Just Peace Festival
Just Peace Dialogue: Climate and Peace
- Date
- Sunday 22 June 2025
- Time
- Address
-
Wijnhaven
Turfmarkt 99
2511 DP The Hague - Room
- Spanish Steps
Today’s world faces large-scale climate change and other environmental disruptions. Meeting these challenges involves major adjustments to economy and society, with substantial potential for conflict and violence. This dialogue assembles leading authorities on the relationship between climate and peace, including speakers from civil society, government, university and youth. The panel explores how climate change can be handled in ways that minimize war and maximize peace.
Meet the panel
Kumi Naidoo, Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative
- Kumi Naidoo is a South African human rights and environmental justice activist, who currently is the President of the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Payne Distinguished Lecturer at Stanford University. He is the former Secretary-General of Amnesty International (2018-2020) and also the first person from the Global South to lead Greenpeace International (2009-2015). He is an advisor for the Community Arts Network. He serves as a global ambassador for Africans Rising for Justice, Peace and Dignity. His family has started the Riky Rick Foundation for the Promotion of Artivism to build on the positive legacies left by popular South African rapper Rikhado “Riky Rick” Makhado through his music and life’s work. Kumi is the author of award-winning Letters To My Mother: The Makings of a Troublemaker. Kumi is also the host of the podcast Power, People and Planet.
Anna Pot, Netherlands National SDG Coordinator
- Anna Pot is the National Coordinator, a role in which she promotes national implementation of the SDGs in and by the Netherlands. The Coordinator works closely with other ministries and organisations within the central government, as well as with the broad SDG movement in the Netherlands, including companies, municipalities and provinces, NGOs, youth organisations, knowledge and educational institutions.
Judith Verweijen, Utrecht University
- Judith Verweijen is an Assistant Professor in Political Geography at Utrecht University. She specializes in the relationship between armed violence, resource conflict and climate change in areas of protracted violence. She focuses on eastern DR Congo, where she has conducted intermittent fieldwork since 2010. In 2024, Verweijen received a NWO Vidi grant for her research Centring Armed Organizations in the Climate-Conflict Nexus (CLIMCON).
Noemi Zenk-Agyei, World's Youth for Climate Justice
- Noemi Zenk-Agyei is a climate advocate and legal researcher working at the intersection of environmental justice, international trade, and human rights. She currently works for the World’s Youth for Climate Justice (WYCJ), where she helped mobilise over 130 countries to support the UN General Assembly’s request for an Advisory Opinion from the International Court of Justice on climate change. Noemi has contributed to legal research on climate litigation, climate finance, and environmental peacebuilding, and co-founded a diaspora youth organisation connecting African and European youth in global climate diplomacy.
Laura Birkman, Director Climate, Water and Food Security at the Hague Centre for Strategic Studies
- Laura Birkman serves as the Director of the Climate, Water, and Food Security Programme at HCSS. She oversees impactful initiatives, including the award winning Water, Peace, and Security (WPS) partnership, which develops innovative tools and services to identify and address water-related security risks. Laura is also a member of the International Military Council on Climate and Security (IMCCS).
Moderator: Prof Dr Jan Willem Erisman
- Jan Willem Erisman is Professor of Environment and Sustainability in the Institute of Environmental Sciences at Leiden University and chairs the Netherlands Scientific Climate Council.
Register for this event
The Just Peace Dialogues are a free event hosted by Leiden University. Space is limited, therefore registration is required for all Just Peace Dialogues.
RegisterSchedule
- 13.30 Doors Open
- 14.00-15.10 Roundtable
- 15.15-16.15 Breakout Groups
- 16.15-17.15 Borrel
About the Just Peace Dialogues
The Just Peace Dialogues are a set of meetings for public deliberation of key aspects of building peace in today’s world. The dialogues are held from 16 to 22 of June and address each of the festival’s six main themes. The aim is stimulate creative discussion about conditions for a just peace in contemporary society.
The dialogues are:
- Imagining Peace (16 June 2025 16:00 - 19:00);
- Peace in Europe (17 June 2025 16:00 - 19:00);
- Peace in Sudan (18 June 2025 16:00 - 19:00);
- Peace in Israel-Palestine (19 June 16:00 - 19:00);
- Democracy and Peace (20 June 2025 16:00 - 19:00);
- Cybersecurity and Peace (21 June 10:30 - 13:45);
- Rule of Law and Peace (21 June 14:00 - 17:15);
- Equality and Peace (22 June 10:30 -13:45);
- Climate and Peace (22 June 14:00 - 17:15).
