OSLO, NORWAY: Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado has won the Nobel Peace Prize.
She won “for her tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy”, the Norwegian Nobel Committee said in its citation on Friday.
The full statement from the Nobel Peace Prize Committee can be viewed here.
The former opposition presidential candidate in Venezuela was lauded for being a “key, unifying figure in a political opposition that was once deeply divided – an opposition that found common ground in the demand for free elections and representative government”, committee chair Joergen Watne Frydnes said.
“In the past year, Miss Machado has been forced to live in hiding.
“Despite serious threats against her life, she has remained in the country, a choice that has inspired millions.
“When authoritarians seize power, it is crucial to recognise courageous defenders of freedom who rise and resist.”
The committee chose to focus on Venezuela at this time, in a year dominated by US President Donald Trump’s repeated public statements that he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize.
Before the announcement, experts on the award had said Trump would not win it as he is dismantling the international world order that the Nobel committee cherishes.
The 2024 award went to Nihon Hidankyo, a grassroots movement of Japanese atomic bombing survivors who have worked for decades to maintain a taboo around the use of nuclear weapons.
The Nobel Peace Prize, worth 11 million Swedish crowns, or about $A1.8 million, is due to be presented in Oslo on December 10, the anniversary of the death of Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, who founded the awards in his 1895 will.
—With Associated Press, Australian Associated Press, The Guardian, Reuters and ABC News.
