2023 – Aung Myo Min
Gold Medal for Human Rights

On 2 June 2023, the Sydney Peace Foundation awarded its Gold Medal for Human Rights to Aung Myo Min.
The citation reads, “for inspiring a generation of pro-democracy advocates in Myanmar. His lifelong work is an example of how hope, courage, and the values of justice can grow out of the most difficult circumstances.”
Aung Myo Min is the Union Minister for Human Rights in the cabinet of the National Unity Government of Myanmar. Prior to joining the NUG, he was one of Myanmar’s most prominent human rights advocates and a youth leader in the 1988 democracy uprising. Aung Myo Min lived in exile for 23 years and continued working on human rights issues in Myanmar, particularly in relation to marginalised people. He graduated with a Masters’ Degree in human rights from Columbia University, New York, in 1993. He has received eight human rights awards for his outstanding human rights work, including the Schuman Human Rights Award in 2017.
Dr Susan Banki, Sydney Peace Foundation board member and Asia-Pacific expert in the University of Sydney’s School of Social and Political Sciences has stated,
“It’s a great honour to recognise Aung Myo Min with the Sydney Peace Foundation Gold Medal for Human Rights, for inspiring a generation of pro-democracy advocates in Myanmar. Aung Myo Min’s lifelong work, most often practiced under deeply restrictive conditions, is an example of how hope, courage, and the values of justice can grow out of the most difficult circumstances.”
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2020 – Midnight Oil
Gold Medal for Human Rights

On 26 November 2020, the Sydney Peace Foundation awarded its Gold Medal for Human Rights to Midnight Oil. The citation reads, ‘For shining a light on the climate crisis, promoting solutions and fearlessly denouncing those destroying the planet, for their leadership in the political awakening of a generation of climate action leaders and through their songs of defiance and strength providing hope that together we can build a peaceful and just world’.
Chair of the Sydney Peace Foundation, Archie Law has stated,
Midnight Oil is and has for decades been an Australian human rights trailblazer. This Medal is in recognition of that relentless focus,
and in particular for their environmental activism, their humanity and their drive to promote
justice through both their music and their actions.
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