Kuala Lumpur/Vienna, 20 September 1997

Professor Hans Koechler, President of the International Progress Organization, has been appointed as member of the International Advisory Panel of the Centre for Civilisational Dialogue of the University of Malaya in Kuala Lumpur. The Centre was inaugurated on 15 September 1997 in the presence of Malaysia's Minister of Education - in connection with the holding of the Third International Seminar on Civilisational Dialogue in Kuala Lumpur. Among the members of the Panel are Professor Osman Bakar (Deputy Vice-Chancellor of the University of Malaya), Prof. Ali A. Mazrui (Albert Schweitzer Professor in the Humanities, New York), Prof. Shuntaro Ito (Director of the Centre for Comparative Study of Civilisations at Reitaku University, Japan), Prof. Tu Wei-ming (Professor of Chinese History and Philosophy at Harvard University), and the Venerable Maha Ghosananda, Supreme Patriarch of the Cambodian Buddhist community. The Director of the Centry is Prof. Chandra Muzaffar.

The Centre for Civilisational Dialogue, the first of its kind in the region of South-East Asia, seeks to promote dialogue and mutual understanding between civilisations through various intellectual activities such as international research seminars and a series of publications.