Good afternoon. My name is Farida Ali. I am from UNICEF. I work with religious groups and intergovernmental organizations. I am very pleased to be here today for UNICEF and to see so many friends of children.

We endorse this initiative and will work towards harmonizing this and other initiatives that have already taken place. We believe that there is a commonality of objectives and ideas and I am very happy that the rights and well-being of children are embodied in this Forum’s Terms of Reference. As you know from your own experience, UNICEF has been greatly involved with religious groups for over twenty years now. And we know from our own experience how well interreligious cooperation works based on the many experiences within countries.

I am glad to see one of our major partners, the World Conference on Religions for Peace with which we are still deeply involved, as well as the Ambassador who was until December last year the President of the UNICEF Executive Board, the Ambassador of Turkey to whom we have spoken about greater collaboration with the Alliance of Civilizations, and my own Ambassador, Mr. Munir Akram, who has spoken about Enlightened Moderation.

These global concerns are a very firm testimony that all development efforts and all peace efforts start with children. And unless we begin with that fundamental basis, we really will not get much further. We in UNICEF also believe that the only way to achieve that is by affecting attitude change and behavior change. So anything that we can do to increase the level of awareness is probably the best way to go. I am glad to see two colleagues who are now with UNFPA and with UNESCO and we have all been speaking with each other on how to better coordinate a common UN response to these initiatives.

Thank you.