Belarus, Russia and Ukraine rights activists get Nobel Peace prize

Bloomberg

Human rights advocates in the former Soviet neighbors of Belarus, Ukraine and Russia won the Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts to fight authoritarian regimes as Europe’s worst military confrontation since World War II is roiling the region.
Ales Bialiatski from Belarus, Memorial of Russia and Ukraine’s Center for Civil Liberties were awarded the 10-million Swedish kronor ($900,000) prize by the Oslo-based Norwegian Nobel Committee on Friday.
The committee “wishes to honour three outstanding champions of human rights, democracy and peaceful co-existence,” it said in a statement. “This year’s laureates have revitalised and honoured Alfred Nobel’s vision of peace and fraternity between nations — a vision most needed in the world today.”
The announcement was unexpected, with opposition leaders in Belarus and Russia, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya and Alexey Navalny — both vocal critics of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine —long tipped as potential winners. Coming on the day Vladimir Putin celebrates his 70th birthday, it awards the prize to a critic of the Russian president’s regime for the second year in a row.
Ales Bialiatski, 60, is the chairman of Viasna, a non-governmental center that has tracked human rights violations since 1996. Bialiatski was detained last year in President Alexander Lukashenko’s ongoing repression of the opposition following nationwide protests against his claimed landslide victory in the 2020 election. Viasna is effectively outlawed in Belarus, with seven of its members imprisoned, including Bialiatski. There are more than 1,300 political prisoners in Belarus, according to Viasna.
“Government authorities have repeatedly sought to silence Ales Bialiatski,” the committee said. “Since 2020, he is still detained without trial.