An engineer-turned-activist, Narges Mohammadi is currently living in a detention facility in Iran under the charges of “spreading anti-state propaganda”. She is the second Iranian woman to be awarded in the prize's history.
Iranian activist Narges Mohammadi has been awarded the 2023 Nobel Prize for Peace, “For her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and her fight to promote human rights and freedom for all”, as stated by the Norwegian Nobel Committee in its citation.
The committee also referred to last year’s protests in Iran, following the killing of a young woman named Mahsa Amini while she was in the custody of the Iranian morality police. The protests’ motto ‘Zan –Zendegi – Azadi’ (Woman – Life – Freedom) “suitably expresses the dedication and work of Narges Mohammadi”, the committee said.
Mohammadi is currently in Iran’s Evin House of Detention, serving a 16-year sentence that began in 2015 over charges that include spreading propaganda against the state. Her family expressed their gratitude to the committee in a statement, adding, “We also want to extend our sincere congratulations to all Iranians, especially the courageous women and girls of Iran who have captivated the world with their bravery in fighting for freedom and equality… As Narges always says: Victory is not easy, but it’s certain.”
Early brushes with activism
Born in 1972 in Iran, Mohammadi and her family have long been involved in political protests – beginning with the Iranian Revolution against the country’s monarchy. Iran’s Pahlavi dynasty fell in 1979 and it then became an Islamic republic. Members of her family were among those arrested after the new government came to power. She said in an interview with The New York Times in June this year that two childhood memories “set her on the path to activism” – her mother’s prison visits to her brother, and seeing her watch announcements on TV for the names of prisoners executed each day.
Mohammadi went on to study nuclear physics in the city of Qazvin. At college, she met her future husband Taghi Rahmani, who is also an activist. He was jailed for 14 years in Iran and currently lives in exile in France with the couple’s two children.
On women, prisoners’ rights
The committee said that in the 1990s, as a student, Mohammadi was already “distinguishing herself as an advocate for equality and women’s rights.” She began working as an engineer but also wrote articles for newspapers. In 2003, she became associated with the Defenders of Human Rights Center in Tehran, an organisation founded by Shirin Ebadi – the first Iranian woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize back in 2003. Mohammadi’s activism has centred on Iranian women’s rights and she has campaigned against the death penalty and other harsh sentences meted out to prisoners in the country.
Her first arrest came in 2011. But even during her incarceration, she has organised protests against the government along with other women prisoners. During last year’s protests after Amini’s death, she organised solidarity actions. In 2022, her book ‘White Torture’ was published while she was briefly at home after a heart attack and surgery. It focused on solitary confinement and included interviews with other Iranian women who had experienced the punishment.
“Altogether, the regime has arrested her 13 times, convicted her five times and sentenced her to a total of 31 years in prison and 154 lashes,” the Nobel Committee said.
Previous awards and the Nobel legacy
Mohammadi has also been awarded other prominent prizes in the West for her work, such as the PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write Award in May 2023 and the 2023 UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize. In 2022, she was featured in the BBC’s list of 100 inspirational and influential women from around the world.
The first Iranian woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, Shirin Ebadi, received it “for her efforts for democracy and human rights,” the Committee’s citation said. Ebadi was one of Iran’s first female judges and defended people who were being persecuted by the authorities. She was also imprisoned for her work on the rights of women and children and now lives in London.
The committee also wrote, “In its choice of Ebadi, the Nobel Committee expressed a wish to reduce the tensions between the Islamic and the Western worlds following the terrorist attack on the United States on 11 September 2001.” A reflection of Nobel’s peace prizes reflecting ongoing geopolitical tensions, last year, the prize was awarded to human rights advocate Ales Bialiatski from Belarus, the Russian human rights organisation Memorial, and the Ukrainian human rights organisation Center for Civil Liberties. Unlike the Peace Prize, Nobel prizes in the fields of Medicine, Physics and Chemistry are awarded many years after the scientists’ work has been published to effectively gauge the impact of the research work. That the Peace Prize has sometimes been awarded to politicians and world leaders much sooner in comparFor example, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed was awarded in 2019, “for his efforts to achieve peace and international cooperation, and in particular for his decisive initiative to resolve the border conflict with neighbouring Eritrea”.
However, violence broke out in the region in 2020, and the Committee later issued a rare statement. “As Prime Minister and a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, Abiy Ahmed has a special responsibility to end the conflict and help to create peace,” it said, noting the fact that humanitarian relief was not able to reach Tigray.ison has become a point of criticism.
Similarly, the award given to former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in 1973, for negotiating a peace treaty during the Vietnam War, also saw some pushback. The treaty fell apart soon after it was signed. Two Nobel Committee members resigned over the committee chairman’s statement that the committee had unanimously supported the selection of Kissinger and Le Duc Tho, the Vietnamese negotiator. Tho himself refused the prize over the treaty’s violation.
Source: Indian Express, 6/10/23
