among five Midwestern
colleges of the ELCA with Norwegian heritage: Augsburg College,
Minneapolis; Augustana; Concordia College, Moorhead, Minn.; Luther
College, Decorah, Iowa; and St. Olaf College, Northfield, Minn.
     Held in cooperation with the Norwegian Nobel Institute, this
series of forums was created to offer an opportunity for Nobel Peace
Prize laureates, diplomats, scholars, young people and the general
public to come together in expression of their personal commitment to
peace.
-- -- --
     Editors: Current information on the Peace Prize Forum is available
at http://www.peaceprizeforum.org on the Web.

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