Nobel Peace Prize for 2022

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 2

The Nobel Peace Prize for 2022, awarded to a jailed Belarus civil rights activist, and a rights organisation each in Russia and Ukraine.

Ales Bialiatski

• He is a Belarus civil rights activist who promotes democracy and peaceful development in his country.
• Ales Bialiatski, who is in jail since 2021, is a vocal critic of Putin’s ally, President Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus. 
• In 1995, Bialiatski founded the Belarus human rights group Viasna (Spring) which, according to a fund-raising page on patreon.com, “defends human rights, promotes human rights and exposes violations”.
• Belarus’s support to Russia – offered country’s territory to Russian troops for launching attacks into Ukraine and its soldiers are said to have fought alongside Russian troops.

Center for Civil Liberties, Ukraine

• The Center was founded in Kyiv in 2007 with the aim of advancing human rights and democracy in Ukraine. 
• The Center has actively advocated that Ukraine become affiliated with the International Criminal Court.
• Since Russia’s invasion in February 2022, the Center has engaged in efforts to identify and document Russian war crimes against the Ukrainian civilian population in collaboration with international partners.

Memorial group of Russia

• Memorial was established by human rights activists in the former Soviet Union during the Gorbachev years of glasnost and perestroika, and among its founders were 1975 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Andrei Sakharov and Russian mathematician Svetlana Gannushkina.
• Its objective was to record atrocities committed during the communist regime, especially under Joseph Stalin. 
• After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Memorial grew to become the largest human rights organisation in Russia. 
• It established a centre to document victims of the Stalinist era, and compiled information on political oppression and human rights violations in Russia. 
• Memorial, the most authoritative source of information on political prisoners in Russian detention facilities, also leads efforts to combat militarism and promote human rights.
• During the Chechen wars, Memorial gathered and verified information on abuses and war crimes by Russian and pro-Russian forces. 
• In 2009, the head of Memorial’s branch in Chechnya, Natalia Estemirova, was killed because of this work. 
• The organisation was stamped as a “foreign agent” early on, and in December 2021, the Supreme Court ruled that it must be liquidated and the documentation centre shut permanently.

Significance

• The Peace Prize winners represent civil society in their home countries.
• They have for many years promoted the right to criticise power and protect the fundamental rights of citizens.
• They have made an outstanding effort to document war crimes, human rights abuses and the abuse of power
• Together they demonstrate the significance of civil society for peace and democracy.
• This year’s winners have revitalised and honoured Alfred Nobel’s vision of peace and fraternity between nations — a vision most needed in the world today.