Germany’s Angela Merkel to receive prestigious UN prize for handling of 2015 migration crisis
- ‘Angela Merkel has shown great moral and political courage by helping more than a million refugees survive and rebuild,’ High Commissioner for Refugees said
- Ex-chancellor awarded Nansen Refugee Award for showing what could be achieved when politicians act supportively and work on solutions to world’s challenges
Former German chancellor Angela Merkel is to be awarded the UN refugee body’s prestigious award on Monday, in recognition of the way her country accepted more than 1.2 million refugees and asylum seekers in the 2015 and 2016.
“Angela Merkel has shown great moral and political courage by helping more than one million refugees to survive and rebuild,” said High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi of the Nansen Refugee Award.
Merkel showed what could be achieved when politicians act supportively and work on solutions to the world’s challenges rather than just passing on the responsibility, he said.
In the summer of 2015, as refugees were streaming into Europe, Merkel opened her country’s borders and famously declared to Germans “Wir schaffen das” – “We can do this” – welcoming refugees fleeing war-torn Syria and other countries including Iraq, Afghanistan and Eritrea.
The Nansen Refugee Award, awarded annually by the UNHCR, is worth US$150,000. It is named after Fridjof Nansen, a Norwegian polar explorer and humanitarian who received the 1922 Nobel Peace Prize.
