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On September 10, a letter of appreciation from the Superintendent General of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) Minoru Saito was presented to the Soka Gakkai for providing facilities to support the MPD’s security duties during the Tokyo 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games due to the proximity of the main stadium to the Soka Gakkai Headquarters.

On September 3, as part of the 18th Annual Conference of the European Association for the Study of Religions, a study session titled “Soka Gakkai: Resilience and Solidarity in a Global Buddhist Movement” was held.  The conference took place from August 30 to September 3, at the University of Pisa in Italy and was broadcast live. Director of the Center for Studies on New Religions (CESNUR) Massimo Introvigne, Professor Vinicio Busacchi of the University of Cagliari, Professor Anne-Mette Fisker-Nielsen of Soka University and Professor Bernadette Rigal-Cellard of the University of Bordeaux Montaigne among others presented their studies on the Soka Gakkai. Topics included how the Soka Gakkai fosters resilience, the history of the Soka Gakkai in Italy, and its efforts to spread hope during the pandemic.

I.B Tauris, the academic division of Bloomsbury Publishing in the UK, has published an English edition of The Power of Hope: Thoughts on Peace and Human Rights in the Third Millennium, the dialogue between President Daisaku Ikeda and Argentinian Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Adolfo Pérez Esquivel. Esquivel, a human rights activist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1980, played a vital role in resisting the Argentinian military dictatorship. He suffered arrest and torture as a result. The dialogue explores their perspectives on how to make the third millennium the millennium of peace.