United Nations (PTI): Paying tribute to Mahatma Gandhi on his 139th birth anniversary, UN General Assembly (UNGA) on Thursday asked its members to use the philosophy of non-violence as a foundation of resolving conflicts.

Placing a bust of the Mahatma by his side, President of UNGA Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann urged the member states to help world adopt the "Satyagraha" in all languages to begin a gradual and profound process of reflection into its meaning.

"If we do so we would have entered into the process of liberating humankind from its dependence on violence as a means to resolve differences," he said.

Brockmann, a great admirer of Gandhi, said there is nothing passive or timid about this "love force" or "truth force". On the contrary, "Satyagraha is a bold, brave, assertive and risk-taking method of struggle."

The former foreign minister of Nicaragua called on the UN members to choose, "personally and collectively," step-by-step experiments in the "infinite power" of truth, saying," truth, in the final analysis, is synonym of love."

Commending Gandhi's message, he said that Martin Luther King Jr's application of his methods to the struggle in the United States for civil rights, economic justice and end of Vietnam War revealed the "power of growing non-violent movement to begin to transform the course of even the most powerful nation in history."

"Echoing Gandhi, King proclaimed to that nation and the world that we must choose non-violence or non-existence," he recalled.

THE HINDU
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