Arab activists win Australian award

The Australian Immigrant Cultural Organisation along with Advisory Board of The Immigrant 'Al-Mohager' Newspaper, in Melbourne have chosen the Moroccan researcher Samira Kadiri, Yemeni activist Tawakkul Karman, poet and  translator Muhammad Hilmi Elresha, Egyptian activist Wael Ghonim, as well as Wikileaks founder Julian Assange to be Persons of the Year. This is the third international award for Moroccan Kadiri. The first was a gold medal from the National Council for the Ancient Music of Morocco, which is affiliated to UNESCO. She has also received the Grand Prize of Naji Naaman's Foundation in Lebanon, for her study ‘Arab cultural influences in European civilization,’ along with being the Honorary Ambassador for culture in the world. Kadiri was chosen to be a Person of the Year, in recognition of her lectures in many European universities; and being responsible for a number of activities, meetings and cultural festivals in Morocco. Her Opera Art has been lauded to harmonise co-existing societies. The second Person of the Year was Muhammad Hilmi Elresha, a Palestinian poet and researcher who recently published his lates anthology Poetry XIV ‘Moon or Aspirin’. In a statement, the Secretariat of Immigrant Organisation said they chose Elreshha for his contribution to global culture as well as his translations of the poetic texts of a poem from 16 different countries around the world. Elresha has releases 14 poetry collections, 12 of them in three volumes. Moreover, he is the author of three books in translation, and is preparing to release two more tranlsated poetry books. He is currently working on translating one of his works into Italian. Elresha is known as the ‘Poetic Hermit’ as he devoted his life to poetry and poetry translations. The Organisation also chose Yemeni activist Tawakkul Karman, the first Arab woman to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize this year, in recognition of her struggle in the peaceful Yemen’s uprising. Egyptian activist Wael Ghonim, the founder of a Facebook page titled, "We Are All Khaled Said”, was chosen for virtually as well as in reality setting the scene for the Egyptian revolution in 25th of January, a.k.a Egypt's Revolution of Rage. The final Person of the Year is Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. Previously, Assange was awarded by Amnesty International for exposing the assassinations occuring outside the ambit of the judiciary in Kenya. He was also awarded the Sam Adams in 2008, and in September 2010 was ranked as the 23rd in the list of 50 most influential people in the world.