Strasbourg, 14/12/2011 (Agence Europe) - European Parliament (EP) President Jerzy Buzek officially awarded the Sakharov Prize to five Arab Spring activists on Wednesday 14 December. Egyptian human rights activists Asmaa Mahfouz and Libyan Ahmed al-Senussi, who spent 31 years in jail after a failed coup against Colonel Gaddafi, were present at the ceremony in Strasbourg. The other award winners are Syrians Razan Zeitouneh, a human rights lawyer and blogger, and caricaturist Ali Farzat, and, posthumously, Tunisian Mohamed Bouazizi whose self-immolation sparked the uprising in his country. “By awarding the Sakharov Prize to the five Arab Spring activists, the European Parliament recognises the efforts of all those who struggle for dignity, basic freedoms and political change in the Arab world”, said Buzek.
In her acceptance speech, Asmaa Mahfouz said that the award of the Sakharov Prize was reward for the Egyptian revolution and the Arab revolution as a whole and “marks a new era in relations between the European Union and the Arab world, and better mutual understanding as we have long lived on stereotypes of Arabs and Muslims”. “This reward pays homage to all those people in Egypt who have been much more courageous than me and actually sacrificed their lives on the streets. I would like to tell you how proud I am for all the martyrs of Arab revolution”, she added, before going on to say that Egyptians face a long battle to change the regime, a reference to the military council.
In his speech, Ahmed al-Senussi honoured women. “Women have made many sacrifices - their lives, those close to them, their children - to achieve our goals: getting rid of a totalitarian regime”, he said. He stated, too, that, “for 42 years, we have lived in exclusion in humiliation of human dignity, and it was these long years that led us to the revolution”, pointing out that the only weapon the young revolutionaries had was their desire. He said that there was “still a long way to go to achieve our goals, but we will achieve them, thanks to our patience, once an elected parliament has been put in place and there is a constitution approved by the people”.
In a recorded video message, Ali Ferzat said that he was “suffering for all that is currently taking place in Syria. As every minute passes, the number of victims rises”. His thoughts with the demonstrators, Ferzat said: “They are issuing a call to us, telling us that freedom is great, important, precious, that it is a gift from God”. (CG/transl.rt)