The Nobel Peace Prize will be handed out in Oslo on Sunday but with the notable absence of winner Narges Mohammadi, currently in prison, who will be represented by her children.
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Iranian activist Mohammadi – a staunch opponent of the mandatory wearing of the hijab for Iranian women and of the death penalty in her home country – has been arrested and convicted many times in recent decades.
She has been detained since 2021 in Tehran’s Evin prison.
She will therefore be absent from the glitzy award ceremony at 1:00 pm (1200 GMT) in Oslo City Hall, where she was to receive the Nobel Peace Prize she was awarded in October “for her fight against the oppression of women in Iran”.
Instead, her 17-year-old twins Ali and Kiani, will receive the award on her behalf and read out a speech that she managed to smuggle out of her cell.
According to her family, Mohammadi will be observing a hunger strike at the same time, in solidarity with the Baha’i community.
Representatives of Iran’s largest religious minority say it is the target of discrimination in many areas of society.
Mohammadi, who suffers from poor health, went on a hunger strike for several days in early November to obtain the right to be transferred to hospital without wearing a head covering.
She is one of the women spearheading the “Woman, Life, Freedom” uprising, which included months-long protests across Iran triggered by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini.
Amini, an Iranian Kurdish woman, died on September 16, 2022, while being held by Iran’s religious police for allegedly breaching the Islamic republic’s strict dress code for women.
‘Priceless’ freedoms
Mohammadi’s twins, who have been living in exile in France since 2015 and have not seen their mother for almost nine years, do not know if they will ever see…
Source : france24
