Jailed Iranian Women’s Rights Advocate Narges Mohammadi Awarded Nobel Peace Prize

Jailed Iranian women’s rights advocate Narges Mohammadi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday.

Award Honors Recent Demonstrations and Calls for Mohammadi’s Release

The award-making committee said the prize honored those behind recent unprecedented demonstrations in Iran and called for the release of Mohammadi, 51, who has campaigned for three decades for women’s rights and abolition of the death penalty.

Message of Courage for Women Around the World

“We hope to send the message to women all around the world that are living in conditions where they are systematically discriminated: ‘have the courage, keep on going,'” Berit Reiss-Andersen, head of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, told Reuters.

“We want to give the prize to encourage Narges Mohammadi and the hundreds of thousands of people who have been crying for exactly ‘Woman, Life, Freedom’ in Iran,” she added, referring to the protest movement’s main slogan.

No Immediate Official Reaction from Tehran

There was no immediate official reaction from Tehran, which calls the protests Western-led subversion.

But semi-official news agency Fars said Mohammadi had “received her prize from the Westerners” after making headlines “due to her acts against the national security.”

Multiple Sentences and Charges Against Mohammadi

Mohammadi is serving multiple sentences in Tehran’s Evin Prison amounting to about 12 years imprisonment, one of the many periods she has been detained behind bars, according to the Front Line Defenders rights organization.

Charges include spreading propaganda against the state.

Deputy Head of Defenders of Human Rights Center

She is the deputy head of the Defenders of Human Rights Center, a non-governmental organisation led by Shirin Ebadi, the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

“I congratulate Narges Mohammadi and all Iranian women for this prize,” Ebadi told Reuters. “This prize will shed light on violation of women’s rights in the Islamic Republic … which unfortunately has proven that it cannot be reformed.”

‘Embolden Narges’ fight’

Mohammadi is the 19th woman to win the 122-year-old prize and the first one since Maria Ressa of the Philippines won the award in 2021 jointly with Russia’s Dmitry Muratov.

Mohammadi’s husband Taghi Rahmani applauded as he watched the announcement on TV at his home in Paris.

“This Nobel Prize will embolden Narges’ fight for human rights, but more importantly, this is in fact a prize for the ‘women, life and freedom’ movement,” he told Reuters.

Global Tributes

Mohammadi’s win also came just over a year after the death of Mahsa Amini in the custody of morality police for allegedly flouting the Islamic Republic’s dress code for women.

That provoked nationwide protests and was met with a deadly crackdown costing several hundred lives.

Among a stream of tributes from major global bodies, the U.N. human rights office said the Nobel award highlighted the bravery of Iranian women.

“We’ve seen their courage and determination in the face of reprisals, intimidation, violence and detention,” said its spokesperson Elizabeth Throssell .

“They’ve been harassed for what they do or don’t wear. There are increasingly stringent legal, social and economic measures against them … they are an inspiration to the world.”

Dan Smith, head of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute think tank, said that while the prize could help ease pressure on Iranian dissidents, it would be unlikely to lead to her release.