Nobel Peace Prize awarded to South African judge Navi Pillay

The Norwegian Nobel Committee announced that South African judge Navi Pillay won the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for “her efforts to promote peace and international law.”

The committee added, “A common thread runs from the early stages of her career defending Nelson Mandela and others who fought against the apartheid system to her work as a judge in some of the most significant cases before international courts in our era.”

The Peace Prize is the fifth Nobel Prize awarded this week, following the prizes in Literature, Chemistry, Physics, and Medicine. Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado had won the Peace Prize in 2025.

The Nobel Peace Prize, worth 12 million Swedish kronor (approximately $1.2 million), will be presented in Oslo on December 10, the anniversary of the death of Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, who established the prizes in his will in 1895.