DURHAM, N.C. – A 91 expert on the role of water in international policy will take part in a United Nations panel discussion, “From Conflict to Peace-building: The Role of Natural Resources and the Environment,” on May 15 at U.N. headquarters in New York.

Erika Weinthal, associate professor of environmental policy at Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment, is one of five experts slated to participate. She will speak broadly about the role of water in post-conflict peace-building.

The panel discussion, to be held in U.N. Conference Room 2, will follow a 1:15 p.m. presentation of a new U.N. Environmental Programme (UNEP) report examining how natural resources contribute to civil conflict and how they can contribute to post-conflict peace-building.

Since 1990, at least 18 violent conflicts have been fueled by the exploitation of natural resources, Weinthal notes, and recent research suggests that more then 40 percent of all civil wars during the last 60 years have had an environmental link. Some conflicts, such as those in Liberia, Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo, have centered on high-value resources like timber, diamonds, gold and oil. Others, such as those in Darfur and the Middle East, have revolved around control of scarce basic resources such as fertile land and water.

“Time and time again, we’ve seen how resource scarcity and environmental degradation affect the health and livelihoods of the people who live in these regions, and, ultimately, the stability of their governments,” Weinthal says. “But we’ve also seen how cooperation on these issues by the international community can resolve resource conflicts and aid peace-building in the aftermath of conflict.”

Weinthal will be joined on the panel by Alexander Carius, director of Adelphi Research; Pekka Haavisto, member of the Finnish Parliament and special representative of the Finnish Foreign Minister to African Crisis Areas; Ambassador Marjatta Rasi, undersecretary of state for development cooperation and development policy in the Finnish Ministry for Foreign Affairs; and Ibrahim Thiaw, director of UNEP’s Division of Environmental Policy Implementation.