Written by : Jamal Jubran

Many were not surprised when Yemeni activist Tawakkol Karman shared the Nobel Peace Prize with the Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Liberian activist LeymahGbowee. The stubborn reporter raised the flag of freedom and justice years ago. 

The life of Tawakkol Karman was not traditional one day. The Yemeni activist and reporter, who won the Nobel Peace Prize yesterday, became an icon for struggling woman in her country while she is around 32 years old. "look at other articles on page 20). Thus she struggled so that the Yemeni women get a better status in the public life. Moreover, she raised the flag of freedom of expression very high rejecting all chains on issuing newspapers or launching private TV channels. 

Karman, however, was not like many others. She did not focus on theorizing human rights and journalism cases but rather was devoted to serving these cases on the ground. She founded the female reporters without borders organization and was subjected to physical and psychological assaults while participating in demonstrations along with the youths of the revolution. 

This stubborn was abducted while on driving home along with her husband days after the revolution started. Security elements loyal to the regime of Ali Abdullah Saleh abducted and detained her inside the central prison for 30 hours. She was released under unprecedented popular and international pressure on the regime. It was beyond when president Saleh called her oldest brother and told him "the government was not be responsible if she would face any harm in the future". 

Saleh's words implied a threat of murder and that was what she revealed to media. The regime did not respond to her statement then. Karman, who was educated within one of the largest religious parties in the country the Islah Party, says she knew her path would never be trouble-free because she was facing a military and security regime of Saleh. She stated that she would face the worst but affirmed that no threats and intimidation would stop her from walking the path she chose. 

The Yemeni young woman repeated in all statements her favorite sentence "for the human being to get own legal right, they shall demand that right". Based on this slogan, she shouted loudly in protest against oppression and injustices faced by her people and then she laid the groundwork for the freedom square in front of the building of the Yemeni Cabinet. She used to hold sit-ins and protests on Tuesdays in solidarity with every Yemeni who suffered injustices. 

Three years later, a new square was founded, the change square where Yemeni young revolutionaries continued to protest for seven months to demand the ouster of the regime of president Saleh. The News called Karman when she was announced as a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize and she said that she was awarding the prize to the great group which had been struggling with her since 2007. 

"We have been since practicing our right in defending freedom of expression and protesting against extrajudicial imprisonment". She said did not expect she would win this prize. "Basically, I did not know I was nominated for it. Nonetheless, I can't hide my great happiness for winning it".

"Nobel for Peace Prize was recognition that the peaceful struggle is the best way to get our rights from the dictator regimes," she affirmed. Furthermore, she considered the prize as an honor of the martyrs and the wounded of the Yemeni peaceful revolution. "It was an international recognition of justice of the revolution and the importance of its victory". 

"The prize confirmed that we were capable to move and overthrow the regime of Ali Abdullah Saleh which had been hindering the efforts to build a modern Yemen for 33 years," she said. Though Karman was keen on rewarding her winning to the martyrs and the wounded of the revolution as well as the youths of the Arab Spring, she did not forget to thank close aides and relatives. "I can't forget my father, husband and family without whom I would not succeed".