Belfast, à  l’école de la paix

Belfast 1994. For the first time in twenty-five years, the civil war seems to have died down. In September and October 1994, the paramilitary organisations on both sides in turn declare a cease-fire. Has peacetime come at long last ? A time for silencing arms, but above all putting an end to fear and ready-made ideas, the half-truths and half-lies ? For three months, a French television crew made a series of three-minute chronicles, entitled Belfast Lessons, broadcast every evening on Channel Four. For their subject, they took ten sixth-formers at Hazelwood College, one of the rare mixed, intercommunity schools in Belfast. Gradually the youngsters find their words and for the first time state some plain truths, not all pleasant to say, nor pleasant to hear about the war which divides their country. Belfast, à  l’école de la paix gives an account of this experience.