Millennium World Peace Summit: U.N. Plans To Bring Together 1,000 World Religious Leaders
Fri Jul 14, 2000 -- A global summit will bring 1,000 religious leaders to the United Nations on Aug. 28-29. The "working list" will be be issued Tuesday. The participants will be given no more than five minutes to make remarks at the United Nations. The Millennium World Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders is organized by an "independent coalition" of interfaith leaders, and is being held in a year when nongovernmental organizations, or NGOs, are seeking use of the General Assembly chamber more than usual. NGO use of the chamber averages about four times a year, but this year it will be roughly 10 times.
The Millennium World Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders opens Aug. 28 with an afternoon procession into the General Assembly and sessions all the next day. It moves for two more days to the nearby Waldorf Astoria hotel.
The religious leaders are expected to issue a Declaration for World Peace and agree to some form of a permanent International Advisory Council of Religious and Spiritual Leaders. Mr. Turner, the summit's honorary chairman, has promised full live coverage by CNN. Funding comes from 11 sponsors, which include the Better World Fund of Mr. Turner and the Templeton, Carnegie and Rockefeller Brothers foundations.