wfn.org | NCCCUSA Calls For Kosovo Cease-Fire

[CAROL_FOUKE.parti@ecunet.org (CAROL FOUKE)]

Contact: NCC News, 212-870-2227
Email: news@ncccusa.org  Web: www.ncccusa.org

41NCC4/6/99 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

EDITORS: When listing organizations providing humanitarian 
relief in the Kosovo crisis, please include Church World 
Service, Attn. Kosovo Crisis, 28606 Phillips Street, P.O. 
Box 968, Elkhart, IN 46515. Phone: (800) 297-1516, ext. 222.  
CWS assistance to date totals $900,000 with more planned; 
story that follows includes details.

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NCC CALLS FOR "MOMENT OF PEACE" CEASE-FIRE ON ALL SIDES IN 
KOSOVO
TO COINCIDE WITH EASTERN ORTHODOX EASTER WEEKEND, APRIL 9-12
CWS Continues to Send Food, Tents, Bedding as Part of 
Planned $1.2 Million Response

 April 6, 1999, NEW YORK --- As Church World Service, 
the relief and development ministry of the National Council 
of Churches (NCC), continues to provide emergency assistance 
to refugees and people displaced as a result of violence in 
Kosovo, the NCC has issued a call for an April 9-12 cease-
fire on all sides to coincide with Eastern Orthodox Easter 
weekend.

 The "moment for peace" would begin Good Friday in the 
Eastern calendar, April 9, and last at least through Bright 
Monday, April 12.  The NCC is inviting heads of its 35 
Protestant and Orthodox member communions to join in "this 
truly religious alternative to violence."

 "We are calling for this `moment for peace' not because 
we believe it is the ultimate answer to the conflict, but 
because it is a symbolic statement of hope," said the Rev. 
Dr. Joan Brown Campbell, NCC General Secretary.  "A cease-
fire could break the cycle of violence and provide an 
opportunity for intense negotiation."

 "His Holiness Patriarch Pavle (leader of the Serbian 
Orthodox Church) is one of many church leaders in Europe and 
elsewhere who have joined in a movement for peace in this 
troubled region," said the Rev. Paul Wilson, NCC Europe 
Director.  

 "Leaders of the World Council of Churches, the 
Conference of European Churches, the Lutheran World 
Federation, the World Alliance of Reformed Churches and 
other worldwide faith groups have specifically called for a 
moment of peace during Holy Week," he said.  "This call is 
in the spirit of statements from Pope John Paul II, His All 
Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I and Patriarch 
Alexy II of Moscow and All Russia.  Joined in a worldwide 
ecumenical community, we pray that perhaps such a moment for 
peace will provide an opportunity for the United Nations to 
search for a path to peace."

 Dr. Campbell has also requested a meeting with 
President Clinton to discuss "this prayerful request.  It 
comes from the depth of a Christian tradition that for 
centuries has held the holy days separate and apart from 
human conflict."

 In a letter to President Clinton, sent Monday and 
released publicly today, Dr. Campbell stressed the 
"blessings of liberty" in the United States, where 
"Christians and adherents of other religions may freely 
express their convictions by addressing their president and 
government, and their legislators, on matters of 
conscience."

 "Serbia, as part of communist-ruled Yugoslavia, has 
been for some five decades ruled by an officially atheist 
system that did its best to marginalize religious belief and 
practice," Dr. Campbell continued in the letter.  
"Nevertheless, the Serbian Orthodox Church has been a 
faithful witness to the Christian faith.

 "The Serbian Orthodox Bishop of Kosovo, Artemije, has 
steadfastly and courageously and publicly stated that the 
conflict in Kosovo cannot be resolved with dignity and in 
peace until the ethnic Albanian and Serbian communities can 
engage in honest dialogue - and that such dialogue is 
prevented by a dictatorial government in Belgrade and by 
militarized groups, both Serbian and Albanian, in Kosovo.  
Patriarch Pavle, in the present crisis, has called for peace 
and for a cease-fire observed by all." 

 Meanwhile, Church World has already sent $900,000 in 
assistance to partner agencies working on the ground in 
Albania and other regions affected by the crisis in Kosovo 
as part of a $1.2 million response.

So far, CWS has provided $800,000 for tents, blankets 
and mattresses to Diaconia Agape (DA) in Albania -- 
specifically 1,000 tents, 25,000 blankets and 10,000 
mattresses which are being purchased in the region. Diaconia 
Agape is the social and development office of the Orthodox 
Autocephalous Church of Albania, and has been working within 
Albania to assist Kosovo refugees with material assistance.

On April 2, airlifts of relief goods consigned to DA 
began arriving in Tirana -- flights that included relief 
items funded by CWS and other members of Action by Churches 
Together (ACT), a worldwide network of churches and related 
agencies meeting human need through coordinated emergency 
response.

The ACT Coordinating Office is based with the World 
Council of Churches (WCC) and the Lutheran World Federation 
(LWF) in Switzerland.  These airlifts -- coordinated by 
DanChurchAid and flown by the Danish Air Force -- will 
continue throughout the coming week and will include 
additional food, tents and blankets.

 In addition to its partner relationship with DA, CWS 
has channeled $100,000 for bedding through International 
Orthodox Christian Charities (IOCC), the official overseas 
humanitarian assistance agency of Orthodox Christians in the 
U.S. and Canada. IOCC has provided emergency food and 
hygiene assistance to refugees and displaced persons in both 
Macedonia and Montenegro.  IOCC is also working to 
coordinate new shipments of aid into the region and to 
provide direct assistance to orphans, disabled, and elderly 
persons.

Working through local partner organizations and fellow 
ACT members is a guiding principle of CWS, since local 
partners are in the best position to provide the fastest and 
most efficient assistance given their knowledge of local 
infrastructure and their understanding of cultural 
sensitivities, said Donna Derr, Director of the CWS 
Emergency Response Office. 

"Working with partners allows us to be immediately 
active because we don't have to send our own personnel," 
Derr said. "In addition, money that would be used to send 
personnel can be used for an immediate response that is 
defined by the local partner and may include hiring of 
additional staff from the area or procurement of goods from 
the immediate region."  In that respect, working with local 
partners is a more cost-efficient method of operating, she 
said.

"Our partners are also important to us because they 
reflect many of the values and concerns that all of the 
ecumenical community shares," Derr said, including a 
commitment to assist disaster survivors regardless of their 
religion, nationality or cultural heritage.  CWS also has 
its own staff in Bosnia, and they are assessing the most 
critical needs of the estimated 15,000 Kosovar refugees who 
have fled to Bosnia.

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