Hello there!
Welcome to my GDS 2025 Diary!
On April 2, 2025, I arrived at Brandenburg Airport, Berlin, Germany at 6:00 PM CET and, after immigration processing, checked into the Scandic Berlin Potsdamer Platz Hotel within three hours of landing. I traveled for almost 24 hours, I was fatigued, but thrilled too!
Guess, why I am here? Why I am excited?
I came here from Bangladesh to participate in the Third Global Disability Summit!
Global Disability Summit goes beyond a summit; for all dedicated to protecting the rights of persons with disabilities including people with disabilities and their organizations and other relevant stakeholders, it is a revered pilgrimage site.
Since 2018, I have dreamed of being at this historic site and witnessing history firsthand! I supported the Bangladesh delegation to the first GDS 2018 in London and played the lead role of the Access to Justice Thematic group, then in the second GDS 2022, I played a vital role by organizing a series of consultation meetings with Bangladeshi organizations of persons with disabilities, supporting a survey conducted by GDS Secretariat, and moderating an online session of Youth Disability Summit 2022.
The momentous occasion has finally come! Being invited and sponsored by IDA and the Federal Ministry for the Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) of Germany, I am attending Global Disability Summit GDS2025 in person, finally!
As the representative voice of the global disability movement, the International Disability Alliance (IDA) is the permanent co-host of the GDS, and the Federal Ministry for the Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) of Germany and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan are co-hosting this edition alongside IDA.
Global Disability Summit (GDS) is a unique global mechanism that improves the lives of persons with disabilities, especially from the global South. The Summits aim to close the gap between two often disconnected areas: disability inclusion and development cooperation. GDS is more than just a two-day event held every three years—it is a mechanism involving continuous advocacy with global disability development stakeholders and mobilizing the disability rights movement and its allies.
I am excited to witness this historic milestone in the timeline of the disability movement!
With 4,500 participants from around 100 countries, many of them persons with disabilities themselves, far more people came to the Summit in Berlin than initially anticipated. For two days, attendees took part in more than 60 events, sessions, and fire-side-chats where they discussed ways to further improve the realization of the rights enshrined in the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD).
The Amman-Berlin Declaration was a key outcome of the Summit. It was developed by co-hosts and endorsed by more than 60 governments from both Global North and South. The declaration outlines concrete goals for greater inclusion in development cooperation.
The declaration sets a target to ensure that at least 15 percent of international development programs being implemented at the country level pursue disability inclusion as an objective. This target is to be achieved by 2028, the year in which the fourth and next Global Disability Summit is to be held.
Since the Global Disability Summit (GDS) was launched to create momentum to support Development Agenda 2030, I hope the 15% for 15% policy will tremendously support to achieve SDGs in line with CRPD, within 2030!
This is showing light at the end of the tunnel!
It’s time to transform flowery words into fruits! Lets make a stormy drive to allocate 15% for the 15%!
Now, it’s my turn to give back to the GDS!
I am planning to advocate with government and non-government agencies, development partners, and funders for the execution of 15% for 15% population of my country. I am sure if 15% of total development programs focus on disability inclusion, it will make a paradigm shift at the practice level, people with disabilities will be able to enjoy their rights in line with the CRPD!
Please remember! CRPD is our life code!
Without participating in GDS, the life cycle of a disability rights advocate and OPD leader remains incomplete!
Thanks to the International Disability Alliance for cohosting the Global Disability Summit regularly and allowing me to attend GDS2025!
hashtag#GDS2025
hashtag#CommitToChange
hashtag#OverABillionReasons
Global Disability Summit
International Disability Alliance
Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ)
Higher Council for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (HCD)
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