Rudolf Vrba Jury
Brigitte Dufour, Belgium
The human rights activist and NGO leader Brigitte Dufour was born in Montreal, Canada. She has degrees in Russian and Law from the University of Montreal. Throughout her career, Dufour has focused on a number of issues, ranging from women's rights to banning the death penalty in countries around the globe. Her career has included both wide-ranging on-the-ground field missions and high-level advocacy in the United Nations system, the Council of Europe and the European Union. Between 1994 and 2007, she assisted human rights activists throughout the former Soviet Union as legal counsel and later as a deputy executive director of the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights. She is currently the director of the International Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR), which is based in Brussels, where she also lives with her family.
((2))Ko Maung, Burma
Ko Maung has been fighting for democracy in his native Burma since the 1970s, when he tried to help reinstitute the banned Student Unions that had been brutally suppressed by the Burmese military junta. After Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy (NLD) party won a landslide victory in the 1990 elections, he was arrested along with hundreds of elected MPs, and put into jail when the military regime refused to allow the transfer of power. Upon his release, Maung moved to Thailand, from where he assists Burmese political prisoners and human rights campaigners, including around a thousand political leaders and activists who were arrested following the 2007 Saffron Revolution and the liberation movement that emerged in the wake of Cyclone Nargis in 2008.
((3))Maria Sereda, Russia
Maria Sereda was born 26 years ago in Ryazan in central Russia. As a teenager, Maria became a member of the local chapter of the Memorial Human Rights Society, one of the largest NGOs in Russia, for which she has worked as a human rights trainer and youth campaign organiser. In 2004, she helped coordinate the “How Much?” campaign in Ryazan, which encouraged people to demand more information and transparency about what was happening in Chechnya. After winning a Ford Foundation Scholarship in 2005, she went to study non-profit marketing in the UK. Since returning to her homeland, Sereda has worked as a social marketing analyst and consultant while participating in projects aimed at promoting human rights and stimulating civic engagement in Russia.
((4))Tolekan Ismailova, Kyrgyzstan
Tolekan Ismailova runs the One World Kyrgyzstan festival and is also the director of the “Citizens against Corruption” centre, which works to strengthen democracy, human rights and the rule of law in the Kyrgyz Republic. Last year, this organisation won the French “Liberty, Equality and Brotherhood” Human Rights Award. As one of the leading civic experts in her country, Tolekan has collaborated with international organisations such as Front Line and New Tactics in organising several training events on the security of human rights campaigners. Tolekan was also one of a thousand women nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2005.
((5))Li Xiongbing, China
Li Xiongbing holds a BA in economics and another degree in law. He has been working as a lawyer for a Beijing law firm since 2003, and has actively promoted equality and freedom of religion and expression in his legal work. In recent years, his clients have included members of banned religions and journalists. He has also defended Chinese human rights activists in some of the most famous cases in the country. Li Xiongbing is a signatory of Charter 08, which calls for the democratization of China.