NewzSouth African judge Navi Pillay won the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize for her work promoting peace and international law, from opposing apartheid to serving on international courts. The International Criminal Court said the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to its former judge Navanethem "Navi" Pillay on Friday was important recognition for the role of international justice as a cornerstone of peace. South African judge Navanethem “Navi’ Pillay, 85, won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday “for her efforts to promote peace and international law”, the Norwegian Nobel Committee said.
She reacted to the news by making a quip about US President Donald Trump's well-documented desire to win the prize himself. Navi Pillay, eminent South African jurist, awarded the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize Submitted by Sondos Asem on Fri, 10/09/2026 - 10:28 Pillay was the chair of the UN committee that concluded last year that Israel was responsible for genocide in Gaza, and is currently an ad hoc judge at the International Court of Justice Former United Nations rights chief Navi Pillay pictured in Johannesburg in 2023 (Wikus de Wet/AFP) Off Navi Pillay, the eminent South African jurist who co-authored the United Nations report accusing Israel of committing genocide in Gaza, has been awarded the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced on Friday. The committee said Pillay had been chosen "for her efforts to promote peace and international law".
"The Nobel Peace Prize for 2026 goes to a person who with exceptional courage and integrity has led the way towards a more comprehensive global legal order. This year’s laureate has been instrumental in ensuring that war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide are prosecuted," the committee said. Pillay, 85, is one of the most influential figures in international criminal justice and human rights law, and is South Africa’s most prominent international judge.
She previously served as the chair of the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, which concluded in an authoritative report last year that Israel is responsible for genocide in Gaza. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); A former UN high commissioner for human rights from 2008 to 2014, she was nominated by Nelson Mandela, then the president of South Africa, in 1995 to serve on the UN's International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), where she served as a judge and president (1999-2003). Pillay's work at the ICTR produced the first genocide convictions in history.
She was also one of the founding judges of the International Criminal Court, and currently serves as an ad hoc judge at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which is due to determine whether the Myanmar committed genocide against the Rohingya. As the president of the ICTR, Pillay helped establish that rape and sexual violence can constitute genocide, setting a historic precedent in the jurisprudence on genocide. In a wide-ranging interview with Middle East Eye's Expert Witness podcast last year, Pillay said that as a UN expert inve…
[The Norwegian Nobel Committee] The Nobel Peace Prize for 2026 goes to a person who with exceptional courage and integrity has led the way towards a more comprehensive global legal order. The 2026 Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded to jurist Navanethem “Navi” Pillay of South Africa “for her efforts to promote peace and international law,” the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced on Friday. Pillay, whose background is Indian Tamil, grew up in the eastern coastal city of Durban, where she set up her own law firm in the 1960s.
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