Nobel Peace Prize 2021

• 09 Oct 2021

Why in News

Recently, the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to journalists Maria Ressa of the Philippines and Dmitry Muratov of Russia for their efforts to safeguard freedom of expression, which is a precondition for democracy and lasting peace.

• In 2020, the award was given to the World Food Programme (WFP), a United Nations (UN) agency.
• Other 2021 Nobel Prizes for Literature, Chemistry, Physics and Medicine have already been announced.

Key Points

• Maria Ressa:
  
  • She is an investigative journalist, in 2012 she co-founded Rappler, a digital media platform for investigative journalism, which she continues to head.
  • Rappler has focused critical attention on President Rodrigo Duterte's regime's controversial, murderous anti-drug campaign.
    
    • In the 2021 World Press Freedom Index, the Philippines ranked 138 of 180 nations (India was ranked lower, at 142).
  • She has also authored Seeds of Terror: An Eyewitness Account of Al-Qaeda’s Newest Center, and From Bin Laden to Facebook: 10 Days of Abduction, 10 Years of Terrorism.
• Dmitry Muratov:
  
  • Muratov has for decades defended freedom of speech in Russia under increasingly challenging conditions''.
    
    • Russia has ranked 150 in the 2021 World Freedom Index.
  • He along with around 50 colleagues started Novaya Gazeta (Newspaper) in 1993, as one of its founders. He has served as the newspaper’s editor-in-chief since 1995.
    
    • Committee to Protect Journalists, a US-based non-profit, had felicitated Muratov as one of its International Press Freedom awardees in 2007.
  • Six of Muratov’s colleagues have been killed since the newspaper started, which has often faced harassment, threats, violence and murder from its opponents.
    
    • Despite the killings and threats, editor-in-chief Muratov has refused to abandon the newspaper’s independent policy.
• Significance:
  
  • Free, independent and fact-based journalism serves to protect against abuse of power, lies and war propaganda.
  • Without freedom of expression and freedom of the press, it will be difficult to successfully promote fraternity between nations, disarmament and a better world order to succeed in our time.

Source: TH