The Royal Swedish Academy has awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 2023 to Narges Mohammadi in recognition of her tireless efforts in advocating for the rights of women in Iran and her unwavering commitment to advancing human rights and freedom for all.
“The 2023 peace laureate Narges Mohammadi is a woman, a human rights advocate, and a freedom fighter. This year’s Nobel Peace Prize also recognizes the hundreds of thousands of people who have demonstrated against the theocratic regime’s policies of discrimination and oppression targeting women,” the Academy said.
The committee also made mention of the protests in Iran from the previous year, which erupted after the tragic death 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 Nobel committee said.
She became the 19th woman to receive the prestigious 122-year-old prize, marking the first female recipient since Maria Ressa of the Philippines shared the award with Russia’s Dmitry Muratov in 2021.
The other contenders for the Nobel Peace Prize this year, were Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, and UN Secretary-General António Guterres.
Who is Narges Mohammadi?
Born in 1972 in Zanjan in Iran, she grew up during the highly oppressive and resentful Shah rule in Iran. Iran was at that time gripped in a revolutionary fervor, which led to the overthrow of the Shah monarchy and turned Iran into an Islamic Republic, in 1979.
“Women will not give up. We are fuelled by a will to survive, whether we are inside prison or outside."
— The Nobel Prize (@NobelPrize) October 8, 2023
Imprisoned 2023 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi has helped ensure the protests related to Mahsa Jina Amini's killing have not ebbed.#NobelPeacePrize pic.twitter.com/MOCoA5oiWj
After finishing high school in Zanjan, she did her majored in applied physics at Imam Khomeini University in Qazvin. There she co-founded an organisation called Tashakkol Daaneshjooei Roshangaraan( Illuminating Students Group ) and started taking up women’s issues and debates against the death penalty. She met another activist here, Tagh Rahmani whom she would marry later on in 1999.
After completing her studies, she worked as an engineer and also as a columnist in various reform-minded newspapers, writing on women’s issues and reformist causes.
Later on when her husband Mr.Rahmani got arrested in 2001 for rights and civil society campaigns, a year later she joined the Centre for the Defenders of Human Rights, which was co-founded by Shirin Ebadi, the famous human rights campaigner, who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003.
Iran is a theocratic state, ruled by the country’s supreme leader. Though the women are allowed to have jobs, academic positions, and government appointments, their lives are subjected to strict control, they all are required to at least wear a headscarf, or hijab, to cover their hair as a sign of piety. Iran and neighboring Afghanistan remain the only countries that mandate it.
Currently, she is imprisoned in Evin jail, infamous as the Bastille of Iran. Her 2022 book “White Torture” which captures the interview with 12 female inmates gives the details of inhuman conditions in Evin jail. She is currently serving her sentence of 16 years, for acting against national security and campaigns against the government in Evin jail. The methods of torture in jail and solitary confinement can break even the most resilient spirits, but her commitment and will did not break her.
Though the Nobel Peace Prize Committee has been accused many times of awarding the Prize to the critics of regimes that are seen as rivals of the West, irrespective of that it is Narges Mohmmadi’s quick rise as a human rights activist has earned her the wrath of the current theocratic regime, her unwavering commitment and ending efforts to champion the women’s right in Iran makes her the most deserving person for the Nobel Peace Prize.
