[URL]http://www.france24.com/en/20111210-women-triumph-nobel-peace-prize-awards-oslo-norway-arab-spring[/URL]
[QUOTE]Liberia's president, a Yemeni and a Liberian activist received the Nobel Peace Prize on Saturday for championing women’s rights in regions where oppression is common and helping women participate in peace-building.
[B]AFP [/B]- Liberia's president, a fellow Liberian and a Yemeni activist received the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo Saturday for showing how women facing war and oppression can shed the mantle of victimhood and lead the way to peace and democracy.
"You represent one of the most important motive forces for change in today's world: the struggle for human rights in general and the struggle of women
for equality and peace in particular," Norwegian Nobel Committee president Thorbjoern Jagland said before handing out the prestigious award.
At the lavish ceremony in a colourfully flower-decked Oslo city hall, and with Norway's royal family and other dignitaries in attendance, Liberian
President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, her compatriot and "peace warrior" Leymah Gbowee and Yemeni "Arab Spring" activist Tawakkol Karman received their
gold medal and diploma.
"You give concrete meaning to the Chinese proverb which says that 'women hold up half of the sky'," Jagland told the heterogeneous group.
Gbowee, a 39-year-old social worker who led Liberia's women to defy feared warlords and bring an end to her country's bloody 1989-2003 civil war,
hailed the Nobel Committee for shining the spotlight on women's struggle for peace and human rights, insisting "this prize could not have come at a
better time than this."
"It has come at a time when in many societies where women used to be the silent victims and objects of men's powers, women are throwing down the
walls of repressive traditions with the invincible power of non-violence," Gbowee, wearing a colourful headdress, was expected to say according to
prepared remarks obtained by AFP.
"Women are using their broken bodies from hunger, poverty, desperation and destitution to stare down the barrel of the gun," she said, noting that
"ordinary mothers are no longer begging for peace, but demanding peace, justice, equality and inclusion in political decision-making."
Gbowee, a mother of six who inspired Christian and Muslim women alike to wage a sex strike in 2002 and refuse to sleep with their husbands until the
violence ended, pointed out that "we succeeded when no one thought we would, we were the conscience of the ones who had lost their consciences."
Sirleaf, Africa's first democratically elected woman president who last month won a second term, also hailed the Nobel Committee's focus on women's
struggle after the world in recent decades has witnessed "unprecedented levels of cruelty directed against women" in places like the Democratic
Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Sierra Leone and her own Liberia.
"The number of our sisters and daughters of all ages brutally defiled over the past two decades staggers the imagination, and the number of lives
devastated by such evil defies comprehension," she was to say, according to a copy of her speech.
But in the face of such adversity, women still dare to stand up and fight for peace, said the 73-year-old grandmother, wearing a majestic purple dress
and headdress.
"Find your voice! And raise your voice! Let yours be a voice for freedom!" she said.
An example of someone who found a powerful voice despite almost insurmountable odds is Karman, who at 32 is the youngest person to win the Peace
Prize and the first Arab woman to receive a Nobel in any category.
The journalist and mother of three, wearing a white headscarf with lilac and green flowers, was expected to express confidence that the "Arab Spring"
uprising would succeed even in her country, where she has helped push 33-year-ruler Ali Abdullah Saleh to agree to step down early next year.
"I see on the horizon a glimpse of a new world," she said in her prepared remarks.
Karman however expressed frustration with the lack of Western support for the Yemen uprising.
"I should note that it did not get the international understanding, support or attention of the other revolutions in the region. This should haunt the
world's conscience," she said, calling on the "democratic world, which has told us a lot about the virtues of democracy and good governance," to support
people struggling for freedom.
"All of that is just hard labour during the birth of democracy which requires support and assistance, not fear and caution," she said.
Jagland meanwhile stressed the importance of women in the uprisings.
"The promising Arab Spring will become a new winter if women are again left out," he cautioned.
At a separate ceremony in Stockholm, the winners of the Nobel Prizes for Medicine, Physics, Chemistry, Literature and Economics were set to receive
their prizes later Saturday.
[/QUOTE]
Too bad the prize means very little these days.
However this seems to put the Nobel Peace Prize back on a more reasonable path
Women's rights is not peace, it is women's rights. Why is this so hard to understand?
[QUOTE=Capitulazyguy;33670736]Women's rights is not peace, it is women's rights. Why is this so hard to understand?[/QUOTE]
I don't think there's an award for fighting for basic human rights and for stopping violence towards women, though
[QUOTE=Capitulazyguy;33670736]Women's rights is not peace, it is women's rights. Why is this so hard to understand?[/QUOTE]
Why is it so hard for you to understand that stopping [B]violence[/B] against women promotes peace?
[QUOTE=Capitulazyguy;33670736]Women's rights is not peace, it is women's rights. Why is this so hard to understand?[/QUOTE]
They're women. Their brains just aren't big enough to understand.
[quote]bring an end to her country's bloody 1989-2003 civil war[/quote]
hi im Capitulazyguy and I absolutely, positively, never read more than a sentence before posting
[QUOTE=Fahrenheit;33670778]They're women. Their brains just aren't big enough to understand.[/QUOTE]
wow
that was incredibly unfunny
[editline]11th December 2011[/editline]
and offensive
[QUOTE=Contag;33669801]Too bad the prize means very little these days.[/QUOTE]
Are you joking? This prize means alot! It's a great honor to win a nobel prize.
[QUOTE=Mr.T;33671199]Are you joking? This prize means alot! It's a great honor to win a nobel prize.[/QUOTE]
It's kind of diminished when you give it to politicians before they've done anything significant.
[QUOTE=Capitulazyguy;33670736]Women's rights is not peace, it is women's rights. Why is this so hard to understand?[/QUOTE]
who the hell let peter hitchens on this forum
I still think Memorial should've won the prize.
[QUOTE=Mooe94;33670835]wow
that was incredibly unfunny
[editline]11th December 2011[/editline]
and offensive[/QUOTE]
Wow, you must fucking hate 99% of comedy if that actually bothers you.
[QUOTE=Fahrenheit;33677866]Wow, you must fucking hate 99% of comedy if that actually bothers you.[/QUOTE]
well then 99% of comedy must be terrible.
either that or you are a shit comedian... i'm inclined to the latter.
So 3 women are equal to 1 Barack Obama
[QUOTE=smurfy;33677923]So 3 women are equal to 1 Barack Obama[/QUOTE]
proof he's a muslim???
[QUOTE=Fahrenheit;33677866]Wow, you must fucking hate 99% of comedy if that actually bothers you.[/QUOTE]
it wouldn't bother me if it was actually a good joke and not a retarded attempt at humor at the expense of women fighting for their rights
I find it ridiculous that they're supposedly upholding women's rights when what really occured was a civil war in their country. Is Liberia a female-only country? Surely men have somehow contributed to the effort?
EDIT: Also Mooe ^ - Get over it.
Whether or not the recent prizes were deserved or not, if the prize indeed did lose some influence lately, I definitely think this one is an excellent choice, so the committee is at least on the right path right now.
[QUOTE=Mooe94;33670835]wow
that was incredibly unfunny
[editline]11th December 2011[/editline]
and offensive[/QUOTE]
why does everyone become offended so easily now a days.
I would laugh my ass of if they Fought over the prize.
"Noble Peace Prize"
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