May 7 (UPI) — Jailed Russian dissident Vladimir Kara-Murza was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary for his columns written for The Washington Post criticizing the war in Ukraine and the crackdown on democracy and free speech.
The $15,000 prize went to the 42-year-old politician, author and historian for “passionate columns written under great personal risk from his prison cell, warning of the consequences of dissent in Vladimir Putin’s Russia and insisting on a democratic future for his country,” the Pulitzer board said in an announcement.
The winning work comprised seven columns all published between January and June of 2023 written from his prison cell after being imprisoned the previous year on charges of treason and spreading fake news about the war for which he was sentenced to 25 years.
Accepting the award of his behalf, Kara-Murza’s wife, Yevgenia Kara-Murza, thanked The Washington Post for ensuring the voice of her husband, who is being held incommunicado in a prison in Siberia, was heard.
Yevgenia Kara-Murza said she was “truly heartbroken” that her husband could not be at Monday’s awards presentation at Columbia University in New York to “accept this high distinction by himself.”
The couple has three children together.
The Washington Post hailed the achievement and bravery of its contributor.
“Congratulations to the courageous Vladimir Kara-Murza for winning the Pulitzer Prize in Commentary — for columns he wrote while imprisoned in Russia,” Washington Post op-ed chief Mili Mitra wrote on X.
“Makes me proud to work at Post Opinions now and every day.”
The McCain Institute, the pro-democracy foundation of the late U.S. Senator John McCain, R-Ariz., also took to social media to congratulate Kara-Murza.
McCain had called him “one of the most passionate and effective advocates for passage of the Magnitsky Act,” a 2012 Russia-targeted bill that eventually led to the current system empowering U.S. administrations to sanction government officials of foreign nations for human rights abuses, including freezing their overseas assets and travel bans.
Kara-Murza, a close ally of the assassinated Kremlin critic Boris Nemtsov, has been recognized with numerous other awards including the Sakharov Prize for Journalism as an Act of Conscience, the Magnitsky Human Rights Award, and the Geneva Summit Courage Award.
