Nobel Peace Prize laureates say they hope to inspire women to lead

December 9, 2011
Nobel Peace Prize laureates say they hope to inspire women to lead
By Lennart Simonsson | Deutsche Presse-Agentur

OSLO, Norway — The three 2011 Nobel Peace Prize laureates on Friday said they hoped to inspire other women to aspire to become leaders in the struggle for peace and justice.

Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, Tawakkul Karman and Leymah Gbowee spoke at a joint press conference in Norway, ahead of the awards ceremony that will take place at the Oslo City Hall on Saturday.

Johnson-Sirleaf, who was recently re-elected as president of Liberia said the women of her country had "carried the burden of conflicts."

"This prize to me, represents them, their suffering, their contribution," she said.

Johnson-Sirleaf, who took office in 2006, three years after the end of a 14-year-long civil war, said she intended to work to help young girls "reach their potential in life."

Karman, a Yemeni pro-democracy activist and the first Arab woman to win the Peace Prize, said it signaled "the period where women were victims had ended" and said the Nobel Committee would "not regret" its choice.

"We will participate to create a new world that means peace, equal participation, love, helping and working with each other."

Karman said she would continue to work for democratic rule in Yemen and ensure that "all those who have stolen public money will go to prison" and the money be returned to the country.

Gbowee, an activist from Liberia who is based in Ghana, said she would return home to work for reconciliation, accepting an offer from the president to head a peace commission.

Gbowee has in recent years headed the Ghana-based group Women Peace and Security Network Africa.

She said the "real celebration" would be "20 years from now, when we see a 1,000 young women or 2,000 young women globally say 'we are leaders because in 2011 we saw three women (win the Nobel Peace Prize), we got inspired, we got challenged'."

The Nobel Peace Prize endowed by Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, inventor of dynamite, is worth 10 million kronor ($1.4 million). It was only the second time in its 110-year-old history that the prize was shared by three people.

The five-member Nobel Committee considered a record 241 nominations for the 2011 prize.

Last year, jailed Chinese dissident and writer Liu Xiaobo was awarded the prize.

A group led by former South African Anglican Archbiship Desmond Tutu, who won the Peace Prize in 1984, and former Czech President Vaclav Havel on Friday announced the establishment of an international committee to support his release.

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