Group of 78 – Le Groupe des 78 – Peace, Justice, Survival. Paix, Justice, Survie.

“Palestine is disappearing”: Mary Robinson and The Elders

Former Prime Minister of Ireland and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson and her fellow Elders—Graça Machel, Helen Clark and Hina Jilani—returned from a recent fact-finding mission to the West Bank, Israel, Lebanon and Jordan with grave concerns. “I arrived at a clear conclusion,” Mary Robinson writes: “the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu aims… Continue Reading “Palestine is disappearing”: Mary Robinson and The Elders

Nagasaki, Nuclear Prayer Day and Interfaith Action Webinar now live

A part of the 10th Anniversary Interfaith Awareness Week, this webinar, put on by the International Academy for Multicultural Cooperation (IAMC), featured Audrey E. Kitagawa, J.D., Jonathan Granoff, J.D., The RT. Rev. William E. Swing, Monica Willard, Fumi Johns Stewart, Dorothy Maver, Colleen Moore, and Issac S. Thomas. The 32rd annual ringing of the Nagasaki Peace Bell in… Continue Reading Nagasaki, Nuclear Prayer Day and Interfaith Action Webinar now live

Honouring Canada’s Peacekeepers: “The world needs more peacekeeping and less warfighting!” (Walter Dorn)

The Group of 78 joins peace and disarmanent organizations across our country to honour the excellence and sacrifice Canadian peacekeepers. Sunday, August 9, 2026 was National Peacekeepers Day. As Walter Dorn, Professor at Royal Military College and Canadian Forces College, wrote recently: “It’s a day when we can honour those who served in peace operations, particularly those who… Continue Reading Honouring Canada’s Peacekeepers: “The world needs more peacekeeping and less warfighting!” (Walter Dorn)

“A Perilous Decline in Global Leadership”: Canada Should Step Up to Increase International Funding for Peacemaking

Writing in The Hill Times on August 7, 2026, Jenna Sapiano, John Packer, Marie-Joëlle Zahar and Meredith Preston-McGhie argue that Canada should lead an international effort to reinvest in peacemaking. Military budgets are skyrocketing. “Yet at precisely the moment when the need for peacemaking is greatest,” the authors write, “the number of negotiated peace agreements is falling. Peace… Continue Reading “A Perilous Decline in Global Leadership”: Canada Should Step Up to Increase International Funding for Peacemaking

“Defending the ICC Today is About Defending Canadian Sovereignty”: Mark Kersten on Benyamin Netanyahu’s Breaching of Canadian Airspace

How Canada engages with international organizations demonstrates our sovereignty, wrote Mark Kersten, a criminal justice professor at the University of the Fraser Valley, on August 6, 2026, in The Globe and Mail. But the way Canada is ignoring its duty to the International Criminal Court signals “that our sovereignty is up for negotiation,” he argues. Over the past… Continue Reading “Defending the ICC Today is About Defending Canadian Sovereignty”: Mark Kersten on Benyamin Netanyahu’s Breaching of Canadian Airspace

G78 Announces its 2026 Annual Policy Conference, October 9-10, at the University of Ottawa

Reinventing the Architecture for Peace: Catalysing Citizens, Coalitions, and Capital The institutions created after World War II to maintain peace, security, and a rules-based international order are proving incapable of responding to the current polycrisis of coercive hegemons, ramped-up military spending, a new nuclear arms race, accelerating climate change, increasing migration, and inadequate ethical governance of AI. How… Continue Reading G78 Announces its 2026 Annual Policy Conference, October 9-10, at the University of Ottawa

“The Making and Unmaking of American Dominance”: The Iran War, the Second Precision Revolution and the Leverage of Commercial Uncertainty

Writing in Foreign Affairs on July 24, 2026, University of Chicago political scientist Robert A. Pape argues that the US-Iran war shows that, using cheap drone weaponry made largely from commercially available components, a weaker power can challenge US military dominance, creating market uncertainty that imposes real costs on American and global business interests. The Iran war, he… Continue Reading “The Making and Unmaking of American Dominance”: The Iran War, the Second Precision Revolution and the Leverage of Commercial Uncertainty

A nation’s war expenditures: “spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children”—Dwight Eisenhower via Heather Cox-Richardson

In her July 23, 2026, Substack blog, political commentator Heather Cox-Richardson reported on the opaque, unaccountable and mounting war budget of the current US administration. In contrast, she highlighted a 1953 speech by US President Dwight D. Eisenhower, given following the death of Josef Stalin, that forcefully opposed the diversion of tax dollars to military spending. She quotes… Continue Reading A nation’s war expenditures: “spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children”—Dwight Eisenhower via Heather Cox-Richardson

The Green Helmets Initiative: Fighting Climate Disasters with NATO’s Budget-Can Canada Lead?

On July 24, 2026, Toronto Star reporter Allan Woods profiled Canadian development expert and former senior CIDA analyst, Dr. Rémy-Claude Beaulieu, and his proposal for a global mobile “Green Helmets” force to take emergency action to “keep the peace with Mother Nature,” as Woods puts it. Dr. Beaulieu’s vision of the initiative includes an international network of centres… Continue Reading The Green Helmets Initiative: Fighting Climate Disasters with NATO’s Budget-Can Canada Lead?

The Thomson Reuters Contract with ICE: What Could Go Wrong?

With the important mid-term elections in the United States coming up fast, and the Administration taking a range of steps to tilt the playing field in the GOP’s favour, civil-liberties and democracy advocates are expressing grave concern over Canadian-owned Thomson Reuters’ new $125-million contract to provide US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, with tools and support to… Continue Reading The Thomson Reuters Contract with ICE: What Could Go Wrong?