Themed 'Power and Paradox', TRT World Forum 2021 kicks off virtually

By Rabia Iclal Turan

ISTANBUL (AA) – The TRT World Forum 2021, a two-day event to discuss "the most pressing issues of our time" began virtually on Tuesday.

The forum's fifth edition started with an opening speech by Mehmet Zahid Sobaci, the director general of Turkey's public broadcaster TRT, followed by speeches from Communications Director Fahrettin Altun and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Sobaci said he hopes the event "will be our last virtual meeting, and we will soon meet again in Istanbul."

"Although there are some physical barriers between us due to the COVID-19 pandemic, today, the world needs more dialogue, discussions, collective reasoning, exchange of ideas and developing a new approach more than ever," he said.

He said the TRT World Forum is considered to be an "extremely valuable" platform for intellectual debate in shaping the future.

"The forum highlights the difficulties of interpreting and understanding problems from a single point of view, and underlines the need for multiple viewpoints," he said.

Adding that a "new international order is taking shape," he said: "We believe that these problems can only be resolved by discussing them on a global scale."

"We can only make sense of all the problems, from climate change to terrorism, food safety to global armament and internal conflicts to risks posed by interstate global competition, by approaching them in a multidimensional and holistic manner," Sobaci said.

"Our problems are global, and thus the solution to them should be based on cooperation," he stressed.

This year's program is hosting nearly 100 speakers from more than 36 countries.

With the theme, Power and Paradox: Understanding Grand Strategy in the 21sth Century, the event brings together academics, journalists, intellectuals, politicians, and members of civil society from around the globe.

The sessions and discussions featured this year include The Future of Sovereignty in an Interdependent World, Towards New Realignments in the Middle East: The Future of Turkish-Arab Relations, Climate and Global Health Crises as Strategic Threats, Europe’s Grand Strategy after Brexit: Old Challenges and New Realities, and Global Governance and the Challenges and Opportunities of Multipolarity.

The Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan will also be discussed in an expert roundtable titled The Taliban Returns: Lessons Learned and Lost.

The speakers will include Ahmed Mohammed Al-Meraikhi, special adviser to the UN secretary-general; Prince El Hassan bin Talal, former Crown Prince of Jordan; Richard Falk, professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University; Andreas Wimmer, professor of sociology and political philosophy at Columbia University; Tarik M. Yousef, director of the Brookings Doha Center; and Diane Karusisi, CEO of BK Group, the largest financial services group in Rwanda.

Prof. Jonathan Patz, the health and the environment director of Global Health Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, will also be among the speakers, along with CyberPeace Institute’s Chief Executive Officer Stephane Duguin, Director of the Geneva Center for Security Policy (GCSP) Thomas Greminger, Director of the Centre for European Reform Charles Grant and President of Observer Research Foundation Samir Saran.

Registrations for the event can be done via www.trtworldforum.com.