LAST MONTH, on December 10, the award ceremony for the prestigious Nobel Prizes was held. The awards are bestowed by a special commission on those who have made outstanding contributions in Physics, Chemistry, Literature, Medicine, Economic Sciences and Peace, and who are therefore considered to be world leaders in those disciplines.
There was great joy when it was announced that the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize was bestowed jointly on three women: Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Leymah Gbowee of Liberia, and Tawakkul Karman of Yemen for “their non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women’s rights to full participation in peace-building work”.
On the contrary, what sad news to hear that Ralph Steinman had died of cancer just a few hours before the announcement that he had won the Nobel Prize in Medicine. The Canadian-born scientist was honoured with the award for his discoveries about the human body’s immune system – research that had for years extended to his own life in a losing battle against an aggressive form of pancreatic cancer.
However, this was not the first time in Nobel Prize history that a winner was not able to collect the award. I can still remember quite clearly the scene when in December of 2010, the chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee crossed the dais and gently placed a diploma and a medal on an empty chair. Those present, including ambassadors, royalty and other dignitaries, rose in a standing ovation. They were all honouring the great Chinese literary critic and writer Liu Xiaobo, to whom the esteemed committee had decided to award the 2010 Peace Prize “for his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental rights in China”. Liu wasn’t there because he was, and still is, serving an 11-year sentence at Jinzhou Prison in north-eastern China for urging sweeping changes to Beijing’s one-party Communist system.
The event was not covered by China’s state-controlled media, and foreign TV News channels went black all over the country as the award ceremony began. Chinese authorities denounced the award as a ‘political farce’, and described the awarding of the prize to the 56-year-old writer as an attack on their political and legal systems. Moreover, they placed Liu’s supporters, including his wife Liu Xia, under house arrest to prevent anyone from picking up the prize. The Chinese government also pressured diplomats to stay away from the ceremony, with 16 countries submissively bowing to their boycott, including Russia, Pakistan, Iran, Venezuela and Cuba.
During the award ceremony, the committee chairman Thorbjoern Jagland, highlighting that neither Liu nor his closest relatives were able to attend, declared, “this fact alone shows that the award was necessary and appropriate”.
After the ceremony, a torchlight parade meandered through Oslo’s dark, snowy streets, ending at the Grand Hotel where the laureate normally spends the night. Hundreds of torch-bearing demonstrators gathered near the hotel chanting: Democracy Now and Free Liu Xiaobo.
While it is natural to rejoice for the Nobel Prizes presented last December, it is also natural to feel outraged and express concern about the Chinese government’s treatment of Liu Xiaobo, his wife and his supporters. It is our duty to make sure that this outrage does not die down, remembering that all the basic rights we take for granted in North America and Western Europe are trampled on in China, where thousands of innocent people are languishing in jail.
The People’s Republic of China is today a superpower that all look up to with great interest, not least because she holds the keys to the world’s economic recovery. She has experienced exponential economic growth, and her hard-won prominence on the world’s stage impose on her great and decisive responsibilities which, however, cannot exempt her from making progress in the field of human rights.
China is a lovely country, we all like her food and buy her products. This, however, should not make us shy away from asking her government to release all political prisoners. Liu Xiaobo must be freed immediately because, as the writer himself said during his trial: “There is no force that can put an end to the human quest for freedom, and China will in the end become a nation ruled by law, where human rights reign supreme”.
Updated on October 06 2016