By DPA
Kabul : Thousands of people across war-ravaged Afghanistan Friday marched behind the country’s biggest-till-date peace effort as fighting and suicide attacks continued in some parts.
Peace Day was observed in almost all provinces with different events on a scale never seen before in Afghanistan, a statement from United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) said.
Around 1,500 people gathered at one of Kabul’s best known schools, the Estleqal High School, to watch and take part in performances, kite flying, songs and prayers for peace.
Elsewhere, several schools were painted with white and blue peace banners, billboards proclaimed peace, a major city square was renamed Peace Square and calls for peace prayers were sent out to mosques.
Television and radio stations carried peace programmes, and newspapers – normally not published on Fridays – published special Friday peace editions.
President Hamid Karzai released a Peace Day statement via national radio, saying that Afghanistan was committed to doing everything in its power to make peace permanent for the nation and region.
In the eastern city of Jalalabad at least 500 people joined a peace march, a day after thousands poured through the streets of the western city of Herat in what media reports described as one of the biggest rallies Afghanistan has ever seen.
In the Central Highlands, around 200 people took part in a clean-up campaign for peace in Band-e-Amir national park.
People attended a peace rally to see weapons being handed over, and around 2,000 people marched from UNAMA’s offices to the site of Bamyan’s giant Buddhas, destroyed in 2001 by Taliban fanatics.
Enthusiastic celebrations took place in Kandahar and Zabul provinces Thursday, and doves and balloons were released.
“You can’t hear about all that’s happening and not feel moved by it,” said Bo Asplund, UNAMA deputy special representative. “Today is an achievement for all the people of this country. The demand for peace is overwhelming.”
International Peace Day is marked each year by UN member states on Sep 21.
But this year in Afghanistan the day has been the focus of a campaign that began on July 19 when UNAMA teamed up with Jeremy Gilley, founder of Peace One Day, actor Jude Law, and the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) to promote Peace Day.
Scores of groups have since joined in, including businesses, civil society, government, international donors, UN agencies, politicians, Afghan celebrities and performers, schools, municipal and regional authorities and individual citizens.
As well as President Karzai’s peace message, a message of support for peace was issued by the country’s new parliament.
The Peace Day in Afghanistan campaign has coincided with separate peace initiatives, including a peace jirga, or tribal assembly of elders, and signaling from both the government and Taliban rebels of openness to talks.
UNICEF, the World Health Organization, and Afghan health authorities have taken advantage of the space created by these efforts to conduct polio immunization in insurgency-afflicted areas of the south.
Violence has been a near daily phenomenon in some parts of Afghanistan over the past 18 months of an insurgency.
On Friday, there were reports of fighting in the southern province of Helmand, and a convoy attack to the west of Kabul killed a soldier and wounded several civilians.