Hillary Clinton Award | 02/05/2018
In 2014, the Islamic State attacked Nadia’s village in Iraq’s Sinjar region. That day, she witnessed the murders of her mother and brothers at the hands of the Islamic State, which considers the Yazidis to be ‘infidels.’ Nadia, was kidnapped and enslaved as a sex slave to members of the Islamic State. That year, around 7,000 Yazidi women and girls were abducted by the Islamic State.
Nadia managed to escape from her captives and a nearby family helped her flee from ISIS-controlled territory. She was able to reach a refugee camp in northern Iraq, and thereafter she was selected for a resettlement program in Germany.
Since then, Nadia has testified about her experiences to the United Nations Security Council. She uses her platform to urge the international community to respond to the plight of the Yazidis and other ethno-religious minorities in Iraq. London-based human rights attorney Amal Clooney has taken on Nadia’s case in pressuring the United Nations to investigate the crimes committed against the Yazidis by the Islamic State.
Now a Nobel Peace Prize nominee and the first UN Goodwill Ambassador for the Dignity of Survivors of Human Trafficking, Nadia is a powerful voice for justice for the Yazidis.
Wai Wai Nu
Hillary Clinton Award | 02/05/2018
Wai Wai was among thousands of political prisoners detained by Myanmar’s former military regime. Following the sentencing of her father, an opposition MP, the then-18-year-old law student was sentenced to seventeen years in Insein Prison.
Wai Wai served seven years of her sentence, a period that she now refers to as her “University of Life.” Freed in 2012, at the age of 25, she quickly became an agent of change.
She earned her law degree at Yangon East University. She founded two NGOs: Women’s Peace Network-Arakan—an organization that conducts trainings around civic engagement in Rakhine State—and Justice for Women—a network of female lawyers offering legal aid to Burmese women. Through these organizations, Wai Wai aims to bolster peace-building efforts and empower Myanmar’s women and youth through legal counsel and rights education.
Wai Wai is Rohingya. Her viral #MyFriend campaign in 2015, urging social media users to share ‘selfies’ with their friends of diverse racial and religious backgrounds, solidified her reputation as a young human rights activist worldwide. She recently used her platform to persuade the United Nations to conduct a fact-finding mission in Myanmar—though she lobbied for a more intensive Commission of Inquiry—to investigate the persecution of her fellow Rohingya in Myanmar.