The 2022 Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded to the jailed human rights advocate Ales Bialiatski from Belarus, and two human rights organizations, Russia’s Memorial group, and Ukraine’s Center for Civil Liberties.
Ales Bialiatski
In 1996, Bialiatski, 60, founded the human rights organization, Viasna, following controversial constitutional changes by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.
Through Viasna, Bialiatski provided support to imprisoned demonstrators and their families, while documenting the use of torture by the government.
In 2011, Bialiatski spent four and a half year in prison for tax evasion, in 2021 he was arrested again for tax evasion charges. A move widely seen to silence his work, according to Lukashenko’s critics.
“In recent years, a number of fundamental decisions of the Nobel Committee are so politicised that, excuse me, Alfred Nobel is tormented and turning in his grave.”
– Anatoly Glaz, Belarus’ Foreign Ministry Spokesman
Memorial
In 1987, Memorial was established in the Soviet Union to provide support to the victims of the communist regime.
In 2009, Natalia Estemirova the head of the Memorial’s office in Chechnya was shot dead. The group was gathering evidence on war crimes committed by Russian forces against civilians.
In 2021, Memorial was ordered to shut down by Russia’s Supreme Court, after previously being registered as “foreign agents”, the organization denies these accusation.
Center for Civil Liberties
In 2007, the center for Civil Liberties was founded to promote human rights, democracy and to fight corruption in Ukraine.
Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February, the organization has focused on documenting Russian war crimes against the local population.
