Your eminences,

Mr. President Pujol,

Your excellencies and friends,

The choice for Barcelona as the seat of this International Meeting for Peace, the first in this new millennium, organised by the Community of Sant�Egidio, is an honour for all the Spanish and also for all the Catalan.

Barcelona truly is an historical city of the Mediterranean, the sea that during the millennia has been and remains a meeting point, a place of mutual exchange and dialogue between different peoples, races and civilizations. In the melting pot of the Mediterranean they all found the essence and the fundaments of what is called western civilization.

In fact these seashores also witnessed the birth and the development of the three great religions connected with the common patriarch Abraham, as an absolute element of its contribution to the moral and spiritual progress of humankind.

In the two thousand years of Christianity that precede us, the religious history of the Mediterranean passed through a thousand vicissitudes. It has known periods of hostility between the believers of the three creeds. At other times an enviable harmony has reigned between them, which at its turn produced admirable fruits of civilization of which Spain keeps splendid examples in its art, science and literature.

Starting in the middle of the Eighties, the Community of Sant�Egidio gathered the testimonies of European people from the past and the present who believed that dialogue in the spirit of faith supports peace and living together.

Our fellow citizen Raimundo Lullo, the great wise and spiritual man of the XIII century dedicated his life to dialogue with the Arab and Hebrew world. He already preached in his works that �kind words bear peace while bitter words unchain war�. The people from Sant�Egidio are familiar with this principle. Like Raimundo Lullo they are dedicated with heart and soul to cover streets and promote meetings between people responsible of the Christian churches and of the great world religions, together with authoritative representatives of the international political and cultural world. They are rightly convinced that dialogue, which has to be promoted by kind words smoothing all bitterness, creates an increased common knowledge and opens the door to the common task of promoting development, justice and peace.

As one of them defined his own group, the Community of Sant�Egidio �does not have any interest but peace, she has no arms but sincerity, her culture of friendship and the faith that she can inspire, thanks to the knowledge she acquired in her relations with belligerent.�

The Community of Sant�Egidio gathered the heritage of the great historical meeting in Assisi in 1986 where Pope John Paul II invited all the important religious leaders in the world to pray together for peace. The Community has taken up this pontifical initiative and organised international meetings for peace in many European cities, the last being in Lisbon. As in the past the invitation of this new Meeting in Barcelona has been welcomed by eminent religious, political, cultural and social leaders to bring through their presence their personal experiences and support. It is a very useful contribution so that our world could know peace again, a peace based on justice. Bearing in mind the antique roman aphorism �si vis pacem para bellum�, the meeting of religions and civilizations longing for peace lead to declaration that is really the opposite and was pronounced by His Holiness the Pope. �If you want peace, give justice�, �si vis pacem, para iustitiam�.

There is always a call for a righteous peace in the transcendental message of each religion. One way or another and sometimes with different accents but still founded on the same principle each religion proclaims that man is the child of God. Therefore he is his neighbour�s brother, sharing a common place, which is the earth and that justice is the way to live in peace on earth.

This way the pacific purposes of the religions are reflected in the States and in society through diplomacy that commits itself to search for peace, avoid conflicts and find ways of living together through attitudes and interests that in principle may be opposite at times.

It is obvious that religions � and in particular Christianity � have the very sacred duty and obligation to foment unity between peoples instead of antagonism. Religions should favour dialogue, and not remain silent when despicable groups deceive their own country, using vindictive reprisal, at times through a genocide but always through

terrorism to assassinate their own brothers and impose coactions and ideas that oppose everything, not only a democratic and peaceful society, but also oppose religion and the contemporary human maturity.

I would like to congratulate the Community of Sant�Egidio for the lasting commitment and engagement for peace it has shown in its interventions in the conflicts in Lebanon, Mozambique, Kosovo etc.

As the Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs I welcome this International Meeting for Peace. I bring the special greetings of the President of the Government to the national and foreign authorities who fill this great Teatre del Liceu today wishing that this Meeting would enable the continuation and progress on the path towards peace.

As a Catalan I thank the Community of Sant�Egidio for choosing Barcelona. With president Jordi Pujol I rejoice, as well as the authorities of Barcelona for the given support and the provided facilities for this Meeting that shows once again the love for peace of our Catalan land.