María Corina Machado, the Venezuelan opposition leader who was awarded this year’s Nobel Peace Prize, will not attend the ceremony in Oslo on Wednesday, the Norwegian Nobel Institute said.
Machado was set to receive the award in the Norwegian capital at 1 p.m. local time (7 a.m. ET) in a ceremony attended by members of the country's royal family as well as Latin American leaders including Argentine President Javier Milei and Ecuadorean President Daniel Noboa.
In a statement the Institute said Machado had “done everything in her power to come to the ceremony,” and her journey had been one “of extreme danger,” but she would not be able to attend. It added that it was “profoundly happy to confirm that she is safe and that she will be with us in Oslo.”
Instead, a big portrait of Machado hung in the Oslo City Hall next to an empty seat on stage as her daughter, Ana Corina Sosa Machado, accepted the award on behalf of her mother to a standing ovation from the audience.
Sosa Machado said she would finally be able to embrace her mother in a few hours after “16 months of living hell.”
She went on to read a speech prepared by her mother.
“Freedom is not something we wait for, but something we become,” Machado wrote. “It is a deliberate, personal choice, and the sum of those choices forms the civic ethos that must be renewed every day.”
Machado, 58, is barred from leaving Venezuela and has spent more than a year in hiding since the authoritarian regime of President Nicolás Maduro declared him the winner in an election last year that was widely criticized as rigged. She had been the opposition’s original candidate against Maduro, but the government prevented her from running.
Authorities in Venezuela, where Machado has been under a decade-long travel ban, have said she will be considered a fugitive if she attempts to travel abroad. She was last seen in public on Jan. 9, when she was briefly detained after appearing with supporters at a protest in the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, the day before Maduro was sworn in for his third six-year term.
In her speech, Machado recounted the wave of support she received during the 2024 election and how “the dictatorship responded with terror.”
“And yet, the Venezuelan people did not surrender,” she wrote. “This prize carries profound meaning. It reminds the world that democracy is essential to peace.”
