The Nobel Peace Prize

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Nobel Peace Prize 2022-

• It was awared to Ales Bialiatski, the Russian human rights organisation Memorial, and the Ukrainian human rights organisation Center for Civil Liberties.
• The laureates represent civil society in their home countries. 
• With the awardees being from Belarus, Ukraine, and Russia, an implicit message has been sent about the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine. 

Ales Bialiatski-

• Ales Bialiatski was one of the initiators of the democracy movement that emerged in Belarus in the mid-1980s. 
• Before 1991, when the former Soviet Union fell and independent countries emerged, many countries in Central Asia and Europe saw pro-independence movements. 
• Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko has been in power since 1994 – when the post first came into being.

Russian human rights organisation, Memorial-

• The organisation was established in 1987 by human rights activists in the former Soviet Union who wanted to ensure that the victims of the communist regime’s oppression would never be forgotten.
•  Nobel Peace Prize laureate Andrei Sakharov, who won the prize in 1954, and human rights advocate Svetlana Gannushkina were among the organisation’s founders.
• Memorial is based on the notion that confronting past crimes is essential in preventing new ones. 
• It has been described as the largest human rights organisation in Russia, and in the present day, it helped in gathering information on “the political oppression and human rights violations in Russia 

Ukrainian human rights organisation, Center for Civil Liberties-

• It  was founded in Kyiv in 2007 for the purpose of advancing human rights and democracy in Ukraine. 
• The Centre describes itself as one of the leading actors in Ukraine, influencing the formation of public opinion and public policy, supporting the development of civic activism, and actively participating in international networks and solidarity actions to promote human rights.
• After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the Center has engaged in efforts to identify and document Russian “war crimes” against the Ukrainian civilian population.

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