“259 candidates for Nobel Peace Prize in 2013 is the highest number of candidates ever. The previous record was 241 from 2011”, says the official portal of the Nobel Peace Prize.
Ludmila Alekseeva, a head of the Moscow Helsinki group, as well as Russian human rights Memorial group, and Youth human rights movement are among the nominees to the prestigious prize.
Earlier this week Russian Ministry of Justice called a famous election watchdog GOLOS to be “foreign agent” for its political activity and getting the prestigious Andrey Sakharov prize from the Norwegian Helsinki Committee.
The financial equivalent of the Sakharov prize is $10,000. The Nobel Peace Prize was equivalent to €1,15 million in 2012.
“Nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize is a big honor, and pride”, says executive director of Murmansk branch of Memorial group Vyacheslav Paykachev to the BarentsObserver. He states his NGO isn’t involved into politics, but you can never know how human rights activity can be classified by the Ministry of Justice.
Paykachev also says the Memorial is concerned about the GOLOS case, and believes that “International Prizes and awards for Russian NGOs shouldn’t be estimated as a financial support”.
