Padraig O’Malley (C) with a Christian pastor and a Muslim imam in Kaduna, Nigeria. (Allan Leonard/GlobalPost)
Soldiers with automatic weapons flanked our convoy and armored personnel carriers guarded the entrance as we arrived at the opening of a peace conference here.
This city, which has been a flashpoint in Nigeria’s ongoing violence among Christians and Muslims and a counter-insurgency campaign against Islamic militants, is serving as host of the 4th International Conference of the Forum for Cities in Transition.
The gathering brings together some 200 delegates and observers from divided societies around the world, including Lebanon, Kosovo, Northern Ireland, Iraq, Israel and Palestine, who’ve come to share lessons learned on strategies of reconciliation and the arduous process of restoring trust in conflict-torn countries.
GlobalPost editor Charles Sennott reports from an interfaith peace conference in Kaduna, Nigeria.