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12/10/10

China: Liu Xiaobo-Nobel Peace Prize Award in Stockholm - Human Rights and Democracy go hand in hand

Some 18 countries including China have refused Norway's invitation to today's ceremony awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to jailed Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo. Most have close ties to China and do not seem to want to anger Beijing or have a tendency to take a hard line themselves against their own dissidents.

The countries which stayed away were Afghanistan, Algeria, China, Colombia, Cuba, Egypt, Iraq, Iran, Kazakhstan, Morocco, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Tunisia, Venezuela and Vietnam.  Ukraine, the Philippines and Serbia had at first declined their invitations, but Nobel Institute director Geir Lundestad yesterday said they had changed their minds.

The no-show list, double the number from two years ago, reflects China’s growing global influence as its economic power expands, says Iver B. Neumann, Research Director at the Oslo- based Norwegian Institute of International Affairs.

"The award isn’t directed against China, the chairman of the Nobel committee", Thorbjoern Jagland, said at a news conference yesterday. “It’s a prize honoring those people in China -- and Liu Xiaobo is one of the most prominent ones -- that are clearly understanding that further economic development in China must be combined with political reforms.” 

An interesting note is that Afghanistan, Colombia, Egypt, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Tunisia and Morocco, who did not attend the Noble Prize ceremony in Stockholm are countries who have a close relationship with the EU and the US. Some of them (Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Egypt) receive large amounts of economic and military assistance from the EU and the US.

Another example of the Noble Peace Prize infuriating an existing Government was in 1975 when the Nobel Peace Prize had been awarded to Andrei Sakharov, the Russian physicist-turned-human-rights-champion. Sakharov played a major role in the 1950s in developing the Soviet hydrogen bomb, but by this time he had long been out of military work and antagonized the authorities with his outspoken pro-democracy views. The Nobel citation than called Sakharov "the conscience of mankind".

Liu was not attending the Noble prize ceremony in Oslo today -- he's in jail for his non violent struggle for human rights and democracy in China. Liu Xiaobo is in jail even though article 41 of the Chinese Constitution states: "Citizens of the People's Republic of China have the right to criticize and make suggestions to any state organ or functionary. Citizens have the right to make to relevant state organs complaints and charges against, or exposures of, violation of the law or dereliction of duty by any state organ or functionary; but fabrication or distortion of facts with the intention of libel or frame-up is prohibited. In case of complaints, charges or exposures made by citizens, the state organ concerned must deal with them in a responsible manner after ascertaining the facts. No one may suppress such complaints, charges and exposures, or retaliate against the citizens making them. Citizens who have suffered losses through infringement of their civil rights by any state organ or functionary have the right to compensation in accordance with the law."

EU-Digest

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