Russian journalist gives $103 million to UNICEF
Nobel Peace Prize winner Dmitry Muratov, who was the editor in chief of the independent Russian news service, Novaya Gazeta until it was closed by the Kremlin in March following sweeping new restrictions on journalists in the wake of the Ukraine invasion, has given the $103.5 million he raised from the sale of his Nobel prize to UNICEF so they can help Ukrainian children.
He told UN news he hoped Ukrainian children who were now in Russia, would also benefit: āThere are more than one and a half million refugees in Russia, maybe a little less. Therefore, [we chose] UNICEF, which has such opportunities, and which understands very well that it has not a political, but a humanitarian mission.ā
The Russian Nobel Laureate, who was awarded the gold medal in October 2021, along with journalist Maria Ressa of the Philippines – for services to free speech and fearless reporting in the face of harassment and death threats ā said that never in his āwildest dreamsā had he expected the award to fetch such a large sum.
His most optimistic hope was that it might reach $5 million.
Mr. Muratov said that the auctioneers at UNICEFās request, had done background checks on the various bidders, including the eventual winning bid, to ensure that the source of the money was not an oligarch, or from any illegal criminal operation such as human or drugs traffickers.
āThey checked via the banking system, the financial system, and all that I can say 100 percent, which I was also informed of, notified and shown, is that this is absolutely transparent, and transparent moneyā, he told UN News.
He would not however, reveal the identity of the winning bidder ā indicating that he did not know the name, and that anonymity had been guaranteed: āIf I knew, I would not disclose it, because this is a pure conflict of interest: people agreed to the rules that we proposed, and then we would have taken and violated the rules. That doesn’t work.ā