The “Right Livelihood Award” is considered an alternative Nobel Prize for human rights. This year’s winners include environmental activists from Cambodia. A court banned them from traveling to the award ceremony.
Activists from the group Mother Nature Cambodia are not allowed to travel to Stockholm for the “Right Livelihood Awards” ceremony. A Cambodian court banned them from leaving the country.
As the Right Livelihood Foundation announced, the court recently decided that the Cambodian winners would not be granted permission to travel to Sweden to receive the award there. The foundation called for a review of the decision.
Commitment to environmental protection caused condemnation
According to a spokeswoman for the foundation, the activists are Phoun Keo Raksmey, Thon Ratha and Long Kunthea. According to the Swedish news agency TT, they all received suspended prison sentences because of their work to protect Cambodia’s natural resources. They were therefore convicted in the summer of 2021 for inciting serious crimes.
Several Mother Nature Cambodia activists have already been arrested and detained for protesting. While the environmental protection organization was able to protest undisturbed in the early years and draw attention to grievances, they say they have been increasingly exposed to threats, attacks and arrests since 2015.
Alternative Nobel Prize for Aid organizations
The “Right Livelihood Award”, translated roughly as “prize for the right way of life”, is also known as the Alternative Nobel Prize. The award has been presented for over 40 years.
In addition to Mother Nature Cambodia, the European aid organization SOS Méditerranée, the women’s rights activist Eunice Brookman-Amissah from Ghana and the environmentalist Phyllis Omido from Kenya will be honored this time. The prizes are to be ceremoniously presented on November 29th in Stockholm.