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NEWS - Philippines Aquino Wins Mags
Philippines Aquino Wins Magsaysay Prize
Reuters
04-AUG-98
MANILA, Aug 4 (Reuters)- Former Philippine president
Corazon Aquino on Tuesday won the Ramon Magsaysay
Award for international understanding for her role in
ousting
a dictator and inspiring liberation movements around the
world, the Award foundation said.
Aquino, who helped lead a popular revolt in 1986 that ended
Ferdinand Marcos's 20-year rule, gave ``radiant moral force
to the non-violent movement for democracy in the Philippines
and in the world,'' it said.
Aquino, 65, joined four other Asians as this year's winners
of
the Magsaysay Award, dubbed Asia's version of the Nobel
Prize.
The others were Adibul Hasan Rizvi of Pakistan for
government service, Sophon Suphapong of Thailand for
public service, Phaly Nuon of Cambodia for community
leadership and Ying Ruocheng of China for journalism and
arts.
The winners are to receive $50,000 and a gold medallion
each in ceremonies in Manila on August 31.
The award, which was established in 1958, was named after
a popular former Philippine president who died in an air
crash in 1957. Magsaysay was elected president in 1954.
Past winners included the Dalai Lama of Tibet in 1959 for
community leadership, Mother Teresa in 1962 for
international understanding and United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata in 1997 also for
international understanding.
The foundation cited Aquino for becoming ``the unifying
symbol'' in her fractious country after her husband, former
senator Benigno Aquino, was assassinated in 1983.
The foundation citation said her example inspired democratic
outbursts in South Korea, Myanmar, China, Czechoslovakia,
South Africa, Poland, Chile, Thailand ``and, lately,
Indonesia.''
Besides restoring Philippine democracy, Aquino withstood a
string of army coup attempts after she became president,
governed with dignity and peacefully handed power over to
her elected successor, it said.
``No Asian leader of our time can claim as much,'' it said.
``Up till now, her image lingers brightly as a symbol of
nonviolent democratic aspiration the world over.