The 2011 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to a trio of women's
rights activists: President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Leymah
Gbowee of Liberia, and Tawakkul Karman of Yemen. The Norwegian
Nobel Committee awarded this year's Nobel Peace Prize to three
women for promoting women’s rights through peacebuilding work in
Liberia and Yemen, and passed over contenders from the launching
pads of the Arab uprisings – Tunisia and Egypt. The award, which
had only been bestowed on a dozen women before today, was shared
between Liberia’s Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Africa’s first
democratically elected female president; Leymah Gbowee, who
mobilized women across ethnic and religious lines to bring an
end to war in Liberia; and Tawakkul Karman, head of Women
Journalists Without Chains, who played a leading part in the
struggle for women’s rights and democracy and peace in Yemen.
Committee chairman Thorbjørn Jagland acknowledged the widespread
expectation that the award would be given to at least one Arab
Spring activist, but said that