“We have to choose between dialogue and utter devastation.”

I do not believe that I’m sacrificing, in fact I feel very uneasy when others used the word sacrifice to describe my life. It sounds like I’m demanding returns for my investments.

Fundamental violations of human rights always lead to people feeling less and less human.

The main aim of the [political] dialogue should be to resolve the problems of the nation, not to find who is the winner and who is the loser.

You should never let your fears prevent you from doing what you know is right.

Government leaders are amazing. So often it seems they are the last to know what the people want.

Human rights must be protected by the rule of law, and there can never be occasions where human rights can be neglected or ignored or the rule of law set aside.

Freedom and democracy are dreams you never give up.

We achieve everything by our efforts alone. Our fate is not decided by an almighty God. We decide our own fate by our actions. You have to gain mystery over yourself. It is not a matter of sitting back and accepting.

I don’t like to be called a symbol. And I don’t like to be called an icon. I will just say that I have to work very, very hard. So I’d rather be known as a hard worker. I don’t think symbols do much, nor icons.

Fear is not the natural state of civilized people.

Early childhood development has proved to be very beneficial and very cost-effective in societies where this is been tried. So let’s not confine ourselves to primary education. Let’s think of early childhood development and education as a whole.

Even one voice can be heard loudly all over the world in this day and age.

Each man has in him the potential to realize the truth through his own will and endeavour and to help others to realize it.

Each and every one of us is capable of making such a contribution.

There is nothing to be gained by being unnecessarily nasty. Violence begets violence.

Jobless people will have no self-confidence. And they feel they are worthless because when you don’t have a job you have to rely on someone.

I now talk to different cultures, and I hope that I can bridge those gaps and differences between us. It’s an adventure, a dream…

In that moment I know exactly what I want; I want to peel away all the layers of clothing between us, strip away everything that separates us, the past and the present and the future.

If a cook can’t make soup between two and seven, she can’t make it in a week.

There’s a vast difference between no checkmate and stalemate. This is what the democratic process is like.

I have always thought that a wild animal never looks so well as when some obstacle of pronounced durability is between us.

Competition between women is good only if it does not prevail; that is to say if it coexists with affinity, affection, with a real sense of being mutually indispensable, with sudden peaks of solidarity in spite of envy, jealousy and the whole inevitable cohort of bad feelings.

Sometimes in the real world, there is fire between people.

These infinitesimal distinctions between man and man are too paltry for an Omnipotent Being. How these madmen give themselves away! The real God taketh heed lest a sparrow fall. But the God created from human vanity sees no difference between an eagle and a sparrow.