Germany’s Sustainable Development Strategy states that up to 2030 “even greater efforts than before will be required to reach all disadvantaged people and populations and to counteract rising inequality.” The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed the deep importance of strengthening outreach to ensure that the needs and capacities of the most vulnerable are recognised and addressed through policy, services and programmes. For this reason, we believe in the overarching principle of leaving no one behind and reaching people with fewest development opportunities first and focusing on the rights-basedapproachestodevelopment,inclusion,andsocialcohesion. Wearecommittedtowork collaboratively to drive an agenda for change and ensure livelihoods, rights, disability, gender, and age are at the heart of change. As events continue to unfold and become distorted, we believe that media is the cornerstone of leaving no one behind. Safe and positive media spaces are vital to make the voices of the most marginalized heard, promote constructive dialog, and reduce inequalities. The Peace Building in Lebanon News Supplement you are reading is one such space. The articles here explore values, challenges, fears, aspirations and stories, and show many common grounds between people from different nationalities. In this supplement you have in hands, several topics ranging from economic, social, and cultural aspects of the repercussions of the socio-economic and health crisis on refugees and host communities are highlighted. The supplement is published with funding from Germany through the KfW Development Bank and through the common vision of peace building shared by journalists, activists, researchers and artists in Lebanon.
We stand together to promote women’s empowerment, to encourage sexual orientation and gender rights, to foster refugees full and equal access to basic human rights, to defend the rights of all people including those in older age, and to promote people with disabilities’ full participation in society.
Now it is upon all of us to reach the destination of making voices heard and count, always keeping the pledge of joining forces to Leave no one behind!