OSLO, Oct 6 (Reuters) – Iran’s imprisoned girls’s rights advocate Narges Mohammadi gained the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday in a rebuke to Tehran’s theocratic leaders and increase for anti-government protesters.
The award-making committee stated the prize honoured these behind latest unprecedented demonstrations in Iran and referred to as for the discharge of Mohammadi, 51, who has campaigned for 3 many years for ladies’s rights and abolition of the loss of life penalty.
“We hope to send the message to women all around the world that are living in conditions where they are systematically discriminated: ‘have the courage, keep on going’,” Berit Reiss-Andersen, head of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, advised Reuters.
“We want to give the prize to encourage Narges Mohammadi and the hundreds of thousands of people who have been crying for exactly ‘Woman, Life, Freedom’ in Iran,” she added, referring to the protest motion’s important slogan.
There was no quick official response from Tehran, which calls the protests Western-led subversion.
But semi-official information company Fars stated Mohammadi had “received her prize from the Westerners” after making headlines “due to her acts against the national security.”
Mohammadi is serving a number of sentences in Tehran’s Evin Prison amounting to about 12 years imprisonment, one of many many durations she has been detained behind bars, based on the Front Line Defenders rights organisation.
Charges embody spreading propaganda in opposition to the state.
She is the deputy head of the Defenders of Human Rights Center, a non-governmental organisation led by Shirin Ebadi, the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
“I congratulate Narges Mohammadi and all Iranian women for this prize,” Ebadi advised Reuters. “This prize will shed light on violation of women’s rights in the Islamic Republic … which unfortunately has proven that it cannot be reformed.”
‘EMBOLDEN NARGES’ FIGHT’
Mohammadi is the 19th girl to win the 122-year-old prize and the primary one since Maria Ressa of the Philippines gained the award in 2021 collectively with Russia’s Dmitry Muratov.
Mohammadi’s husband Taghi Rahmani applauded as he watched the announcement on TV at his residence in Paris. “This Nobel Prize will embolden Narges’ fight for human rights, but more importantly, this is in fact a prize for the ‘women, life and freedom’ movement,” he advised Reuters.
[1/5]Iranian human rights activist and the vice chairman of the Defenders of Human Rights Center (DHRC) Narges Mohammadi poses on this undated handout image. Mohammadi household archive images/Handout through REUTERS/File Photo Acquire Licensing Rights
Arrested greater than a dozen instances in her life, and held thrice in Evin jail since 2012, Mohammadi has been unable to see her husband for 15 years and her kids for seven.
Her prize, value 11 million Swedish crowns, or round $1 million, will probably be offered in Oslo on Dec. 10, the anniversary of the loss of life of Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, who based the awards in his 1895 will.
Past winners vary from Martin Luther King to Nelson Mandela.
Mohammadi was quoted by the New York Times as saying she would by no means cease striving for democracy and equality, even when that meant staying in jail.
“I will continue to fight against the relentless discrimination, tyranny and gender-based oppression by the oppressive religious government until the liberation of women,” the newspaper quoted her as saying in an announcement.
Her award got here as rights teams say that an Iranian teenage woman was hospitalised in a coma after a confrontation on the Tehran metro for not carrying a hijab.
Iranian authorities deny the stories.
GLOBAL TRIBUTES
Mohammadi’s win additionally got here simply over a 12 months after the loss of life of Mahsa Amini within the custody of morality police for allegedly flouting the Islamic Republic’s costume code for ladies.
That provoked nationwide protests, the largest problem to Iran’s authorities in years, and was met with a lethal crackdown costing a number of hundred lives.
Among a stream of tributes from main international our bodies, the U.N. human rights workplace stated the Nobel award highlighted the bravery of Iranian girls. “We’ve seen their courage and determination in the face of reprisals, intimidation, violence and detention,” stated its spokesperson Elizabeth Throssell .
“They’ve been harassed for what they do or don’t wear. There are increasingly stringent legal, social and economic measures against them … they are an inspiration to the world.”
Dan Smith, head of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute assume tank, stated that whereas the prize may assist ease strain on Iranian dissidents, it could be unlikely to result in her launch.
Reporting by Gwladys Fouche, Nerijus Adomaitis, Terje Solsvik and Tom Little in Oslo, Ilze Filks in Stockholm, Parisa Hafezi in Dubai, Anthony Paone in Paris, Charlotte Van Campenhout in Brussels, John Davison, Gabrielle Tetrault-Farber and Cecile Mantovani in Geneva; Writing by Gwladys Fouche and Andrew Cawthorne; Editing by William Maclean
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