In November 2013 Jeremy Corbyn, a Backbench Labour MP since 1983 was given the Gandhi Foundation International Peace Award.
The Foundation explained that the Award was given –
“in recognition of his consistent efforts over a 30-year Parliamentary career to uphold the Gandhian values of social justice and non-violence. Besides being a popular and hard-working MP he made time to speak and write extensively in support of human rights at home and world-wide. His committed opposition to neo-colonial wars and to nuclear weapons has repeatedly shown the lack of truth in the arguments of those who have opposed him.”
Following Labour’s dismal failure in the 2015 General Election, its leader Ed. Milliband resigned the leadership, and under new party rules where non-MPs were allowed vote for the Party leader, there was a huge influx of members into the Party. Corbyn was elected by a huge majority of members to the fury of MPs who arranged a challenge to him two years later. He won that by a bigger margin than two years earlier.
At a ceremony in Geneva on 8th December 2017 THE INTERNATIONAL PEACE UNION awarded Jeremy Corbyn with the Sean MacBride Peace Prize.
The Award is named after the late Sean MacBride (1904-1988) who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1974. As Ireland’s Minister of External Affairs, MaBride was instrumental in the Council of Europe’s adoption of the European Convention on Human Rights. (Britain’s Parliament, by giving British service personnel immunity from prosecution for human rights abuses, has just reneged on the Convention adopted in 1950).
The International Peace Union explained its award –
“Jeremy Corbyn is awarded the Sean MacBride Peace Award for his sustained and powerful political work for disarmament and peace. As an active member of the Stop the War Campaign in the UK he has worked for peace and alternatives to war. As a member of parliament in the UK he has for 34 years continually undertaken that work for justice, peace and disarmament inside and outside Parliament. He has ceaselessly stood by his principles ..”
Has any other British Parliamentarian been given such honours?
Comments are closed.