Oosterbeek, Netherlands

The World Peace Flame monument at the Airborne Museum in Oosterbeek (Netherlands) was inaugurated on 20 December 2014. The flame was lit from the World Peace Flame at the Vredespaleis (the ‘Peace Palace’) in The Hague to pupils of the Dorenweerd College in Doorwerth. The pupils brought the flame to the Airborne Museum for the inauguration ceremony.

The initiators of the WPF Oosterbeek – Monique Schieman and André van Schaveren – saw the Airborne Museum as the ideal location for a WPF monument because it symbolises the link between ‘remembrance’ and ‘the way forward to peace’. The project had the full cooperation of the municipal council and the committee of the Airborne Museum.

Monique Schieman states that children all have the same right to live in peace and love. ‘I invite everybody to think about what they would most like to pass on to our children and grandchildren. Because peace starts with ourselves, with our children, our own families and the people around us.

Savitri MacCuish, director of the WPF Foundation quoted Eleanor Roosevelt who once said: ‘It is n’t enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn’t enough to believe in it. One must work at it’.