wfn.org | WCC News Release: Kobia congratulates Nobel peace prize-winner

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World Council of Churches - News Release
Contact: + 41 22 791 6153 +41 79 507 6363 media@wcc-coe.org 
 

For immediate release: 8 October 2004

EARTH ETHICS: KOBIA CONGRATULATES NOBEL-PRIZE WINNER WANGARI MAATHAI

Warm congratulations were sent by World Council of Churches (WCC) general
secretary Rev. Dr Samuel Kobia to Mrs Wangari Maathai, who today was awarded
the Nobel Peace Prize for 2004.

Speaking as "your compatriot", Kobia assures Maathai, who is assistant
minister of environment in the Kenyan government and founder of the country's
well known Green Belt movement, that she has "brought honour to the African
continent and its people".

Recalling that she was the WCC's advisor on environmental issues and a
keynote speaker at its ground-breaking conference on Faith and Science at the
MIT in 1979, Kobia affirms that the Council has "gained much from your
insights". 

"Your campaign against deforestation across Africa is a unique contribution
not only to save African forests, but also African lives. As the Nobel
Committee correctly says, you represent an 'example and a source of
inspiration for everyone in Africa fighting for sustainable development,
democracy and peace'," Kobia concludes.

The full text of Kobia's letter to Wangari Maathai is available on our
website at:
http://www.wcc-coe.org/wcc/what/jpc/maathai-letter.html 

Additional information: Juan Michel,+41 22 791 6153 +41 79 507 6363
media@wcc-coe.org 

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The World Council of Churches is a fellowship of churches, now 342, in more
than 120 countries in all continents from virtually all Christian
traditions. The Roman Catholic Church is not a member church but works
cooperatively with the WCC. The highest governing body is the assembly, which
meets approximately every seven years. The WCC was formally inaugurated in
1948 in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Its staff is headed by general secretary
Samuel Kobia from the Methodist church in Kenya.