NOTE TO CORRESPONDENTS INTERNATIONAL DAY OF PEACE TO BE OBSERVED AT HEADQUARTERS

Press Release

NOTE TO CORRESPONDENTS INTERNATIONAL DAY OF PEACE TO BE OBSERVED AT HEADQUARTERS

About 300 students from several New York City schools will visit United Nations Headquarters on Tuesday, 16 September, to take part in a celebration of the International Day of Peace. The students, who will be at Headquarters as guests of the Department of Public Information (DPI), will attend a flag raising ceremony in Conference Room 4 beginning at 10 a.m. and participate in an interactive display of the United Nations Home Page on the World Wide Web. They will also watch a performance of songs and dances by the Vanaver Caravan, a Long Island-based ensemble.

The programme is being organized by DPI in association with the World Peace Prayer Society. The President of the fifty-first session of the General Assembly, Razali Ismail (Malaysia), and Assistant Secretary-General for Public Information Samir Sanbar will join the students in observing the Day, which is also being observed by DPI as "Students' Day at the UN".

As part of the day's programme, the CyberSchoolBus website of the United Nations Home Page will launch its "peace poem" project. Schools around the world have been invited to contribute two lines each to a poem on the theme of peace. On United Nations Day, 24 October 1997, the last date for submission, these lines will be collated together into one long Peace Poem and posted on the Web. The poem will also be published as a booklet.

The International Day of Peace, which coincides with the opening of the annual regular session of United Nations General Assembly, was proclaimed by the Assembly in 1981 to commemorate and strengthen the ideals of peace both within and among all nations of the world.

For further information call (212) 963-6555; for media accreditation call (212) 963-6934.

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