The 2025 Nobel Peace Prize highlights the value of peace and democracy

Maria Corina Machado is a worthy winner of the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize, which rewards her for her personal courage, and also for unifying civil society opposition to the authoritarian regime in Venezuela. The prize also highlights that attacks on democratic structures require a concerted civil society response. Trade unions are strong defenders of democratic rights; indeed, the IUF Rules call for the organization, as part of its mandate, to "actively defend the full range of human rights and democratic freedoms."

Civil unrest leads to war. And the current global political climate has war on the ascendancy in all IUF regions. War is terrible for the soldiers who have to fight it, it is dangerous for civilians and the environment in affected areas, and it damages all societies that find themselves wasting resources on it. But most of all, regardless of which side of the conflict they find themselves on, war harms all aspects of workers' lives: Their economic life, where wartime inflation, sanctions and tariffs threaten their economic existence, and their lives outside work, where rising nationalism and authoritarian regimes kill free expression, cultural, political, and family life.

In Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, violent extremism threatens to destabilize countries beyond the Sahel region of Africa. In Ukraine, where the IUF has been supporting affiliates and trade-union building activities, the full-scale war is now in entering its fourth year. The IUF 28^th Congress Resolution 13 (also available in French and Spanish), on Ukraine, adopted in 2023, assigned the blame for the war to President Putin. In Myanmar - in many ways a forgotten conflict - armed groups have since 2021 been fighting a military junta, with the Rohingya people caught in between.

Armed conflicts in all these regions are traceable to the rise of nationalism and authoritarian regimes. Indeed, Resolution 23 entitled "Peace and nuclear disarmament" warned against "the rise of far-right wing political parties and the resurgence of fascism." Presciently, it also warned against "irrational and illogical political leaders willing to put this planet at risk."

The IUF supports the International Trade Union Confederation's mobilization titled Trade Unions for Peace. In line with its explicit support for peace and respect for international law, the IUF welcomes the announcement that Israel and Hamas have agreed to the first phase of a ceasefire plan, a long-awaited step that will hopefully lead to a roadmap towards long-lasting peace, humanitarian relief and prospects for better future for people in the region.

The position of the IUF remains stable and consistent: A just and sustainable peace in the region must include recognition of a Palestinian State alongside the State of Israel.