Friday 7 October 2011

The Nobel Prize: women in political and social change

The Nobel Peace Prize rewards the role of women in political and social change-Winners of the Liberian Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, president of the African country and Leymah Gbowee activist for the rights of African women, and the opposition Yemeni Tawakkul Karman.
The Nobel Peace Prize Committee in Norway has decided to divide the prize in three parts this year. Three names, three women, but the same praise: the role of women in political and social change. The awardees are the president of Liberia, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, the Liberian Leymah Gbowee also responsible for the organization Women Peace and Security Network Africa, and the Yemeni activist Tawakkul Karman.


Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, 72, is from 2006, the first African woman to preside over a democratic country. Leymah Gbowee, 39, is an activist known for organizing the peace movement failed to end the second civil war in Liberia in 2003, which allowed just Sirleaf's election.

For its part, Tawakkul Karman, is a Yemeni political and human rights activist who heads the group of Women Journalists Without Chains, created in 2005. Yemen is one of the Arab countries hit by the wave of change. Its president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, remains in power despite the protests. During the jury's pronouncement of Oslo, Karman was in prayer on Friday, reports from Sanaa Angeles Espinosa.

The award honors three women and breaks down all the pools that pointed to the Arab spring and the faces of the revolution in the countries of North Africa and Middle East. Have also been placed in the race for Nobel candidates and the president of the Afghan Independent Human Rights, Sima Samar, or Cuban Osvaldo Paya and Oscar Elias Biscet.

The Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, released in late 2010 after several years of house arrest, also sounded hard though since it was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991. Another favorite in the polls were the Memorial human rights organization and its leader Svetlana Gannushkina, Lidia Yusupova Chechnya's lawyer, the Uighur activist Rebiya Kadeer and Sergey Kovalev.

The award ceremony will take place in Oslo on December 10, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel's death. The awards are endowed with 10 million Swedish kronor, about 1.1 million euros for each of the six disciplines.The award ended up in the 2010 U.S. President Barack Obama.

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