Oslo (Norway): Africa’s first democratically elected woman president, a Liberian campaigner against rape and a woman who stood up to Yemen’s autocratic regime won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday in recognition of the importance of women’s rights and the role of women in the spread of global peace.
The 10 million kronor ($1.5 million) award was split three ways between Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, women’s rights activist Leymah Gbowee from the same African country and 32-year-old democracy activist Tawakkul Karman of Yemen — the first Arab woman to win the prize.
Thorbjorn Jagland, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, said Karman’s award should be seen as a signal that both women and Islam have important roles to play in the uprisings known as the Arab Spring, the wave of anti-authoritarian revolts that have challenged rulers across the Arab world. “The Arab Spring cannot be successful without including the women in it,” Jagland said.
Yemen is an extremely conservative society but a feature of the revolt against the Ali Abdullah Saleh regime has been a prominent role for women who turned out for protests in large numbers. AGENCIES Nobel winner Sirleaf is Liberia’s ‘Iron Lady’ I n Liberia, a country ravaged by civil wars for more than two decades until 2003, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf is seen as a reformer and peacemaker.
Sirleaf, 72, a Harvard postgraduate who has held top jobs at the World Bank and UN, ran second to warlord-turned-president Cha-rles Taylor in 1997.
Though she lost by a landslide, she rose to national prominence and earned the nickname, “Iron Lady”.
She became Africa’s first democratically elected female leader in 2005.
Leymah Gbowee, who organized a group of Christian and Muslim women to challenge Liberia’s warlords, was honored for mobilizing women “across ethnic and religious divides to bring an end to the war in Liberia, and to ensure women’s participation in elections”.
Her Women For Peace movement, credited with ending the war, included prayers and songs at a market, while she urged wives and girlfriends of leaders of the warring factions to deny them sex until they gave up arms.
Thorbjorn Jagland, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, admitted that it was difficult to find a leader of the Arab revolts, especially among the many bloggers who played a role in energizing the protests, and noted that work of Yemen’s
Tawakul Karman started before the Arab uprisings.
“We have included the Arab Spring, but we have put it in a particular context,” he said. AGENCIES
The 10 million kronor ($1.5 million) award was split three ways between Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, women’s rights activist Leymah Gbowee from the same African country and 32-year-old democracy activist Tawakkul Karman of Yemen — the first Arab woman to win the prize.
Thorbjorn Jagland, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, said Karman’s award should be seen as a signal that both women and Islam have important roles to play in the uprisings known as the Arab Spring, the wave of anti-authoritarian revolts that have challenged rulers across the Arab world. “The Arab Spring cannot be successful without including the women in it,” Jagland said.
Yemen is an extremely conservative society but a feature of the revolt against the Ali Abdullah Saleh regime has been a prominent role for women who turned out for protests in large numbers. AGENCIES Nobel winner Sirleaf is Liberia’s ‘Iron Lady’ I n Liberia, a country ravaged by civil wars for more than two decades until 2003, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf is seen as a reformer and peacemaker.
Sirleaf, 72, a Harvard postgraduate who has held top jobs at the World Bank and UN, ran second to warlord-turned-president Cha-rles Taylor in 1997.
Though she lost by a landslide, she rose to national prominence and earned the nickname, “Iron Lady”.
She became Africa’s first democratically elected female leader in 2005.
Leymah Gbowee, who organized a group of Christian and Muslim women to challenge Liberia’s warlords, was honored for mobilizing women “across ethnic and religious divides to bring an end to the war in Liberia, and to ensure women’s participation in elections”.
Her Women For Peace movement, credited with ending the war, included prayers and songs at a market, while she urged wives and girlfriends of leaders of the warring factions to deny them sex until they gave up arms.
Thorbjorn Jagland, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, admitted that it was difficult to find a leader of the Arab revolts, especially among the many bloggers who played a role in energizing the protests, and noted that work of Yemen’s
Tawakul Karman started before the Arab uprisings.
“We have included the Arab Spring, but we have put it in a particular context,” he said. AGENCIES
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