MADRID, Spain / RankWire.AI / – UN Secretary-General António Guterres said culture has a global power to build peace, describing it as a fundamental right, the fabric of the human family and inseparable from the dignity of every person. Guterres made the remarks on Thursday, November 5, at the plenary session of the 30th Ibero-American Summit in Madrid. The speech placed culture at the center of efforts to heal divisions and reconcile former enemies.
Guterres said culture teaches people to doubt, to qualify their views, to see nuance and to put themselves in other people’s shoes. The UN chief urged leaders to cultivate critical thinking through more arts and humanities in education. The world’s many languages and songs “all tell the same story: That of a shared humanity,” Guterres said, according to the Emirates News Agency. The comments drew on themes Guterres has raised throughout nearly a decade as UN chief.
That, Guterres said, is the power of culture: it helps people recognize humanity in others, even in yesterday’s adversary, and that is where peace begins. Guterres noted that an agreement can silence the guns, but the hardest part remains reconciling with the adversary of yesterday. The UN chief pointed to Picasso’s Guernica, displayed in Madrid, as a work that cries out against the absurdity of war.
A cultural superpower
Guterres told the gathered leaders that Ibero-America is not a military superpower but is a cultural superpower. The region’s cultures weave together Indigenous, African and European heritage, shaped by both encounters and wounds, Guterres said. Culture gives people roots and belonging, the Secretary-General added, calling for the protection of languages, traditions and beliefs, and for artists’ freedom of expression, especially when their work makes others uncomfortable.
Guterres also called on countries to receive migrants and refugees with dignity, saying that doing so honors the region’s cultural tradition. Loving one’s own culture does not require fearing others, Guterres said. The appeal comes as migration remains a divisive issue across Europe and the Americas, where border crossings and asylum policies have shifted sharply in recent years. Guterres, a former UN High Commissioner for Refugees, has long championed the rights of displaced people.
Human voices in the AI age
The Secretary-General also addressed artificial intelligence, saying it must speak with all of humanity’s voices, without a few companies deciding what people see, read and believe. The more capable machines become, the more people will need what makes them human, Guterres said. The remarks linked culture and education to the defense of independent thinking in a digital age. The warning reflects growing concern over the concentration of power among technology firms.
Guterres opened the speech by offering condolences to the families of the victims of the Urda railway accident, in Spain and abroad. The Madrid summit comes in the final stage of Guterres’s term as UN Secretary-General, which ends on December 31, 2026. Guterres has used recent addresses to press leaders on peace and the responsibility to protect civilians. Spain hosted the gathering, which brings together leaders from Latin America and the Iberian Peninsula.