After Henry Kissinger, who was accused of war crimes, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1973, the American satirist and mathematician Thomas Lehrer declared that “When Kissinger won the Nobel peace prize, satire died”[1]. Since then, Lehrer has withdrawn from public programmes and started teaching mathematics at a university. Although satire died for Lehrer, that of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee lives on.

According to the bourgeois press itself[2], the peace-loving country of Norway, where the Nobel Peace Prize Committee is located, has the highest level of arms export per capita in the world. No country exports more weapons per population than the one which awards the Nobel Peace Prize. What is the function of these exported armaments? They are probably supposed to serve world peace with their use!

Berit Reiss-Andersen, the chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee in Oslo, started her speech on 6 October 2023 with the words “Woman, Life, Freedom” in Farsi and announced that this statement was the slogan of the protests in Iran. She then went on to describe the components of the phrase “Woman, Life, Freedom”, and emphasized that the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Narges Mohammadi for her struggle to promote human rights and achieve freedom. Ms Andersen, pointing to the demonstrations of hundreds of thousands of Iranians during the recent protests, as well as the killing of more than 500 people and the arrest of thousands of individuals, advised the rulers of the Islamic bourgeoisie to listen to the voices of their people.

The award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Mrs Mohammadi has the support of most democratic and “peace-loving” leaders. António Guterres, Secretary-General of the Den of Thieves (United Nations), described the award as a “tribute” to all women who are fighting for their rights. Joe Biden also called Mrs Mohammadi’s struggle an inspiration to all those who strive for human rights and dignity worldwide. Emmanuel Macron congratulated Mrs Mohammadi and considered her worthy of admiration. German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock viewed the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Narges Mohammadi as a sign of women’s power. The chancellor of Germany, prime minister of Italy, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada, Minister of Information of Israel, Farah Pahlavi (former queen), Maulvi Abdul Hamid (Sunni Muslim cleric), Zahra Rahnavard (former presidential candidate’s wife), etc., all commended Mrs Mohammadi for receiving the Nobel Peace Prize.

Mrs Mohammadi started her social activities in 1996 with journalism for Payam Hajer, the women‘s organization of the Islamic Revolution. In 1997, she was active in the election headquarters of Mohammad Khatami (the “reformist” president). In 1999, she became a member of the national-religious election headquarters in the parliamentary elections. She is also a former member of the supreme policy council of Tahakim Vahdat (the Office for Strengthening Unity, OSU)[3], the “reformists”. After the presidential elections of 2009 and the protests that followed, in 2010, Mrs Mohammadi was arrested and banned from going out. Since that date, she has been released and arrested several times, and she has been in detention for a long time. Mrs Mohammadi was a member of the Defenders of Human Rights Center and is now the vice-president of this association, which is chaired by Shirin Ebadi, who has also previously won the Nobel Peace Prize. In 2017, Mrs Mohammadi participated in the elections from prison and voted for the representative of the “reformists”. Following the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize, Mrs Mohammadi told her father on the phone that after hearing about the award, she chanted “Woman, Life, Freedom” out of joy. During her time in prison, Mrs Mohammadi published statements and letters and gave interviews to various media. The above explanation clearly shows that Mrs Mohammadi was a member of the government “reformists” who, like many of the others, was later thrown into the opposition.

Although the Nobel institution is apparently an independent one, it is actually the mouthpiece and ideologue of the Western bourgeoisie. Just as the echo of the slogan “Woman, Life, Freedom” was heard from the bourgeois parliaments and with this motto some parliamentarians cut their hair in the European Union Parliament, the Nobel Peace Prize was presented to Mrs Mohammadi in a continuation of the imperialist interests of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee and as a lever to put pressure on the Islamic bourgeoisie. Apparently, the award of the Nobel Peace Prize was supposed to give more energy to the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement, but was overshadowed by the new war in the Middle East and could not provide the necessary publicity and propaganda.

The Western bourgeoisie pursues several goals in pressuring the Islamic bourgeoisie. The first is to put pressure on it and weaken it, so that the Islamic bourgeoisie, as a weak and submissive regime, gives up its imperialist ambitions in the region and provides part of the energy crisis of the West in the current critical situation so that the West can better threaten Russia economically. The second is to prepare an alternative to replace the Islamic bourgeoisie so that, if there is a change in political power, the Western bourgeoisie can present its replacement, like in 1979.

The bourgeoisie produces “famous faces”, “famous opponents”, “prominent activists”, etc. The working class does not need such “unheroes”, as activists and figures of the working class rise not from within the movements such as the “Woman, Life, Freedom” one but from within the class struggle.

Talking about peace in the capitalist system is nothing more than a bitter and unpleasant satire. From within the peace of capitalism, only the flames of war can spread. Only the working class can offer real peace to humanity through class struggle and by subverting capitalism, and the only alternative ahead is class struggle in all corners of the globe.

M. Jahangiry

8 October 2023

[1] The Guardian.

[2] Norway exports the most weapons per inhabitant.

[3] Founded in 1979 as a conservative Islamist organization to combat leftist and secular student groups, in the 1990s the OSU evolved to support the reformist faction of the Islamic bourgeois.

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