ICIP President presents 2012 Annual Activity Report to Parliament

The president of ICIP, Rafael Grasa, appeared before the Commission of External Action, European Union and Cooperation of the Parliament of Catalonia to present ICIP’s Annual Activity Report for 2012.
The president of ICIP summarized the activities that the Institute has carried out over these past months and the results obtained in the key areas of action: Research, Training, Dissemination and Knowledge Transfer, and Peacebuilding and Conflict Prevention.Grasa sought to highlight the effort ICIP has made to maintain a high level of activity and of publications despite the budget reduction, especially in the area of research, where 16 doctoral fellowships were maintained: “We have made an enormous effort to save the doctoral fellowship program, which is the only way to ensure that the training of new generations of specialists will continue.”
Grasa also stressed, as ICIP’s strengths, the consolidation of the ICIP Peace in Progress Award, the increase in partnerships with international organizations – for example, with Norway’s PRIO – and the work carried out in collaboration with the Library of Catalonia to recover the memory of the peace movement.
With respect to institutional matters, the president of ICIP urged the members of Parliament to proceed “ASAP” with the partial renovation of the Governing Board, which has been pending for months.
Acknowledgement of the parliamentary groups
All of the parliamentary groups present in the Commission (ERC, PSC, PP, ICV, Ciutadans, Mixed Group and CiU, in speaking order) congratulated ICIP on the work it carries out – in a difficult economic context – and expressed their gratitude for the “high level of transparency” of the Institute in its accountability to Parliament. The various groups highlighted the importance of promoting research and stressed that ICIP goes well beyond the achievement of its objectives. The parliamentarians also expressed their awareness of the need to proceed with the renovation of the Governing Board, as called for by the president of ICIP.