They are four relatively obscure humanitarians: an orphanage founder in Burundi who challenged a bloodthirsty mob and other dangers; the only doctor for half a million people in Sudan’s Nuba Mountains; a Pakistani advocate for indentured laborers who helps extricate them from debt; and a Roman Catholic priest in the Central African Republic who saved more than 1,000 Muslims, mostly women and children, from fatal persecution.
An international committee deliberating on who would receive a new humanitarian award, created in memory of the Armenian genocide, has selected these four as finalists for the annual prize, meant to honor those whose exceptional work to preserve human life in disasters created by humans — like war and ethnic strife — puts them in great peril. The finalists, whose selection will be announced Tuesday, will attend a ceremony in Yerevan, Armenia, on April 24, where the winner will be announced.
“They’re not celebrities — they’re surprised that some people in the outside world even noticed them,” said Vartan Gregorian, the president of the Carnegie Corporation of New York, a philanthropic foundation. Mr. Gregorian, an American scholar of Armenian descent, leads the selection committee for the award, known as the Aurora Prize for Awakening Humanity.
“They’re not in the self-aggrandizing business,” Mr. Gregorian said in an interview alongside two other committee members, Gareth Evans, a former foreign minister of Australia, and Leymah Gbowee, a Liberian peace activist and Nobel laureate.
The prize, created by Mr. Gregorian and two other prominent philanthropists of Armenian descent, Noubar Afeyan and Ruben Vardanyan, has a twist that distinguishes it from other prizes: The winner receives $100,000 and designates an organization that inspired his or her work to be the beneficiary of $1 million.
The finalists are Marguerite Barankitse, founder of Maison Shalom, which began as a center for orphans during ethnic upheavals that convulsed Burundi, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo in the 1990s; Dr. Tom Catena, a physician from Amsterdam, N.Y., who founded the Mother of Mercy Hospital in Sudan’s war-ravaged Nuba Mountains eight years ago; Syeda Ghulam Fatima, who runs the Bonded Labour Liberation Front, an organization in Lahore, Pakistan, that aids destitute workers and who was once shot because of her work; and the Rev. Bernard Kinvi, a priest from Togo who runs a Catholic mission in the Central African Republic that has saved many civilians from reprisals in that country’s chronic civil conflict, regardless of their backgrounds.
The finalists were chosen from 200 submitted after the award was announced last April during events for the centennial of the Armenian genocide, widely considered the first genocide of the 20th century. As many as 1.5 million Armenians were killed as the Ottoman Empire collapsed.
The award founders named it the Aurora Prize after a genocide survivor, Aurora Mardiganian, who witnessed the massacre of relatives and told her story in a book and film.
Ms. Gbowee said she hoped the prize would inspire a generation of young people, many of whom she feared had become hardened or intimidated by humanitarian crises around the world.
“How do we awaken humanity in them? Should we start now?” she said. “My answer is yes. And the whole idea of this prize is the perfect opportunity to begin that conversation.”
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https://auroraprize.com/en/prize
The Aurora Prize
On behalf of Armenian Genocide survivors and their descendants and in gratitude to saviors.
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We, the members of the Aurora Prize Selection Committee, are proud to announce the four finalists for the inaugural Aurora Prize for Awakening Humanity.
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THE SELECTION COMMITTEE
George
Clooney
Co-Chair
Co-founder, Not On Our Watch; Humanitarian, performer and film maker
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Elie
Wiesel
Co-Chair
President of the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity; Nobel Laureate
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Vartan
Gregorian
Member
Co-founder, 100 LIVES; President of the Carnegie Corporation of New York
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Leymah
Gbowee
Member
Nobel Laureate, Liberian peace activist and women’s rights advocate
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Hina
Jilani
Member
Former United Nations Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Human Rights Defenders
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Gareth
Evans
Member
President Emeritus of the International Crisis Group; Former Australian Foreign Minister
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Mary
Robinson
Member
Former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights; Former President of Ireland
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Oscar
Arias
Member
Two-time President of Costa Rica; Nobel Laureate
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Shirin
Ebadi
Member
Human Rights Lawyer and Iran’s first female judge; Nobel Laureate
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ABOUT THE PRIZE
A $1 million grant for inspiring acts of humanity
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Our purpose
On behalf of the survivors of the Armenian Genocide and in gratitude to their saviors, the Aurora Prize for Awakening Humanity will be granted annually to an individual whose actions have had an exceptional impact on preserving human life and advancing humanitarian causes.
The Aurora Prize Laureate will be honored with a US $100,000 award.
In addition, that individual will have the unique opportunity to continue the cycle of giving by selecting an organization that inspired their work to receive a US $1,000,000 grant.
The Aurora Prize will be awarded annually on April 24 in Yerevan, Armenia.
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THE INSPIRATION
Aurora,
the inspirational woman
behind the prize
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OUR PARTNERS
100 LIVES recently announced a strategic partnership with Not On Our Watch (NOOW), the non-governmental international relief and humanitarian aid organization. The agreement will see cooperation and reciprocal support across projects, research, operations and the development of joint fundraising projects. Not On Our Watch was founded by George Clooney, Don Cheadle, Matt Damon, Brad Pitt, Jerry Weintraub, and David Pressman to focus global attention and resources to stop and prevent mass atrocities.
Elie Wiesel and his wife, Marion, established The Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity soon after he was awarded the 1986 Nobel Prize for Peace.
The Foundation’s mission, rooted in the memory of the Holocaust, is to combat indifference, intolerance and injustice through international dialogue and youth-focused programs that promote acceptance, understanding and equality.
The Prize benefits from the administrative and communications and legal support of these partners:
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