2018 Seminars and Events

Professor Hongsheng SHENG met with Director General Ambassador William Swing in Geneva during his participation in the Geneva Dialogue of East Asian Scholars with UN and International Organizations held on July 16 and 17, 2018.

Three other speakers were: Robert Watkins, Former Resident Coordinator of the United Nations Operational Activities in Bangladesh, Delidji Eric Degila, Adjunct Professor of International Relations at Benin Ecole Nationale d’Administration, and Mark Downes, Assistant Director and Head of DCAF’s Operations Department contributed to the Geneva Dialogue with their insightful presentations.

Proposed NEA-NWFZ would contribute to enhance the normative consciousness of prohibiting nuclear weapons in the Northeast Asian region and signal the intention of a state under the “nuclear umbrella” to renounce its reliance on nuclear weapons.

From right to left on front row; Ms. Erika FREY, University of Teachers Education Zug; Ms. Reina MOTEGI of the University of Tokyo; Professor Misako TAKIZAWA of Oberlin University; Dr. Ai KIHARA-HUNT, Associate Professor, Graduate Program on Human Security, the University of Tokyo, Deputy Director, Research Center for Sustainable Peace, and Deputy Director, ACUNS Tokyo Office; Ryotaro Takehara of the University of Tokyo.


Second row from left to right: Colonel Amarsaikhan SERDARI, Chief of Special Plans Office of the Mongolian Armed Forces; Professor Takaaki MIZUNO of the Kanda University of International Studies (KUIS); Yasushi KATSUMA, Professor of Waseda University; Ms. Suzuka YAMADA of the University of Tokyo; Ms. Mizuki ARITA of the University of Tokyo; Ms. Moeka TAWADA of the University of Tokyo; Prof. SHENG Hongsheng of Shanghai University of Political Science and Law; Mr. Takashi KAMISHIRO, Head of Field Office Miravalle, UN Verification Mission in Colombia; Professor ZHANG Guihong, Director of the Center for UN Studies, Fudan University and Vice President & Secretary-General, Shanghai UN Research Association.


Third row from left to right: Professor Aygul KULNAZAROVA of Tama University; Ms. Kana YOKOYAMA of the University of Tokyo; Ms. Maja LIECHTI of the University of Tokyo; Mr. Yuki SAITO of the University of Tokyo; Mr. Eisuke KIMURA of the University of Tokyo; and Mr. Simon PANCHAUD of the University of Geneva.

Chikvaidze referred to Geneva as a prime place for human rights with the Human Rights Council located in Geneva and a vibrant place for humanitarian aid, disarmament and trade. He noted that no city had a richer history of collaboration than Geneva.

According to Madeline Garlick, addressing challenges around protracted refugees, situation of conflict, finding solutions, responsibility sharing are key conditions for successful refugee protection. People fleeing from persecution should not be penalized for moving illegally. Click here for her full presentation and comments by Asian scholars.

More than one billion people are migrating with nearly 250 million international migrants and some 750 million domestic migrants. Nearly a quarter of the migrants are forced to move while the majority migrates freely and orderly.

This former Chamber of the Council of the League of Nations is now used by the UN Disarmament Commission which was first created in 1952 but met rarely until 1978 when the first special session of the General Assembly devoted to disarmament established a successor Disarmament Commission as a subsidiary deliberative body of the Assembly, composed of all Member States of the United Nations.

Thirty-two scholars and students from Japan, China, Korea and Mongolia started their two- day dialogue with senior officials of UNOG, UNHCR, IOM, ICRC, UNHCHR and Geneva Graduate Institute on the theme of Human Rights, Migration and Peacebuilding in a Turbulent Age.

At the 30th Seminar held on Saturday, 26 May 2018 at Tokyo University Komaba Campus, GPAJ members asked the Ambassador how Slovenia gained independence from ex-Yugoslavia and how Slovenia is deal with the mass inflow of refugees and migrants.