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The general secretary of the World Council of Churches (WCC), Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, met with church leaders and politicians in Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand last week. The meeting occurred almost one year after his latest visit to the region. On request of the church leaders a meeting took place with political leaders to discuss follow-up on the Paris Agreement, peace in the Middle East and on the Korean Peninsula, and the challenges the region is facing.

Reconciliation was once primarily seen as a message of the church but is now used by secular leaders trying to establish peace in communities torn by conflict and war, the WCC president for Africa, the Rev. Mary Anne Plaatjies van Huffel, has said at a major Protestant gathering in Germany.

World Council of Churches general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit expressed sadness on 16 February with the news of a bomb attack on the Lal Shahbaz Qalandar Sufi shrine in Sindh province, Pakistan.

The general secretary of the WCC, Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, opened his ecumenical and interfaith tour of New Zealand and Australia on 6 October. The first stop was Auckland with a powhiri at Te Karaiti Te Pou Herenga Waka Maori Anglican church in Mangere. Tveit will visit the region between 6-17 October.

Kerlan Fanagel’s submission to the Human Rights Council (HRC), delivered on the council’s 10th anniversary, highlighted the plight of the Lumad in Mindanao, a group of people who have been displaced from their traditional lands in the southern Philippines.

The Central Committee of the World Council of Churches (WCC), at its meeting in Trondheim, Norway, 27 June 2016, has elected a new executive committee with 11 new members.

How can we begin building peace in an era of religious extremism and acts of terror? Start by reaching out in your own neighborhood, suggests Rev. Arshad Gill, general secretary of the Presbyterian Church of Pakistan.

The Christian Conference of Asia has condemned police brutality against farmers in Mindanao, Philippines. The CCA spoke out against “the violent response and shootings by the police on farmers in the Philippines” and expressed solidarity with the leadership of the United Methodist Church in its continuing protection of some 6,000 farmers and tribal leaders who are threatened by violence from the Philippine National Police.

A bomb attack by terrorists using the name of religion in Lahore on Easter Sunday marked the third time Christians have been targeted in Pakistan in three years, illustrating the vulnerability of people in the country.

The World Council of Churches' general secretary has strongly condemned the lethal terror attack in Pakistan on 27 March as shocking and brutal, urging the government to ensure that its communities can be better protected against fanatics.

Muslims are a minority in Norway and a majority in Pakistan. From 12-15 March, these roles changed at a conference hosted by The Church of Pakistan in Lahore, Pakistan.

Mere days after terror attacks in Beirut and Paris, the theme of an interfaith meeting of Christians and Muslims at the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva on “Religion, Peace and Violence” was entirely appropriate, said participants.

During the 4th United Nations Forum on Business and Human Rights, the WCC, in collaboration with the ACT Alliance and Lutheran World Federation, organized a side-event on “Faith-based organizations’ contribution to the protection of communities’ land rights: lessons learnt and good practices from Africa, Asia and Latin America” at the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva.

Participants in Manilakbazan 2015, called by some the “Lumad caravan”, have come to Manila for a month-long series of activities and protests to bring attention to human rights violations in Lumad communities of the Philippines.

Church leaders from seven countries currently making historic choices for or against outlawing nuclear weapons will embark on a pilgrimage in early August to the two Japanese cities that were decimated by atomic bombs 70 years ago.

The WCC general secretary has sent a letter to the President of the Republic of Indonesia H. E. Joko Widodo appealing for clemency for the 10 death row prisoners scheduled for imminent execution in Indonesia.

The prospect of armed robots taking human lives, and whether to ban autonomous weapons before they are made, concentrated the minds of governmental and non-governmental delegates at a United Nations forum in Geneva in mid-April.

Following the massacre of dozens of students and staff in Peshawar on 16 December, the WCC general secretary extended sympathies to those bereaved or wounded, offering prayers for the victims and their families, for their communities.

After a concerted examination of the evidence presented at the Vienna Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons and two earlier conferences, 44 of the states present called for a ban on nuclear weapons. The host government Austria added momentum with a specific, cooperative pledge to “fill the legal gap for the prohibition of nuclear weapons” and eliminate them.

The recent killing of a Christian couple by an angry mob in Pakistan has prompted condemnation from the WCC. The victims had been accused by community members of desecrating the Qur’an.