The Iranian movement ‘Women, Life, Freedom’ is to be honoured with the M100 Media Award in the German city of Potsdam on Thursday.

According to the organisers, the award honours courageous women and girls as well as men who protest against oppression and for freedom and human rights in their homeland.

The Iranian women’s rights activist Shima Babaei, who had been living in exile in Belgium since 2020, would receive the award on behalf of the winners.

European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen is to give the laudatory speech.

German-Iranian actress Jasmin Tabatabai is also expected to attend the award ceremony.

Previous winners included former German foreign minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher, Russian dissident Alexei Navalny and the Ukrainian people.

Saturday marked the first anniversary of the death of the young Iranian-Kurdish woman Jina Mahsa Amini, which ignited the most serious protests in Iran in decades in the autumn of 2022.

Starting in the Kurdish regions, the protests spread, first against the compulsory headscarf, then against the entire Islamic system of rule. Iran’s security apparatus violently suppressed the protests.

Before the award ceremony, some 70 editors-in-chief and representatives from academia, politics and civil society would discuss the strengths and weaknesses of democracy and reasons for democracy fatigue.

The future of the media in the face of technological advancements and disinformation would also be discussed. 

(dpa/NAN)