On Friday, Venezuelan opposition activist Maria Corina Machado used her 2005 Nobel Peace Prize to dedicate it to the people of Venezuela – and US President Donald Trump, who provided her nation with a decisive defense in its pro-democracy movement.
I would like to dedicate this prize to the plagued people of Venezuela, and President Trump in his resolute support of our cause! she wrote on X.
We are on the brink of victory and never before, she said, did we look on President Trump the people of the United States the peoples of Latin America and the democratic states of the world as our key partners in bringing Freedom and democracy.
Machado hid in Venezuela in the last year after elections, which irredent leftist President Nicolas Maduro is accused of stealing.
Machado, the presidential candidate who was not allowed to vie in the election, only ran in the place of her running mate and former diplomat Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia, whom most of the international society perceived to be the real winner.
She was recognized due to her accomplishments as the Nobel Committee stated her work was tireless to promote democratic rights of the people of Venezuela and as well as her struggle of giving just and peaceful transition of dictatorship to democracy.
Machado, 58, has supported the continued attempt by Trump to use military force against Maduro, such as a significant US naval presence off Venezuela, as a necessary step to a democratic transition in Venezuela.
Karoline Leavitt, the White House Press Secretary posted her Machado Nobel dedication to Trump on her X account.
Other non-governmental individuals managed to get her congratulatory messages by other opposition leaders, including two-time former presidential candidate Henrique Capriles.
Capriles wrote on X that in response to this recognition he hopes it will be the second impetus to reach PEACE and that our Venezuela will end the suffering and find the freedom and democracy it has sacrificed so many years to restore.
Why Nobel Peace Prize Winner Maria Corina Machado Is Facing Criticism
Since Venezuelan democracy activist Maria Corina Machado was named the Nobel Peace Prize 2025, a controversy has arisen. It was criticized that she was in favor of Israel and its bombing on Gaza and she had even asked foreign powers to intervene to remove government in her country.
Machado is one of the leaders of the pro-democracy movement in Venezuela and over the recent years, he became one of the emblems of courage in the face of victims. Nobel Prize Committee declared her the Peace Laureate yesterday because of her contribution to democratizing and combating dictatorial rule in Venezuela.
The announcement later in hours resulted in the White House announcing it as placing politics over peace after a failed attempt to send the picture of President Donald Trump as a global peace maker who prevented half a dozen crises worldwide.
Machado wrote a Nobel dedication to Trump afterwards, and the US President said that he was pleased on her behalf.
Why Machado Got Nobel
Nobel Prize Committee very much lauded Machado as a Peace champion who has managed to keep the flame of democracy burning in Venezuela in the face of increasing darkness. Her chair on the committee, Jorgen Watne Frydnes, described her as the figure that holds centrality and unity to the political opposition in Venezuela that formerly was fragmented.
The Committee said that democracy is the same as peace and the tools of peace is also the tools of democracy and the Peace laureate has demonstrated that Machado is the hope of a better future where the basic rights of the citizens are safeguarded and their voices are heard.
Machado has had to live in hiding in the past year. She has been in the country despite the great threat to her life and this has left millions of people inspired. It is essential to note that when authoritarians take over, it is important to notice valiant champions of liberty who stand up and fight and this is what Frydnes said in his announcement.
Criticism Against Machado
To attack Machado on her support of the so-called genocide in Gaza, critics are posting on her older posts that she had been an advocate of Israel and the Likud party led by Benjamin Netanyahu.
Although she had displayed unity with Israel following the surprise Hamas attack of October 7, 2023, she never subtly expressed her approval of a killing Palestinians.
However, her posts throughout the years can testify to the fact that she is an ally of Netanyahu. One of the issues that have been waving red flags among her critics was when she had stated that, The struggle of Venezuela is struggle of Israel. In two years time, she had referred to Israel as a true friend of liberty. Machado even assured to shift the Venezuelan embassy to Jerusalem in place of Tel Aviv in case she took over power.
Norwegian legislator Bjornar Moxnes indicated that in 2020 Machado had signed a cooperation document with the Likud party of Israel. The award is not in line with the purpose of the Nobel he said, and therefore the Likud party is culpable of the Gaza genocide.
The US-based civil rights Muslim organisation, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, condemned the unconscionable move of awarding her the highest award. The Nobel Committee ought to rethink its move because it dishonours the committee, the organisation posted in a long write up.
It said that the Nobel Peace Prize committee should instead identify an honoree that has demonstrated moral consistency by boldly seeking justice to all mankind including one of the students, journalists, activists, medical practitioners who had risked career and even life to speak against the atrocity of our era: the genocide in Gaza.
Demands To The Foreign Intervention
Machado is also receiving backlash when she requested foreign intervention in her campaign against the regime of the Venezuelan President Nicholas Maduro. In 2018, she had authored a letter that requested the help of Israel and Argentina in changing the regime in her nation.
She had also posted the letter on the Internet, indicating that she was addressing letters to both mauriciomacri, President of Argentina, and netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel, asking them to use their strength and influence to push forward in the process of dismantling the criminal Venezuelan regime, which has long been allied with drug trafficking and terrorism.
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