In Memoriam

Peter van der Veen (1927-2025)

On October 24, 2025 we lost our beloved Jan Peter Hendrik van der Veen, age 98. Born on May 14, 1927 in Rantepao, Sulawesi, Indonesia (formerly the Dutch East Indies), he passed away at his home of 32 years in Bellingham, WA. He was the son of a Dutch Christian missionary linguist and Bible translator (Toraja language) and his German wife, and the grandson of a German linguist and Bible translator (Ewe language). During WWII, he was interned in six Japanese concentration camps on Java, and lost his older brother, mother, and aunt. After the war, in January 1946 he moved to the Netherlands. Growing up in Indonesia and his own experience of hunger during the war motivated him to study tropical agriculture in Wageningen, from 1947-1954, to try to help developing countries with their agricultural sectors and combat hunger. In 1952, he did a six-month practical training on a farm in Muleshoe, Texas, where he obtained hands-on experience with farm machinery and irrigation crops. After graduation, in 1954 he was sent by a Dutch development program to work on an experimental farm in Libya. Here he had a Palestinian colleague who opened his eyes to the plight of the Palestinians and the problem of Zionism. He learned to speak Arabic fluently. He also spoke Dutch, German, English, French, and Bahasa Indonesia.

He spent most of his career working for the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization and lived almost twenty years in five countries in the Middle East and North Africa: Libya, Iraq, Syria, Egypt, and Tunisia. In Baghdad, he met his wife, who is from the USA and was teaching at a mission girls’ school. In 1960, they moved to Davis, California, for his graduate studies. In 1961, they returned to the Middle East, where their children were born (two in Damascus, one in Alexandria). During this time, he published several scholarly articles on grazing and fodder resources and land use for livestock production. In 1972, they moved to FAO, Rome, where he worked for seven years on agricultural investment projects in the Middle East, North Africa, and Central/Eastern Europe. The last ten years of his career were at the World Bank in Washington, DC. He was hired when the institution was still focused on rural development and poverty alleviation but it thereafter prioritized neoliberal economic policies with “structural adjustment” lending, of which he was a strong critic. His job required frequent travel to the Middle East, North Africa, and Central/Eastern Europe. After his retirement in 1989, they moved to Bellingham, WA, to be closer to family. He continued to work as a consultant, returning six times to Indonesia, to the area of his birth, and gradually began to talk about his youth and wartime experiences. In 2009, he presented at a conference in Tana Toraja, and in the last years of his life he co-authored The Linguist’s Family (2023).

Always welcoming strangers, in his retirement he became more active in peace and justice issues, whether with Voices for Peace in the Middle East, the Whatcom Peace & Justice Center, Saint James Mission and Social Action Committee, or the August 15 Foundation (of Dutch survivors of WWII in Asia). He strongly believed in environmental sustainability, civic engagement, peace, justice, and upholding international law and UN conventions. He regularly attended Fairhaven’s World Issues lectures, and participated in the Great Decisions discussion group. On Fridays he and his wife could be found at the weekly Friday peace vigil, and on Saturday tabling at the farmer’s market. They jointly received the Synod of Alaska-Northwest Helen Hamilton Peacemaking Award in 2009, and the Howard Harris Lifetime Peacemaker award in 2011.

The Christian faith was a strong pillar in his life. He was a member of Dutch Reformed church in the Netherlands, then the Methodist church in Rome, and then the Presbyterian church in the U.S. He engaged in interfaith dialogue, organized monthly prayer vigils for peace in the Middle East (from 2012 – 2019), and believed in secular systems where people of different faiths are treated equally under the law, and the rights of religious minorities are protected. He loved to travel, learn about other people’s cultures and histories, follow current events through radio and newspapers, sing in church, hike, swim, and garden. He was also devoted to his family, and kept close contact through letters, phone calls, visits, and family reunions. He leaves behind his wife, three children, four grandchildren, and extended family members in Canada, the Netherlands, and Germany.

Submitted by daughter, Marjolein van der Veen