At the same time as we are gathered here today, the Nobel Prizes for physiology or medicine, physics, chemistry and literature are being awarded to this year’s winners in Stockholm. According to the provisions of Alfred Nobel’s will, all the Nobel prizes are linked to each other, including the peace prize. Alfred Nobel’s vision was about progress through science and the search for truth and ever more knowledge. The vision was also about literature’s pervasive ability to enlighten and enrich the mind and about peace, which is absolutely essential for security and progress. Alfred Nobel’s support for science, literature and peace reflected his belief that such activities were the key to a better world. At the heart of his vision was the belief that talented and committed individuals can make a difference. This year it is a great pleasure for me to honor Ales Byalyatski, the organization Memorial and the Center for Civil Rights as “champions of peace” – who, with different means, but a common goal – have done humanity the greatest benefit. For this, each of them will be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 2022, with a third of the prize amount each. When this decision was announced in October, the Nobel Committee emphasized that the three laureates have fought for the right to criticize power and basic rights for citizens. They have made an unprecedented effort to document war crimes, violations of human rights and abuse of power. Together, they show the importance of civil society for peace and democracy. A democratic government not only needs the support of its people, but also criticism, new ideas and new perspectives. The ultimate source of power is the people. History teaches us that even oppressed people will at one time or another defy the oppressor. Some will form a movement and advocate for more freedom, justice, democracy and the rule of law. These rights and values are the framework that guarantees every citizen the right to have his own opinion and enjoy freedom of expression and association. Our three award winners share this conviction. They have a common approach to expose oppressors and war criminals. Their method involves a systematic collection of evidence of past and present violations of human rights and war crimes. The purpose is to hold the perpetrators accountable, honor the victims and prevent the atrocities from happening again. Reliable evidence is of crucial importance, not only in terms of a legal process, but also for historical documentation and moral restoration of the victims’ perspective. This brings me to the first of our three award winners, Ales Byaljatski. Belarusian authorities have tried for years to silence him. He has been harassed. He has been arrested and imprisoned. He has been deprived of the opportunity to work. Ales Byalyatski is an academic and literary scholar and words have been his weapon ever since he was among those who initiated the democracy and human rights movement in Belarus in the 1980s. He is the founder of Vjasna, an organization that initially documented the authorities’ abuse of protesters, but which quickly developed into a human rights organization. For over 20 years, Vyasna has documented abuse and torture against activists and political opponents of the authoritarian regime in Belarus. The organization identifies victims, monitors where they serve their sentences and monitors the treatment they receive. Vjasna wants to make sure that victims who disappear are not forgotten. In July 2021, Vjasna’s offices were raided and the managers were arrested. Today, our thoughts go out to all political prisoners in Belarus. We think in particular of Ales Byalyatski, who sits in a dark and isolated prison cell in Minsk: You are not alone; we stand by your side. We thank your wife Natallia Pintsjuk, who will soon receive the gold medal and diploma on your behalf. Ales Byaljatski insists that he is not a politician. His role is to promote human rights, democracy and the rule of law – a dangerous task in a dictatorship. He now risks being sentenced to a prison sentence of seven to 12 years. Novelist Milan Kundera once wrote: “Man’s struggle against power is memory’s struggle not to forget.” The organization Memorial is dedicated to just that: memory. It was established at the end of the 1980s in the former Soviet Union by, among others, the Nobel Prize winner Andrej Sakharov and the tireless human rights defender Elena Zhemkóva, who is present here today. Please get up, Elena! Originally, the purpose of the Memorial was to document the repression and atrocities of the communist regime, so that these crimes would never be forgotten. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the organization expanded its scope to also include violations of human rights in Russia. Although Memorial as such was temporarily tolerated by the authorities, its members were constantly subjected to reprisals and attacks. As we all remember, Natalja Estemirova, who headed Memorial’s office in Chechnya, was brutally murdered in 2009 while documenting war crimes committed by Russian and pro-Russian forces during the Second Chechen War. By labeling the legitimate and normal activities of civil society as activities of “foreign agents”, the Russian authorities have secured a legal grip on activities that the authorities do not like. Memorial as a legal entity is now history. The organization was closed down through a court order in April 2022. The network of former employees and supporters of the defunct organization is nevertheless still active. It is extremely important that the Memorial’s unique archives of past and present crimes committed by the state are preserved for the future. We must also ensure that the most important lesson from Memorial’s 35-year fight for the truth is never forgotten: By documenting the dark chapters of our history, we give ourselves the opportunity to learn from the past and prevent the same mistakes from being made in new. Memorial was determined to tell the true story of abuse, oppression and war crimes. Unfortunately, I have to say that such truths are seen as anti-state in today’s Russia. We are honored to have Memorial’s chairman, Jan Ratčinskij, with us here today. His motto is: “No one intends to give up!” Then I finally come to the Center for Civil Rights in Ukraine, which is represented here on the podium by the chair Oleksandra Matvyychuk. The Center for Civil Rights has stated that it wants to “strengthen the principle of human dignity”. It’s an audacious goal. More specifically, the center wants to encourage citizen activism to support democracy, human rights and the rule of law. When the Center for Civil Rights was established in 2007, Ukraine was not a full-fledged democracy and a full-fledged rule of law. The years of newfound freedom after the collapse of the Soviet Union were marked by both progress and setbacks in this field. When the pro-Russian and increasingly authoritarian regime of former President Viktor Yanukovych cracked down on the peaceful pro-democracy protests in Kyiv’s Independence Square in 2013, the Center for Civil Rights launched its Euromaidan SOS initiative. The purpose of the initiative was twofold, both to document the authorities’ violations of human rights and to provide legal assistance to the victims. The center also began monitoring the behavior of various state agencies such as the police and security services in order to hold them accountable for their actions and encourage institutional reforms. Last but not least, Euromaidan SOS developed interactive maps that made it possible to track forced abductions of human rights activists, democracy advocates and investigative journalists. After the ouster of Viktor Yanukovych in February 2014 and Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea, the Center for Civil Rights has turned its attention to the human rights situation there and in the disputed Donbas region. The Center for Civil Rights was the first human rights organization to send mobile monitoring teams to Krym and Donbas. They drew up lists of political prisoners and human rights violations which were later exchanged with, and supplemented by, other national and international human rights monitors. With the Russian invasion of Ukraine, these mobile surveillance teams were given a new and overwhelming task, namely to identify and document war crimes committed by Russian and pro-Russian forces on Ukrainian soil. The Center for Civil Rights has advocated for Ukraine to join the International Criminal Court. It has worked with international partners to gather evidence of Russian human rights abuses and war crimes, paving the way for future legal proceedings against the war criminals. Through its work today, the Center for Civil Rights lays the foundation for peace and justice tomorrow. One day, when hostilities have ceased, Ukraine will continue its work of developing democracy and the rule of law. The Center for Civil Rights aims to spearhead this process. It is the Norwegian Nobel Committee’s conviction that this year’s three peace prize winners demonstrate the vital role civil society plays when it comes to achieving and preserving peace. Today we meet in Oslo and Stockholm to celebrate all the Nobel Prizes. We are meeting at a time when democracy and freedom are on the retreat globally, where a brutal war of aggression is taking place in Europe with destructive global consequences. Faced with these many crises and challenges, the world needs committed scientists and people who persistently search for the truth and expand the boundaries of our knowledge. The world also needs these admirable individuals and groups of people who, with great personal sacrifice, challenge oppressive authorities and stand up to aggression in the fight for democracy, human rights and peace. The Norwegian Nobel Committee is proud to honor Ales Byaljatski, the Memorial and the Center for Civil Rights for their contribution to peace and human dignity in these very troubling times.
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