Liberia leader among Nobel prize winners

[Alpha Blondy]

Liberia's President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, Liberian peace activist Leymah Gbowee and Yemeni women's rights activist Tawakul Karman have been named winners of the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize.

 

The Norwegian Nobel Committee announced the names at a ceremony in the capital, Oslo, on Friday, saying the three were honoured for their "non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women's rights to full participation in peace-building work".

 

"We cannot achieve democracy and lasting peace in the world unless women obtain the same opportunities as men to influence developments at all levels of society," the prize committee said.

 

The committee said that since her inauguration in 2006, Johnson-Sirleaf had "contributed to securing peace in Liberia, to promoting economic and social development, and to strengthening the position of women".

 

Gbowee mobilised and organised 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, said the committee.

 

It said Yemen's Karman had "played a leading part in the struggle for women's rights and for democracy and peace in Yemen" in what was described as the "most trying circumstances both before and during the 'Arab Spring'".

 

 

Leymah Gbowee will share the prize with her president and Yemeni rights activist [Reuters]

The winners will receive their award at a ceremony in Oslo on December 10, the anniversary of the death in 1896 of prize founder Alfred Nobel.

 

Sirleaf, who became Africa's first elected female head of state in 2005 and is seeking re-election in Tuesday's polls, had been widely tipped to scoop the award.

 

The AFP news agency had cited reports by Norwegian commercial broadcaster TV2, which said on Thursday it had reason to believe Johnson-Sirleaf would be getting the call on Friday.

 

"[sirleaf] is the symbol of the new Africa," said TV2, which in 2009 correctly predicted the surprise win by Barack Obama, the US president.

 

Al Jazeera's Will Jordan, reporting from Liberia's capital, Monrovia, said the prize would be a "big benefit" for Johnson-Sirleaf in her re-election bid.

 

But Jordan said the Liberian leader might struggle to win votes in the capital, as most of her supporters live in rural areas.

 

Observers' favourite played down

 

The head of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Thorbjoern Jagland, had told public broadcaster NRK earlier on Thursday that he believed this year's pick would be "well-received all over the world."

 

He said then that the award would be "very powerful ... but at the same time very unifying".

 

While the 2011 pick "is not without conflict", he stressed the prize would "not create as strong reactions from a single country as it did last year" with the choice of Liu Xiaobo.

 

 

Tawakul Karman won the prize for her non-violent struggle for the safety of women [EPA]

He also played down observers' favourite this year: actors within the Arab Spring uprising, which brought the overthrow of autocratic regimes in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya and rattled the ones in Syria, Yemen and Bahrain.

 

"There are many other positive developments in the world that we have looked at," he said.

 

"I think it is a little strange that researchers and others have not seen them," he added.

 

Shadi Hamid, director of research at the Brookings Institution in Qatar, told Al Jazeera the choice of the three women was "surprising".

 

"People were very excited and thought this year would be the year of the Arab Spring. I am not sure what the rationale was exactly, but I think this might be interpreted as a slight to the Arab world," he said.

 

Esraa Abdel Fattah and Ahmed Maher of Egypt, who founded the April 6th youth movement, had been seen as top picks.

 

The movement, which began on Facebook, "played a key role in maintaining the direction and non-violent character of the uprisings in Egypt," which led to the ouster of Hosni Mubarak in February after 30 years in power, Kristian Berg Harpviken, the head of the Peace Research Institute of Oslo, said.

 

Google executive Wael Ghonim, also a central inspiration to the protests on Tahrir Square in Cairo, was another observer favourite, as was Tunisian blogger Lina Ben Mhenni, who chronicled the revolution in her country on the Internet.

 

Among other names that had been circulating were Sima Samar, an Afghan doctor and women's rights activist, and Russian activist Svetlana Gannushkina and her human rights group, Memorial.

 

The EU, currently battling spiralling debt problems in the eurozone, had also been increasingly mentioned as a possible winner for its role in keeping the peace in most of Europe for more than half a century.

 

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http://english.aljazeera.net/news/europe/2011/10/201110773943904523.html

 

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seems like global south women have finally won the greatest token of western affection.

[nuune]

I can't believe you are so addicted to Al Jazeera, uffff, wallaahi you are pathetic, sxb, couldn't you report the same article from other sources, the lunatic, bombastic, filthy Arab media crap of Al Jazeera serves no human dignity, and only promotes Western ideology in the name of rising Arab media, as their audience deteriorated since the so called Arab Spring, not only they have being selective in their coverage of the Arab Uprising, but they have being as the same league as that of Fox News, Sky News and other hell hols, Al Jazeera's Arabic version is even worse, they have deceived millions of viewers into luring their news as being objective and ONLY telling the truth, they have being exposed to the teeth, that fake Arab Sheikh king prince of Qatar who owns Al Jazeera is the editor in chief who is being directed by the West not to report any uprising from Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Brunai, Bahamas and Samao.

[Alpha Blondy]

at the end of the day Nuune, if its the bbc or AJE, there is no contest. look, i understand you have problems with Arabs for god knows whatever reason but your level of hatred is most unnecessary. sxb, you need to chill and present your grievances in a more dignified way. AJE looks at all angles of the story and gives all opinions a platform. maybe you have high ethical standards and this is to be applauded but can we ever expect objective reporting of all events? there is always an interest. i agree AJE coverage on the libyan/syrian uprising left lots to be desired but this was an internal arab issue and maybe AJE didn't handle the situations well. but you've got to love AJE's coverage and dedicated programmes like people and power.

[nuune]

You are obsessed with power, sxb, I have no hatred for Arabs, never even stated a statement, but the double agent Al Jazeera who operates on the cover of the West to mislead the Arabic speaking masses needs to be exposed, you said Al Jazeera has limited resources in covering both angles of the conflict, rubbish, defending a western-sponsored media to the death is not going to make you liberal, sxb, you can't handle the truth as Homer Simpson would say who is another agent of Fox Media!

[Jacaylbaro]

nuune;750287 wrote:

I can't believe you are so addicted to Al Jazeera, uffff, wallaahi you are pathetic, sxb, couldn't you report the same article from other sources, the lunatic, bombastic, filthy Arab media crap of Al Jazeera serves no human dignity, and only promotes Western ideology in the name of rising Arab media, as their audience deteriorated since the so called Arab Spring, not only they have being selective in their coverage of the Arab Uprising, but they have being as the same league as that of Fox News, Sky News and other hell hols, Al Jazeera's Arabic version is even worse, they have deceived millions of viewers into luring their news as being objective and ONLY telling the truth, they have being exposed to the teeth, that fake Arab Sheikh king prince of Qatar who owns Al Jazeera is the editor in chief who is being directed by the West not to report any uprising from Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Brunai, Bahamas and Samao.

;);););)

[uchi]

I will have to agree with nuune on this..., they started well, but have been going down hill ever since the Iraq war.