UNITED NATIONS (CNS) — A U.S. nun who was murdered in 2005 while she worked to defend the rights of poor farmers in the Brazilian Amazon region has been named a recipient of a prestigious U.N. human rights prize. Sister Dorothy Stang, who was a Sister of Notre Dame de Namur, is one of seven recipients of the U.N. Prize in the Field of Human Rights, awarded by the General Assembly every five years. The others are slain Pakistani leader and former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto; Louise Arbour, former U.N. high commissioner for human rights; Ramsey Clark, former U.S. attorney general; Carolyn Gomes, executive director and co-founder of Jamaicans for Justice; Denis Mukwege, co-founder of the General Referral Hospital of Panzi in Congo; and Human Rights Watch. The awards were to be presented at a ceremony in New York on International Human Rights Day, Dec. 10, to mark the 60th anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Sister Dorothy’s brother, David Stang of Colorado, was to represent her family at the ceremony.
Filed under: Brazil, Church, Development, Environment
