The Nobel Peace Prize is announced in October — usually on the second Friday. But the prize is awarded in a ceremony on December 10. The ceremony for the peace prize is held in Oslo. The ceremonies for the other Nobel prizes are held, on the same day, in Stockholm. Why December 10? Because it was the day the testator, Alfred Nobel, died, in 1896. December 10 is also Human Rights Day. That is a complete coincidence. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was ratified on December 10, 1948.
About this year’s peace prize, I wrote an article published last month. The prize was awarded to one individual and two organizations. The individual is Ales Bialiatski, a Belarusian political prisoner. The organizations are Memorial and the Center for Civil Liberties. The first of these is the foremost civil-society and human-rights organization in Russia. I said “is.” “Was”? Memorial has been banned, of course, but it soldiers on in whatever ways are feasible. The Center for Civil Liberties is a Ukrainian organization, based in Kyiv.
Obviously, Bialiatski, the prisoner, could not attend the ceremony on Saturday. His wife, Natallia Pinchuk, spoke in his stead. This is exactly what Yelena Bonner did in 1975, speaking for her husband, Andrei Sakharov, the great Russian scientist and dissident. (If you would like to know more about this, consult my book, Peace, They Say, a history of the Nobel Peace Prize.)
In Oslo, Natallia Pinchuk said the following, about Belarus:
Hundreds of thousands have been forced to flee the country for the mere reason that they wanted to live in a democratic state. Unfortunately, the war of the authorities against their own people, language, history, and democratic values has been waged in Belarus for years.
Yes. In due course, Ms. Pinchuk quoted her husband, Bialiatski, piecing together some things that he has been able to communicate to her recently and some things that he has said and written in the past.
From Bialiatski:
It just so happens that people who value freedom the most are often deprived of it. I remember my friends — human-rights activists from Cuba, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan. I remember my spiritual sister Nasrin Sotoudeh, from Iran. I admire Cardinal Joseph Zen, from Hong Kong. Thousands of people are currently behind bars in Belarus for political reasons, and they are all my brothers and sisters. Nothing can stop people’s thirst for freedom.
Bialiatski may be in wretched circumstances, as a political prisoner — but
I look inside myself, and my ideals have not changed, have not lost their value, have not faded. They are always with me, and I guard them as best I can. They are as if cast from gold, immune from rusting.
Here is an interesting question: What is the relationship between “nationalism” — or, as Bialiatski puts it, “the values of identity and independence” — and human rights? Bialiatski is very thoughtful on the question, and powerful, too:
I began to be critical of Soviet reality early on. Among other things, I faced a sharp restriction on the use of the Belarusian language, with the policy of de-belarusianization, which was carried out then — and is still being executed today. The former colonial dependence of Belarus is an ever-present reality. And as a result, there is still a threat to the existence of Belarusians as a nation and people.
Continues Bialiatski,
It is a dramatic mistake to separate human rights from the values of identity and independence. I have been involved in the independent underground movement since 1982, in fact since I was young man of 20. Its aim was to achieve a democratic independent Belarus in which human rights would be respected. There can be no Belarus without democracy and there can be no human rights without an independent Belarus.
The following words, to me, were quite touching:
My ideals are in tune with the ideals of my older friends and spiritual mentors — the Czech Václav Havel and the Belarusian Vasil Bykau. Both of them went through great life trials; both advanced their nations and cultures; both fought for democracy and human rights until the last minutes of their lives.
Then there is this:
Presidential elections were held in Belarus on August 9, 2020. Mass falsifications made people take to the streets. Good and evil came together in a duel. Evil is well-armed. And from the side of good there were only peaceful mass protests, unheard of for our country . . .
Some more:
Now the permanent struggle of good and evil has unfolded almost in its purest form throughout the region. The cold wind from the East collided with the warmth of the European renaissance.
It is not enough to be educated and democratic, it is not enough to be humane and merciful. We should be able to protect our achievements and our Fatherland. It is not for nothing that in the Middle Ages the concept of the Fatherland was linked to the concept of freedom.
I know exactly what kind of Ukraine would suit Russia and Putin — a dependent dictatorship. The same as today’s Belarus . . .
Finally,
I am a human-rights activist and therefore a supporter of nonviolent resistance. I am not an aggressive person by nature, I always try to behave accordingly. However, I recognize that goodness and truth must be able to protect themselves.
What a man, Ales Bialiatski. May people sing his name for a long time to come (and, even more, sing his ideals, and live them).