Rektors blogg:

I dag ble Universitetet i Oslos menneskerettighetspris – fra Lisl og Leo Eitingers fond – delt ut til professor Manfred Nowak. Dette skjedde i Gamle festsal.

Nowak er leder av Ludwig Boltzmann Institut für Menschenrechte i Wien, som han var med på å etablere i 1992. Han regnes i dag som en av de fremste menneskerettighetsforkjemperne internasjonalt.

Her er et sammendrag av talen jeg holdt i Gamle festsal: 

It is my privilege to welcome you all to the Old ceremonial hall on the occasion of the University of Oslo’s Human Rights award and the Eitinger conversation.

The founders of the University of Oslo’s Human Rights Award were Leo and Lisl Eitinger. Leo Eitinger was born in what is now a town in the Czech Republic, but which was then a town situated in the Austrian-Hungarian Empire. Leo Eitinger graduated from medical school in 1937 and two years later – being a Jew – he had to flee the Nazis. He came to Norway on a Nansen passport, and was allowed to work as a psychiatrist here. When the Nazis later occupied Norway, he was taken prisoner and sent to Auschwitz and later Buchenwald. Of the 762 Norwegian Jews deported to German concentration camps, 23 survived - Leo Eitinger being one of them. The Eitingers devoted their life to the promotion of human rights and the fight against injustice and racism.

This year’s winner of the Human Rights Award, Professor Manfred Nowak, is one of the foremost advocates of human rights internationally. Through his efforts as the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Torture from 2004 to 2010, and also through a wide range of other assignments for international organizations, governments and NGOs, he has been  indefatigable and courageous in his defense of fundamental human rights.

As a tribute to Professor Nowak, we have decided to use this occasion to announce a new human right initiative of the University of Oslo. We are establishing a university network against death penalty. Universities normally should not take a stance on political issues. However, there are times through history when universities have joined forces. They did so in the fight against apartheid. And they did so in the fight against slavery. The fight against death penalty has the same kind of urgency.

Capital punishment stands in stark violation of human rights. Indeed, the right to life is the most fundamental right. Capital punishment is also in opposition to the scientific mindset, which rejects absolute certainty. The Innocence Project in the USA shows that there are many innocent people on death row. There’s also a large amount of research on capital punishment to indicate that this form of penalty doesn’t have an effect that balances the irrevocable intervention it actually represents.

The University of Oslo aspires to be at the international forefront in promoting human rights through research, education, and advocacy. For us, Professor Nowak sets an example to follow. Professor Nowak: I congratulate you on your outstanding work so far, and I am looking forward to follow your future endeavors for a better world.