How Sports Help in Achieving Peace and Development?

The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization tasked to promote international cooperation and to create and maintain international order.

A senior UN official stated that the United Nations can make its voice matter on the power of sport in promoting both peace and development requesting the participants at a special Headquarters event to “bring out theirinner sports fans,” and use sport as a catalyst for positive change.

Sports bring about a lot of good habits in an individual such as fair play, tolerance and team spirit. Not only this but sports play a very important role in preventing violence and crime as well. They also help in achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that were adopted by world leaders in 2015. This special headquarter event is a great opportunity to advance awareness of the International Day of Sport for Development and Peace. MiroslavLajčák, President of the General Assembly, emphasized that handling crime in the appropriate manner is of utmost importance in changing the world for the better by 2030.

Sport is really an amazing tool for preventing crime. Sportsmen have a better chance of rejecting crime and contributing to achieving the SDGs. Team spirit and sportsmanship can bring forward strong social networking and help in boosting self- esteem of an individual, along with making it easy for communities to put aside their differences.

Former National Basketball Association All Star player DikembeMutombo, Olympians and other distinguished athletes and sports personalities participated in the event, which featured panel discussions on how sport can promote development and crime prevention strategies, and youth programmes. The event was organized by UNODC and the Permanent Missions of Colombia, Italy, Monaco, Qatar and Rwanda to the United Nations.

By: Anuja Arora

Source: https://news.un.org/en/story/2018/04/1006871