Former UN human rights chief Navi Pillay awarded Nobel Peace Prize

South African jurist and former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay was on Friday announced as the winner of the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize.She was honoured “for her efforts to promote peace and international law”, the Norwegian Nobel Committee said in a statement. The committee said the award was going “to a person who with exceptional courage and integrity has led the way towards a more comprehensive global legal order,” noting that she “has been instrumental in ensuring that war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide are prosecuted.”Fighting hate, defending civiliansMs. Pillay served as the UN human rights chief from September 2008 through August 2014, but her career has spanned more than 50 years - from fighting apartheid in her homeland to defending civilians in conflict zones.She is a former chair of the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory and was appointed a judge at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) and the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the Hague, in addition to serving as an ad hoc judge with the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the UN's highest court.“A common thread runs...