GNMI Celebrates the Launch of “Peacebuilding in Pakistan”

On January 27, 2025, the Global Neighbourhood for Media Innovation (GNMI), in collaboration with the East-West Center (EWC), proudly launched Peacebuilding in Pakistan—a publication that highlights the impact and lessons from PeaceFLIX, an initiative launched in 2021 to empower grassroots peacebuilders in Pakistan, with a strong focus on women’s leadership. The publication offers practical insights for peacebuilders globally and contributes to the broader discourse on community-led peace efforts. Through digital media, capacity-building, and networking, the project aimed to promote social cohesion, challenge extremist narratives, and amplify the role of women and transgender individuals in peacebuilding.

This publication-launch dinner event brought together senior journalists, civil society leaders, and changemakers to reflect on the power of grassroots peace efforts and discuss the future of peacebuilding initiatives in Pakistan.

An Outcome of the PeaceFLIX Project

GNMI President Najia Ashar emphasized that this publication is a significant outcome of the two-and-a-half-year PeaceFLIX initiative, which has been a driving force behind sustainable peace efforts across Pakistan. Through this initiative, 130 Peace Action Projects (PAPs) were successfully implemented in over 100 locations, addressing critical themes such as interfaith harmony, tolerance, women’s empowerment, diversity, sports, cultural programs, study tours, and arts-based peace activities. With the direct engagement of over 5,000 community members, PeaceFLIX has proven the power of localized interventions in shaping peaceful and cohesive societies.

EWC Journalism Program Coordinator Steven Youngblood acknowledged GNMI’s leadership in community-driven peace efforts, highlighting that Peacebuilding in Pakistan is not just a publication but a testament to the perseverance and dedication of grassroots changemakers. He emphasized that these stories contribute meaningfully to global peace discourse and inspire greater support for women and community-led initiatives.

Media and Civil Society Role in Strengthening Peace Narrative

The event also highlighted the media’s critical role in peacebuilding, with senior journalists such as Mazhar Abbas, Afia Salam, Faysal Aziz Khan, Lubna Jerar, and Masood Raza sharing their insights on promoting positive narratives. With them, civil society leaders, including Malik Tahir (Legal Rights Forum), Rizwan Jaffar (Youth Parliament Pakistan), Irum Tanveer (Press Information Department, Govt of Pakistan), and Ayaz Khan (MoJo Pakistan), contributed valuable perspectives on strengthening community resilience.

Building a Future of Peace

GNMI is committed to its mission on empowering storytellers, journalists, and grassroots changemakers to catalyze peace process in Pakistan. The event reaffirms the need for collaboration, media engagement, and collective action to create a more inclusive and egalitarian future.

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A bespoke curriculum has been developed to support participants’ self-identification and increase their peacebuilding capacities. Various stakeholders were involved in the process including consultants with diversified academic background, prospective peacebuilders, and the project team. It was important to take peacebuilders’ into consideration to current identify gaps and missing links in the peacebuilding process, as well as in their leadership and communication capabilities

The finalized five-module curriculum focuses on various peacebuilding approaches, developing their communication capacities, and leadership skills to successfully implement peace action plans. It was also designed to help participants strengthen their peacebuilding efforts and peace action profiles and support them in learning how to use digital product skills, social media, and messaging to a greater effect of their projects online and offline.

The comprehensive PeaceFLIX training manual is available here.

Its contents are as follows:

For online training with participants of diversified, educational, socio-economic backgrounds to be effective, adding sufficiently engaging and interactive online activities was mandatory. This step allowed the training to be more practical, enabling participants to retain more information.