The Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded the 2026 Peace Prize to South African jurist Navanethem Pillay for her efforts to promote peace and international law.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize to Navanethem Pillay for her efforts to promote peace and international law, the committee said in its Friday press release. Pillay, 85, is a South African lawyer and judge.
The citation said she has served on South Africa's High Court, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and the International Criminal Court, and as United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. It said she chaired the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory until recently and is an ad hoc judge at the International Court of Justice in the Myanmar case.
Reuters reported that Pillay oversaw a UN inquiry that concluded Israel committed genocide in Gaza, a finding Israel dismissed at the time as scandalous. The Nobel citation itself made no reference to that report, to Israel, or to U.S. President Donald Trump, Reuters said.
The committee said the award underlines the importance of an organised international order at a time when wars are increasing and judges and institutions of international law are under political attack. The prize announcement is the committee's decision; it is not a court ruling.
South Africa is outside this brief's country list, so the row is filed as World.
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- The Nobel committee said Pillay has led the way toward a more comprehensive global legal order.
- Reuters noted Israel had called the Gaza inquiry report scandalous when it was issued.