The first webinar in monthly webinars series of the Tehran Peace Museum (TPM) which covered an introduction to international humanitarian law (IHL) was held by the TPM, Communication and International Affairs Center of the Municipality of Tehran, and International Council of Museum Iran (ICOM) on Zoom on July 25th, 2021. In this webinar, Dr. Pouria Askari spoke about IHL and Ms. Mona Badamchizadeh introduced the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum - Geneva.

The “Symphony of Coughs 3” Webinar Held

The Symphony of Coughs 3 webinar was held on the occasion of the anniversary of the chemical attack on Sardasht on June 30, 2021. The meeting which lasted from 2-4 pm, was held by Tehran Peace Museum (TPM), Iranian Center for International Criminal Law (ICICL), Communications and International Affairs Center of the Municipality of Tehran and the Organization for Defending Sardasht Victims of Chemical Weapons (ODVCW) on zoom platform. This meeting was held with the purpose of investigating aspects of legal prosecution of the use of chemical weapons (CW) against Iran and answering questions on this topic. It was a follow up on “Symphony of Coughs 1” and “Symphony of Coughs 2” seminars previously held by TPM.

The Commemorative event for the Victims of Chemical Weapons and the 10^th Opening Anniversary of Tehran Peace Museum Held.

The commemorative event for the all victims of chemical weapons and the 10^th opening anniversary of Tehran Peace Museum (TPM) on the occasion of the 34^th anniversary of the chemical attack on Sardasht, was held by TPM, Communications and International Affairs Center of the Municipality of Tehran and the Organization for Defending Sardasht Victims of Chemical Weapons (ODVCW) on July 29, 2021 from 11 am to 1 pm on the zoom platform.

In this program, first, the video message of Director General of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), H.E. Fernando Arias on the occasion of the 34^th anniversary of the chemical attack of Sardasht was played. Then the message of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Iran, Dr. Javad Zarif on this occasion was read by the host.

"Peace Reporting Simulation" workshop was held by Iran Secretariat of MFP and the Peace Reporters Association and Iranian Association for Peace Studies at the Tehran Peace Museum 27, 28 December 2019.

The basics and principles of peace reporting, based on how a reporter can prevent biased and escalation and the ways of coverage the truth news to the audience was the topics that educated on the first day of the workshop.
Principles of humanitarian law, the need to protect civilians and not to attack civilian places and the protection of journalists was trained on the second day.
The program also discussed the political history of Afghanistan and the process of peace negotiations between America and the Taliban.

The final section was a simulation of peace reporting on the subject of Afghan peace negotiations.
The participants were divided into different groups and reported on the topics, they had learned during the workshop.
Upon completion of the group reporting, the representatives of each group read their report to the public, and lecturers corrected the texts and explained the important points of each report.

In the end, the participation certification was awarded to participants.

Two Volunteers of Tehran Peace Museum participated in the “Science for all” festival run by Iran’s National Science Museum in November.

Science for all is a festival which provides people with the opportunity to gain knowledge about different aspects of science. In this festival, Ms. Farzaneh Nazari who was one of the participants of "Hiroshima and Peace 2018"course, delivered a speech regarding the peaceful ways of using nuclear energy. The main sections of her speech were about nuclear structure, application of nuclear energy in health, agriculture, water resource management, the nuclear disaster in Fukushima and Chernobyl and also Hiroshima atomic bombing.

Ms. Mona Badamchizadeh who was also an intern of Mayors for Peace organization held a digital art exhibition by artworks related to the consequences of using weapons of mass destruction with support from TPM and Iran’s National Science Museum.

It is worth mentioning that two paintings from the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum’s collection were also digitally displayed. These are two examples of TPM volunteer’s contribution toward raising people’s awareness regarding the effects of weapons of mass destruction.

Local Urban Development Office of “Bagh Azari” in cooperation with Tehran Peace Museum held a course in four sessions on Peaceful Communications in Bagh Azari Neighborhood House in July 2019.

This course was held in order to implement the “ Park Misagh” functional quality improvement project which aims to encourage the neighborhood to enhance their social interactions through participating in group working in the mentioned park.

#stop_phubbing

Phubbing is the act of ignoring someone you are with and giving attention to your mobile phone instead.

Nowadays, we are living in an era with a high impression of technology on our life. The significant role of smart phones is inevitable. According to the statistics on the of usage of smart phones, 26% of cell phone owners use their phone more than 7 hours and check it more than 150 times per day which is equivalent to each 5 minutes. Therefore, it will be great to spend some time without smart phone.

Second Round of Tehran-Sardasht Peace Rally Competition

The second round of Tehran-Sardasht Peace Rally was held for the Commemorate of the victims of chemical weapons and development of friendship and peace through tourism on 27, 28 and 29 June 2019 in Tehran-Sardasht road with participation of 40 cars and 130 members of Tehran Peace Museum family, especially chemical victims and their families. The Rally was held with the cooperation of Chemical Victims Society, Tehran Peace Museum and assistance of Touring and Automobile Club of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Foundation of Martyrs and Veterans Affairs and Sardasht Chemical Victims Society.

The members of Tehran Peace Museum's "Children Department" held a workshop consisted of storytelling, narrating and painting in two schools for girls and boys, named respectively Kowthar and Enqelab located in Sardasht province, from 21^st to 24^th of May.

The collected artworks were displayed in an exhibition called "Little Narrators" for the memorial of the 33^rd Anniversary of Sardasht Chemical Bombardment in Sardasht on June 28^th and 29^th and the venue of this Exhibition was at Bistoon; the old Bathroom (Hammam) of Sardasht.

The Peace Counts Workshop was held on Tuesday July 2^nd from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. with attendance of 17 participants.

At first, participants got to know each other, later on, through group activities, concepts of peace, violence, non-violent behaviors and negotiation and how to avoid violence in fundamental entities like family, local communities and workplaces, the concept of conflict, its procedure and the role of third party were taught during the four main parts of the workshop.

In 1977 The International Council of Museums (ICOM) named May 18^th as “The International Museum Day” with the aim of further unifying the creative aspirations and efforts of museums and drawing the attention of the world public to their activity.

This year the International Museum Day was celebrated with cooperation of Iranian chapter of ICOM and Iranian Academy of the Arts with the theme of “Museums as the cultural hubs: Future of Tradition” on May 18^th.

Dr. Fabio Carbone, special envoy of International Institute for Peace through Tourism (IIPT), accompanied by Mr. Mojtaba Ebadi Fath, International Relations’ Officer of Holy Defense Museum, visited Tehran Peace Museum on May 7^th 2019. Mr. Taghipour Moghadam, director of TPM, guided him on Museum’s tour and provided him with a thorough explanation regarding different sections of the Museum accompanied by the simultaneous translation provided by one if the Museum's intern.

Japanese humanitarian physicians, also known as “MOCT” whose cooperation with Tehran Peace Museum initiated 14 years ago, accompanied by their new members, visited TPM on 25^th of April. After the tour of the museum, history, projects and international cooperation of TPM were presented in a meeting. The future collaboration of the parties was discussed in that meeting as well; among them were Iran-Japan film festival (24-30^th of June) In Hiroshima, facilitation of internship programs, inviting children peace education groups of Peace Museums and holding rotating exhibitions of children’s paintings.

Tehran Peace Museum and SCWVS’s representatives attended 23 Conference of the States Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) and the 4th Review conference of CWC which was held from 19-30 November 2018 in The Hague. 150 member states, 7 international organizations, 75 NGOs, chemical industries and media representatives were present in the conference.

On June 28th, 1987, 4 chemical weapons (mustard gas) were dropped on Sardasht, a city in Northwest of Iran. 110 civilians were killed within few days and 8000 were exposed to mustard gas.
After 31 years, people of Sardasth are still suffering from the long term consequences of mustard gas. This was the first chemical attack against civilians in the history. On this occasion, the minister of foreign affairs of Iran and director general of Organization for Prohibition of Chemical Weapons have issued statements.

June 28, 2018 marks the 31st anniversary of the disastrous gas attack by the Iraqi Ba’athist regime on innocent and oppressed people of Sardasht. This day is designated as National Day of Fight Against Chemical and Biological Weapons in the Iranian calendar. The reality is that the calendar can register this human disaster only on one of its pages while the innocence and resistance of the people of Sardasht have been registered eternally in all pages of history.

Every year on 28 June, we come together to mourn the men and women who perished and those who continue to suffer the terrible after-effects of the chemical attack on the Iranian town of Sardasht. The name Sardasht, like Ieper and Halabja, has become a powerful reminder to the international community that the use of chemical weapons cannot be tolerated – not then, not now, not ever.

"Children and Peaceful Dreams" drawing exhibition was held from 21st to 23rd June 2018 Honar Gallery, Shafagh Cultural Center. This exhibition was a collaboration between Hadis Early Childhood Education Centre and Tehran Peace Museum.

Mayors for Peace Newsflash for June 2018 was published and a section of that is dedicated to the news of total number of Iranian member cities exceeding 1000.

In this news flash it is stated that: " As of June 1, 2018, the number of Iranian member cities reached 1,003.

On 21 June 2018, the state of Palestine became a member state to Chemical Weapons Convention after it deposited its instrument of accession on 17 May 2018 with the Secretary-General of the United Nations.