Goi Peace Foundation Forum

Lily Yeh’s Message Part 3: What Peace Means to Me

Part 1: Self-Introduction

Part 2: What I Have Valued and Devoted Myself To

Part 4: Coming Soon

Goi Peace Foundation Forum 2026

Date/Time

Saturday, November 28, 2026, 3:00 – 5:30pm (Japan Time)
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Theme

Connecting Hope, Creating Peace

We are living in an era of uncertainty, marked by wars, division, disasters, climate change and more.
While anxiety and a sense of hopelessness are spreading, there are also people around the world who are fostering hope and paving the way toward peace, despite difficult realities they are facing.
In this rapidly changing world, what should we believe in, and what values should we hold dear?
This year’s forum explores what each of us can do to connect our hope with a view toward creating a more peaceful future.

Program

PART 1 2026 Goi Peace Award Ceremony and Commemorative Speech

Lily Yeh
Artist, Social innovator (United States)

Voices of Youth

Peace Journey is a new international educational program of the Goi Peace Foundation, designed to nurture young people who “live peace.” From around 1,500 applicants across 93 countries, 70 young people were selected to participate in five months of learning and dialogue. One Peace Pioneer, selected through this journey, along with the three finalists will share their thoughts and the initiatives they are taking for peace.

Raheemah Hafsah Pangarungan
Peace Pioneer (Philippines)
Marko Mazepa (Ukraine, living in the United States)
Nyakangba Nelson Poyo (South Sudan)
Shakhzoda Saidova (Tajikistan, living in Romania)

PART 2
Dialogue Session “Where Does Peace Come From?”

Where does peace come from?
The answer varies depending on one’s experiences and perspective, formed through encountering people, engaging in dialogue, listening to different values, and so on.
Through conversations with speakers from diverse fields and generations—each of them walking their own path toward peace guided by their convictions—we will explore where peace comes from and how it can be nurtured.

Lily Yeh
Artist, Social innovator
Kenji Sekine
President of United People Corporation, Representative Director of United for Peace Film Festival (general incorporated association), Director of NPO PEACE DAY
Raheemah Hafsah Pangarungan

Maki Kawamura
President, The Goi Peace Foundation

PRESENTERS

Lily Yeh
2026 Goi Peace Award Laureate

The Goi Peace Award is presented annually to honor individuals and organizations in various fields that have made outstanding contributions toward the realization of a peaceful and harmonious world for all life on earth.
The 2026 Goi Peace Award will be presented to Lily Yeh, artist and social innovator.

Lily Yeh, born in Guizhou Province, China, in 1941 and raised in Taiwan, is an artist, educator and social innovator. Ms. Yeh emigrated to the United States to study art at the University of Pennsylvania, where she received her MFA. In 1986, while teaching as a professor of painting and art history at the University of the Arts (Philadelphia), she co-founded The Village of Arts and Humanities, transforming more than 120 abandoned lots and neglected spaces into parks and community centers. Her organization gained international recognition as a model for community revitalization through the arts. In 2002, she founded Barefoot Artists to support her international work and replicate the Village model in devastated communities around the world. In addition to the Rwanda Healing Project for survivors of the genocide, Ms. Yeh has led collaborative projects in Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and the United States, working with local residents in the communities, and has created numerous educational, agricultural and economic initiatives. She is recipient of the Ford Foundation’s Leadership for a Changing World Award, a Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Governor’s Award for Environmental Excellence, and multiple honorary doctorates, and is the author of numerous books.

Kenji Sekine

Kenji Sekine is President of United People Corporation, Representative Director of United for Peace Film Festival, and Director of NPO PEACE DAY. During a graduation trip after college, he happened to visit the Gaza Strip, where he encountered the realities of conflict firsthand and made the realization of peace his life’s mission. In 2002, guided by the philosophy of “connecting people to people and contributing to solving the world’s challenges,” he founded United People, a company dedicated to addressing global issues such as war, poverty, hunger, and climate change. He launched the company’s film business in 2009, and since 2011, has organized the United for Peace Film Festival every year on the UN International Day of Peace. On September 21, 2021 (Peace Day), he launched a wine business called United People Wine. He is currently working on the Yoichi Peace Wine Project in Yoichi, Hokkaido, where people from 100 different countries are collaborating across national and religious boundaries.

Raheemah Hafsah Pangarungan

Raheemah Hafsah Pangarungan (Philippines) was selected as Peac