3 women share Nobel Peace Prize
Source: Agencies |
October 8, 2011, Saturday
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LIBERIAN President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, women's rights activist Leymah Gbowee from the same African country and democracy activist Tawakkul Karman of Yemen won the Nobel Peace Prize yesterday, in recognition of the importance of women's rights in the spread of global peace.
The 10 million Swedish kronor (US$1.5 million) award was split three ways between the women.
No woman had won the prize since 2004, when the committee honored Wangari Maathai of Kenya, who died last month at 71. 2004 was also the last year the prize went to an African.
Liberia was ravaged by civil wars for years until 2003. The conflict, that began in 1989, left 200,000 people dead and displaced half the country's population of 3 million. Liberia - created to settle freed American slaves in 1847 - is still struggling to maintain a fragile peace with the help of UN peacekeepers.
Sirleaf, 72, has a master's degree in public administration from Harvard University and has held top regional jobs at the World Bank, the United Nations and within the Liberian government.
In elections in 1997, she ran second to warlord-turned-president Charles Taylor, who many claimed was voted into power by a fearful electorate. Though she lost by a landslide, she rose to national prominence and earned the nickname "Iron Lady." She went on to became Africa's first democratically elected female leader in 2005.
Sirleaf was seen as a reformer and peacemaker in Liberia when she took office. She is running for re-election this month and opponents in the presidential campaign have accused her of buying votes and using government funds to campaign. Her camp denies the charges. The election is next Tuesday.
"This gives me a stronger commitment to work for reconciliation," Sirleaf said yesterday from her home in Monrovia. "Liberians should be proud."
African and international luminaries welcomed the news. Many had gathered in Cape Town, South Africa, yesterday to celebrate Nobel peace laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu's 80th birthday.
"Who? Johnson Sirleaf? The president of Liberia? Oooh," said Tutu, who won the peace prize in 1984 for his nonviolent campaign against white racist rule in South Africa. "She deserves it many times over. She's brought stability to a place that was going to hell."
Gbowee, who organized a group of Christian and Muslim women to challenge Liberia's warlords, was honored for mobilizing women "across ethnic and religious dividing lines to bring an end to the long war in Liberia, and to ensure women's participation in elections."
She has long campaigned for the rights of women and against rape. In 2003, she led hundreds of female protesters through Monrovia to demand swift disarmament of fighters who preyed on women throughout Liberia during 14 years of near-constant civil war.
Gbowee works in Ghana's capital as the director of Women Peace and Security Network Africa. The group's website says she is a mother of five.
Karman is a mother of three who heads the human rights group Women Journalists without Chains. She has been a leading figure in organizing the protests against Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh that began in late January.
The 10 million Swedish kronor (US$1.5 million) award was split three ways between the women.
No woman had won the prize since 2004, when the committee honored Wangari Maathai of Kenya, who died last month at 71. 2004 was also the last year the prize went to an African.
Liberia was ravaged by civil wars for years until 2003. The conflict, that began in 1989, left 200,000 people dead and displaced half the country's population of 3 million. Liberia - created to settle freed American slaves in 1847 - is still struggling to maintain a fragile peace with the help of UN peacekeepers.
Sirleaf, 72, has a master's degree in public administration from Harvard University and has held top regional jobs at the World Bank, the United Nations and within the Liberian government.
In elections in 1997, she ran second to warlord-turned-president Charles Taylor, who many claimed was voted into power by a fearful electorate. Though she lost by a landslide, she rose to national prominence and earned the nickname "Iron Lady." She went on to became Africa's first democratically elected female leader in 2005.
Sirleaf was seen as a reformer and peacemaker in Liberia when she took office. She is running for re-election this month and opponents in the presidential campaign have accused her of buying votes and using government funds to campaign. Her camp denies the charges. The election is next Tuesday.
"This gives me a stronger commitment to work for reconciliation," Sirleaf said yesterday from her home in Monrovia. "Liberians should be proud."
African and international luminaries welcomed the news. Many had gathered in Cape Town, South Africa, yesterday to celebrate Nobel peace laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu's 80th birthday.
"Who? Johnson Sirleaf? The president of Liberia? Oooh," said Tutu, who won the peace prize in 1984 for his nonviolent campaign against white racist rule in South Africa. "She deserves it many times over. She's brought stability to a place that was going to hell."
Gbowee, who organized a group of Christian and Muslim women to challenge Liberia's warlords, was honored for mobilizing women "across ethnic and religious dividing lines to bring an end to the long war in Liberia, and to ensure women's participation in elections."
She has long campaigned for the rights of women and against rape. In 2003, she led hundreds of female protesters through Monrovia to demand swift disarmament of fighters who preyed on women throughout Liberia during 14 years of near-constant civil war.
Gbowee works in Ghana's capital as the director of Women Peace and Security Network Africa. The group's website says she is a mother of five.
Karman is a mother of three who heads the human rights group Women Journalists without Chains. She has been a leading figure in organizing the protests against Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh that began in late January.
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