Leymah Gbowee, one of three recipients jointly awarded the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize, carried in the Olympic flag with seven other humanitarians during the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games.
“It was an amazing experience and honor to join athletes, humanitarians, families, and supporters to highlight our collective talents and strengths,” said Gbowee in a post on her Facebook account.
Gbowee received the Nobel Prize for her work in organizing a peace movement to end the Second Liberian Civil War. She shares the prize with Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and women’s rights activist Tawakkul Karman of Yemen.
A graduate of EMU’s Center for Justice and Peacebuilding, Gbowee co-founded Women, Peace and Security Network Africa in the spring of 2006, with a fellow Summer Peacebuilding Institute alumna, Thelma Ekiyor, and a third woman, Ecoma Alaga, who previously worked for an organization founded by two CJP alumni, the West Africa Network for Peacebuilding.