MEDIA ADVISORY
MEDIA CONTACT:
Kate Ray, Rabinowitz Communications, kate@rabinowitz.com, (202) 265-3000, (414) 614-3557
Former Secretary of State
Hillary Rodham Clinton to Receive 2013 Lantos Prize
Dec. 6 ceremony to take place in Cannon Caucus Room
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Lantos Foundation for Human Rights and Justice will award the 2013 Lantos Human Rights Prize, its highest honor, to Hillary Rodham Clinton in an award ceremony December 6, 2013, at 11:00 am in the Cannon Caucus Room of the Cannon Office Building of the US House of Representatives in Washington. The event is open to press and coverage is invited.
The Former Secretary of State will receive the award for her tireless efforts to promote human rights for women around the world and her groundbreaking work on promoting human rights through Internet freedom. Former recipients of the Lantos Prize include the Dalai Lama, Elie Wiesel, Paul Rusesabagina and Chen Guangcheng.
“Hillary Rodham Clinton has gained global recognition for her leadership in so many critical arenas, but we are particularly proud to recognize the enormous contributions she has made to human rights causes,” said Katrina Lantos Swett, President of the Lantos Foundation. “Her proclamation that ‘women’s rights are human rights’ changed the way the world thinks about human rights and opened doors for women in a way that only Hillary Clinton could. Furthermore, Secretary Clinton’s pioneering work on Internet Freedom has focused worldwide attention on the urgent need to “tear down the walls” of closed societies that seek to imprison their citizens behind internet firewalls that have become the iron curtains of this “virtual” century, She has also provided a powerful intellectual framework for advancing this central human right of our time.”
In nearly four decades of public service, Hillary Rodham Clinton has served as an advocate, attorney, First Lady, United States Senator and most recently as Secretary of State of the United States. Though she has championed a number of issues ranging from education to health care, Secretary Clinton is revered in the human rights community for her 1995 Beijing speech where she boldly stood up for women’s rights and became a true global champion for those issues. She also broke new ground in 2010 when she declared that governments that fail to allow for Internet freedoms are not only attempting to crush dissent, but to deny human rights.
Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, computer scientist and “father of the Internet” Vinton Cerf (by video) and Lantos Foundation president Katrina Lantos Swett will also speak.
The Lantos Foundation established the Lantos Human Rights Prize in 2009 to honor and bring attention to heroes of the human rights movement. It is awarded annually to an individual or organization that best exemplifies the Foundation’s mission, namely to be a vital voice standing up for the values of decency, dignity, freedom, and justice in every corner of the world. The prize also serves to commemorate the late Congressman Tom Lantos, the only Holocaust survivor ever elected to the U.S. Congress and a prominent advocate for human rights during his nearly three decades as a U.S. Representative. Former recipients of the Lantos Prize include His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel, Rwandan humanitarian Paul Rusesabagina, and Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng.
WHO: Hillary Rodham Clinton, Madeleine Albright, Vinton Cerf, Katrina Lantos Swett
WHAT: The Lantos Foundation 2013 Lantos Prize Laureate Award Ceremony
WHEN: Friday, December 6, 2013, 11:00 am
WHERE: Cannon Caucus Room in the Cannon House Office Building, Washington
For more information, please call 603-226-3636. Press who wish to cover the ceremony should contact Kate Ray at kate@rabinowitz.com or 202-265-3000.The event will be live streamed at www.lantosfoundation.org.