PACIFIC WOMEN WILL ADD THEIR PERSPECTIVE TO INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S PEACE GATHERING

April 11, 2005 - (femLINKpacific) The Coordinator of the Gender and Peace Programme of the Ecumenical Centre for Research, Education and Advocacy, Koila Costello Ollson, and femLINKpacific's Coordinator, Sharon Bhagwan Rolls, will join fellow women peacemakers including representatives from Bougainville and West Papua at a week long international consultation, will bring about 15 previous participants together, from the International Fellowship on Reconciliation's Women Peacemakers Program's (WPP) Intercontinental consultation which h will be held in Amsterdam from 16 to 22 March. Last year, the WPP Pacific consultations were staged in East Timor in January.

Together with peacebuilders from the WPP Latin America and Middle East consultations they will be provided the space to exchange experiences and strategies to strengthen their local and regional as well as international activities.?For femLINKpacific - this is a valuable opportunity to share the experiences and stories of women in Fiji and other Pacific Island countries, which they have been documenting since September 2000, as well as to find ways in which greater collaboration could achieve the realisation of the full implementation of the UN Security Council resolution 1325, titled Women, Peace and Security.