12/12/2011

And the Sakharov prize goes to... the Arab Spring!
Recognising those who have risked their own lives to improve those of others

By Peter Adler, Euro-Mediterranean Press Adviser

This year’s winner of the European Parliament’s prestigious Sakharov Prize for the freedom of thought is not a single person, but five representatives of the popular protest movements which swept across the Southern shores of the Mediterranean Sea throughout 2011, commonly referred to as the 'Arab Spring'.

The EPP Group strongly backed the initiative that led to the European Parliament's Sakharov Prize 2011 being awarded to Asmaa Mahfouz (Egypt), Ahmed al-Zubair Ahmed al-Sanusi (Libya), Razan Zaitouneh (Syria), Ali Farzat (Syria) and posthumously to Mohamed Bouazizi (Tunisia), who receives the award post-humously. He was the market trader who set himself on fire in protest at humiliation and badgering suffered at the hands of Tunisian authorities and thereby inspired historic changes in the entire region.

The five winners have all been active in the fight for the recognition and respect of fundamental civic rights in their countries, rights which have been disregarded and brutally oppressed by totalitarian regimes for several decades. Risking their freedom and lives, the five prize winners were at the forefront of the popular uprisings, which led to the removal of regimes in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya and a strong, continued pressure on those still in power in Syria and Yemen.

Since 1988, when the European Parliament created the Sakharov Prize named after the Russian scientist and dissident of the Soviet Union Andrei Sakharov, the winners have been selected among the world’s finest and most famous defenders of the freedom of thought and expression, such as South Africa’s Nelson Mandela, who spent 27 years in jail for his activities against the apartheid regime and became the country’s first black president; Burma’s Aung San Suu Kyi, who has served long prison sentences for her strong, vocal opposition to the military dictatorship; former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and Belarusian opposition leader Alexander Milienkievich. Some organisations and groups have also won the prize, for example Ladies in White, a Cuban organisation of woman who stand up for the rights of political prisoners; Reporters without Borders, an international organisation campaigning for the freedom of press and The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, an association of Argentine mothers whose children "disappeared" during the 'Dirty War' of the military dictatorship between 1976 and 1983.

Most of the winners have been non-European, and the candidates for each year’s prize are proposed by the Parliament’s Committee on Foreign Affairs. The prize is not only a prestigious award to the laureates themselves, but also points a finger at countries where basic values of freedom of thought and freedom of expression are being oppressed. In this respect, the Sakharov Prize contributes to putting international pressure on undemocratic, totalitarian regimes in the world. The Sakharov Prize is usually awarded on or around 10 December, the day on which the United Nations General Assembly ratified the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, also celebrated as Human Rights Day.