By Dr Bertrand Ramcharan Former UN Under-Secretary-General
Seventh Chancellor of the University of Guyana Previously Director of the International Conference on the Former Yugoslavia (1992-1996)
Wars end in one of three ways: victory/defeat; stalemate; or negotiated outcomes. Holsti documented that the majority end in stalemates.
Whichever way the current Russo-Ukraine conflict will end, it is time to empanel an international conference on Ukraine. We draw here on our nearly four years as Director of the International Conference on the Former Yugoslavia, and on our related book, International Peace Conferences.
Saudi Arabia recently convened a meeting of the national security advisers of some forty countries, with the announced aim of endorsing the peace plan of President V. Zelensky. It is of some value that these representatives got around the table to discuss the conflict. But for the initiative to have any future it should evolve into an international peace conference.
