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Who Is Nadia Murad And Why Did She Win The Nobel Peace Prize?

Mark Cunliffe

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Who Is Nadia Murad And Why Did She Win The Nobel Peace Prize?

Featured Image Credit: PA Images

The 2018 Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded to Nadia Murad along with Denis Mukwege, who are both campaigners against rape in warfare.

Nadia Murad, is an Iraqi Yazidi who was trafficked as a sex slave by Islamic State militants, and later became the face of a campaign to free the Yazidi people. She is also the first Iraqi to win the prize.

When she was growing up, Nadia dreamt of being a teacher or a beauty therapist, however, just before she reached adulthood Isis invaded her small Iraqi village and destroyed everything she had ever known.

Credit: PA
Credit: PA
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The UN Goodwill Ambassador was captured in August 2014 and sold into sexual slavery because her family belonged to the minority Yazidi religion.

Nadia was repeatedly raped and sold on to different groups before she managed to make her escape. One of her captors had left a door unlocked and so she risked her life and managed to leave.

Although she had escaped, Nadia was still overcome with the mental and physical effects of her ordeal but she bravely decided to speak publicly about what she had been through.

Credit: PA
Credit: PA
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Nadia had to revisit her torture repeatedly but she bravely released her autobiography The Last Girl in 2017.

The book took its title from Nadia's goal to be the last girl in the world to have a story like hers.

She campaigned to help put an end to human trafficking and called on the world to take a tougher line on rape as a weapon of war.

Her campaign has focused on support for survivors, and a long-term search for justice, calling on the world to collect and preserve evidence that would allow Isis militants to be brought to trial.

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Nadia has a huge support system around her including lawyer Amal Clooney and Samantha Power, US ambassador to the UN under Barack Obama.

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She was awarded the Vaclav Havel Human Rights Prize by the Council of Europe in 2016 and called for an international court to judge crimes committed by IS in her acceptance speech in Strasbourg.

Nadia was also named the UN's first goodwill ambassador for survivors of human trafficking later that year.

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Speaking about the joint award, the committee said: "They have both put their own personal security at risk by courageously combating war crimes and securing justice for victims."

It also added that Nadia Murad and Denis Mukwege "helped to give greater visibility to war-time sexual violence".

Topics: Life News, Real

Mark Cunliffe
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