Navi Pillay awarded 2026 Nobel Peace Prize for work on international law and genocide prosecutions

The Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize to Navi Pillay on Friday, October 9. The citation recognized her efforts to promote peace and international law. Committee chair Jørgen Watne Frydnes said her work has been instrumental in ensuring that war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide are prosecuted. The prize comes as the system of international courts faces political pressure, including new U.S. sanctions on the International Criminal Court announced the same day.

Pillay, 85, is a South African jurist of Indian Tamil origin. She was the first woman to open a law practice in Natal in 1967 and defended anti-apartheid activists, including Nelson Mandela. She became the first woman of color on South Africa’s High Court. She later served as a judge on the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, where her work helped establish that rape and sexual violence can constitute genocide and crimes against humanity. She was a founding judge of the International Criminal Court from 2003 to 2008 before becoming UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Most recently she chaired the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory. That commission concluded last year that Israel committed genocide in Gaza with intent to destroy Palestinians as a group. It named Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Isaac Herzog, and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant as having incited genocide. Israel rejected the findings. Pillay is currently an ad hoc judge at the International Court of Justice in the case concerning Myanmar’s treatment of the Rohingya.

She learned of the award while in Nuremberg’s Palace of Justice, the site of the post-World War II trials. Her first reaction was that it must be a joke. She later said she would dedicate the prize to survivors of international crimes. In a light remark she added that if the applause continued she might share it with President Trump, a reference to last year’s laureate María Corina Machado giving her medal to Trump.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa called the award a tribute to Pillay’s courage and integrity. She is the fifth South African to win the Peace Prize, after Albert Luthuli, Desmond Tutu, Nelson Mandela, and F.W. de Klerk. The prize is worth about 11 to 12 million Swedish kronor and will be presented in Oslo on December 10.

The committee’s choice underscores the role of judges in maintaining legal limits on state action at a moment when several governments challenge the jurisdiction of international courts. Pillay’s career spans from domestic defense work under apartheid to the highest international judicial bodies.