Black Lives Matter: All you need to know about Nobel Peace Prize nominee

Black Lives Matter, the anti-racism movement that was rejuvenated after the killing of an unarmed Black man by a white US police officer, has been nominated for Nobel Peace Prize. Black Lives Matter announced the news from its Twitter handle, saying people are waking up to their global call for racial justice and an end to white supremacy. “We hold the largest social movement in global history. Today, we have been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize,” it tweeted.

Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, Inc was founded in 2013 following the acquittal of 17-year-old African-American high school student Trayvon Martin’s murderer. George Zimmerman, a Hispanic American, fatally shot the teenager during an altercation but was acquitted by a court after claiming self-defence, triggering widespread outrage since Martin was unarmed.

Last year, George Floyd’s death sparked global outrage after the video footage showed a white police officer pressing his knee against the victim’s neck. Black Lives Matter became a rallying cry which prompted political leaders, top business executives, and other public figures to condemn the police brutality and call for an end to systemic racism. US President Joe Biden, who was then a presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, had said that Floyd deserved better, calling for a thorough investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Apple Inc CEO Tim Cook penned an open letter in which pledged to “do more” to fight racial discrimination and injustice and told the Black community that their “lives matter”. The top executive said that George Floyd’s death is shocking and tragic proof that we must aim far higher than a “normal” future, adding a new future should be built that lives up to the highest ideals of equality and justice.

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Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation has also supported the impeachment of former president Donald Trump following the Capitol riots, urging US Senate to convict him. Patrisse Cullors, co-founder and executive director of the foundation, said that Republicans in Congress have “tolerated, and even enabled, his violent and divisive rhetoric for far too long”. “We call on the next administration to further hold Trump and former members of his administration accountable, and take bold action to end white supremacy in the United States,” Cullors had said in a statement.

Notably, the foundation on Friday won Sweden's Olof Palme human rights prize for 2020 for promoting "peaceful civil disobedience against police brutality and racial violence" around the world. The organisers said that Black Lives Matter had its great global breakthrough in the summer of 2020 in connection with a number of cases of extreme brutality. It added that around twenty million people have taken part in the Black Lives Matter protests in the US alone.

“That the all powerful raised voices of African Americans resonate so strongly also internationally, shows that this in essence is about global threats to human dignity and fundamental human rights: BLACK LIVES MATTER!” they stated.

The foundation has its presence in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada. According to the Black Lives Matter website, the movement’s mission is to “eradicate white supremacy and build local power to intervene in violence inflicted on Black communities by the state and vigilantes.”