Nobel Peace Prize to Tunisian Dialogue Quartet includes UGTT

This year’s Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded to Tunisia’s Dialogue Quartet, a grouping made up of the national trade union center UGTT, the national employer confederation, the Tunisian Human Rights League and the Tunisian Order of Lawyers. Since its establishment in 2013, the Quartet has played a pivotal role in preserving and consolidating the democratic gains of the 2011 uprising. The organizational and mobilizing power of the trade union movement, its commitment to democracy and solidarity, was and continues to be an indispensable force in this process.

The chairperson of the Nobel committee, in announcing the prize, praised the work of the Quartet as “instrumental in enabling Tunisia, in the space of a few years, to establish a constitutional system of government guaranteeing fundamental rights for the entire population, irrespective of gender, political conviction or religious belief”, adding that the Committee hoped that the award would “contribute towards safeguarding democracy in Tunisia and be an inspiration to all those who seek to promote peace and democracy in the Middle East, North Africa and the rest of the world”.

At the international union solidarity meeting organized by the IUF in Tunisia on September 25, IUF general secretary Ron Oswald emphasized in interviews disseminated across the Tunisian broadcast and print media the crucial importance of international support for the UGTT and for the Tunisian economy. The widespread economic damage arising from the current collapse of tourism in particular, he warned, placed democratic gains at risk.