The 2025 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded this Friday to Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado “for her tireless work in promoting the democratic rights of the Venezuelan people and for her fight to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy,” as advertisement this Friday the Norwegian Nobel Committee, based in Oslo.
The 2025 Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to “a brave and committed defender of peace, a woman who keeps the flame of democracy alive in the midst of growing darkness,” said Jørgen Watne Frydnes, president of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, in reading the ruling.
This year’s Nobel Peace Prize laureate Maria Corina Machado has led the struggle for democracy in the face of ever-expanding authoritarianism in Venezuela. Ms Machado studied engineering and finance, and had a short career in business. In 1992 she established the Athena… pic.twitter.com/OtFF6NPuGl
— The Nobel Prize (@NobelPrize) October 10, 2025
As the leader of the democratic movement in Venezuela, Machado is one of the most extraordinary examples of civil courage in Latin America in recent times, the committee highlighted, from which it has been explained that he has demonstrated that the tools of democracy are also those of peace.
Machado has been a key and unifying figure in a political opposition that was once deeply divided, an opposition that found common ground in demanding free elections and a representative government, he adds.
Venezuelan opposition leader and former presidential candidate Edmundo González Urrutia said shortly after the news spread that the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to fellow Venezuelan opposition figure María Corina Machado is a recognition of “the struggle of a woman and an entire people” for “freedom and democracy” in Venezuela.
For his part, Venezuelan opposition leader Leopoldo López assured this Friday that the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to María Corina Machado is also a recognition of “a people determined to change.”
Underground
In recent weeks, a rumor circulated on social networks that María Corina Machado is taking refuge in the United States embassy, while the Minister of the Interior and Justice, Diosdado Cabello, suggested that she could be staying at that diplomatic headquarters, according to a report from AFP.
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The opposition has lived in hiding since after the presidential elections of July 28, 2024, in which Maduro claimed victory despite allegations of fraud by his rivals.
The UN Office for Human Rights also congratulated Venezuelan opposition figure María Corina Machado and stressed that the recognition “reflects the clear aspirations of the people of Venezuela for free and fair elections, civil rights and respect for the rule of law.”
Last year, the award went to the Japanese anti-nuclear group Nihon Hidankyo, a movement promoted by survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs. The prize will be awarded on December 10 in Oslo and consists of a gold medal, a diploma and a sum of 1.2 million dollars.
