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In a letter to the European Union, the World Council of Churches (WCC) and Conference of European Churches express grave concern for the situation in the Caucasus related to the exodus of almost the entire ethnic Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh.

In a letter to H.E. Zbigniew Rau, OSCE chairman-in-office, and minister of Foreign Affairs of Poland, World Council of Churches acting general secretary Rev. Prof. Dr Ioan Sauca and Dr Jørgen Skov Sørensen, general secretary of the Conference of European Churches, jointly appeal for urgent action by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to promote a just and sustainable peace in the Caucasus, following renewed violence in the region in which more than 100 lives have already been lost.

Churches are probably the most powerful global civil society group, and they need to live up to this responsibility in the quest for peace, says German bishop, Dr Heinrich Bedford-Strohm. Bedford-Strohm, chairperson of the council of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD), was speaking at an event to promote peace in the Ecumenical Centre on 3 November.

In 1967, the Albanian government, under despotic leader Enver Hoxha, began closing down all religious institutions in the country, declaring Albania the world’s first officially atheist state.

In Taizé, the week-long Gathering for a New Solidarity, for solidarity with the poor and excluded, reached its climax on the weekend of 15-16 August. The ecumenical community is celebrating in 2015 the seventy-fifth anniversary of its foundation by Roger Schutz, as well as the one hundredth anniversary of his birth (on 12 August 1915). Also 16 August was the tenth anniversary of his death.

The opening of the Berlin Wall 25 years ago was one of the most dramatic symbols of the global changes sweeping across the world in 1989.

The general secretary of the WCC, Dr Rev. Olav Fykse Tveit, has condemned the 24 May attack on the Jewish Museum in Brussels which resulted in the deaths of four persons including two Israeli citizens.

Nearly one hundred representatives of the German member churches of the WCC met from 16 to 18 January at the Evangelical Academy of Loccum in order to share their experiences from the WCC 10th Assembly and to discuss how they would continue their way together on their pilgrimage of justice and peace.

Churches and ecumenical groups urge European Union to raise questions with Pakistan government concerning religious intolerance and persecution of religious minorities there.

[Joint release with the Conference of European Churches (CEC)]

Jointly issued by WCC, CEC, NCCUSA and CCC

A pastoral delegation from the World Council of Churches (WCC) will visit Russia and Georgia from 3 to 7 September. The delegation will listen to WCC member churches in both countries, encourage their efforts for peace and visit people displaced by the recent violence as well as church aid programmes.

Jointly issued by WCC and CEC

"Make me a channel of your peace" was the theme for a celebration of common commitment to overcome violence at a gathering of Orthodox, Catholic, Anglican and Protestant church representatives on 17 February in Wittenberg, Germany.

High-resolution photos available - see below

Entrusted with the mission of expressing global ecumenical solidarity with churches and people affected by the current conflict in the Middle East, a three-member ecumenical pastoral delegation composed of representatives of the Conference of European Churches (CEC), the Catholic Bishops' Conference of France, and the World Council of Churches (WCC) today left Cyprus by boat en route for Beirut.

A World Council of Churches (WCC) delegation will meet ministers and official government representatives of three non-nuclear NATO states this week. The purpose of the meetings is to ask these states to take a more pro-active role within the organization to fulfill nuclear disarmament obligations undertaken in the framework of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

Cf. WCC Press Update PU-02-24 of 20 August 2002