Aminatou Haidar (Western Sahara)

Aminatou Haidar won the Right Livelihood Award in 2019:

“For her steadfast nonviolent action, despite imprisonment and torture, in pursuit of justice and self-determination for the people of Western Sahara.”

Aminatou Haidar is an outstanding nonviolent activist and human rights defender from Western Sahara, a territory occupied by Morocco since 1975. Over 30 years of peaceful campaigning for the independence of her homeland have earned her the recognition of being known as the “Sahrawi Gandhi.” Haidar’s dignity and resolve make her one of the most respected leaders in the region.

Haidar started her activism as a teenager and is one of the founders of the Sahrawi human rights movement. She has organised demonstrations, documented cases of torture and carried out several hunger strikes to raise awareness about the violations suffered by her people. She continues to play a crucial role in drawing international attention to the unresolved issue of Western Sahara, which for long has been neglected by the United Nations, the European Union and the media.

Like many other Sahrawi activists, Haidar has been subject to enforced disappearance, beatings, torture and arbitrary detention by Moroccan authorities without charges or trial. She had also spent 4 years in a secret prison, isolated from the outside world. However, despite death threats and harassment directed at her and her two children, Haidar has carried on her campaigns for a political solution to one of the world’s longest frozen conflicts. She also works to instil the merits of non-violent action in the next generation of Sahrawis."

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Find out more about the forgotten conflict and the human rights situation in the Western Sahara!

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