Clap a little more, I may share it with Trump: Navi Pillay jokes after Nobel win

Nobel Peace Prize winner Navi Pillay joked that she might share the award with Donald Trump if the audience applauded louder. She dedicated the honour to survivors of international crimes.Navi Pillai speaking to her colleagues afte the Novel Peace Prize announcement. New Delhi,Oct 9, 2026 18:12 ISTNavaneethem Pillay was not quite ready to believe the news of her Nobel Peace Prize win. Standing in the middle of cheering colleagues, the 85-year-old South African human rights defender of Indian origin reacted with a mix of disbelief, humility and sharp wit, jocking that she might share the prize with US President Donald Trump if the audience applauded a little louder."If you clap a little bit more, I may share this prize with Trump," Navi Pillay said in a brief speech, before expressing disbelief at the news and saying she wanted to verify it.Trump has repeatedly pitched himself as deserving of the Nobel Peace Prize, citing his claims of resolving international conflicts and wars and brokering peace deals.Pillay, a former UN rights chief, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday in recognition of her role as a fearless global rights defender. She has also served on the International Criminal Court and was South Africa's first non-white woman High Court judge. Reacting to the announcement, Pillay said she believed an award was meaningful only when the public felt the recipient deserved it. She dedicated the award to "survivors of international crimes"."You don't want to receive an award, prize or anything unless the public agrees that you deserve this," she told her colleagues. Recalling the response to the announcement, Pillay said one of the main reactions had been to pay tribute to her courage. She questioned why speaking the truth should require courage, saying her approach involved interpreting the law, examining the facts and making impartial decisions.Later, she continued that we are "living through an era where human rights are increasingly under attack, particularly the ICC" and urged everyone to "stand in defence of the rule of law".The 85-year-old jurist of Tamil origin has built a formidable reputation during a decades-long career that took her from South African courts to the ICC and the International Tribunal for Rwanda. She gained global prominence for her outspoken condemnation of government repression of popular protests in the Arab world, including in Libya and Syria. Her engagements also included serving as an ad hoc judge in the case brought by The Gambia against Israel.Between 2021 and 2025, she chaired a commission of enquiry created by the UN Human Rights Council to probe the root causes of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The panel, which does not speak for the UN and has faced harsh Israeli criticism, found that “genocide is occurring in Gaza and is continuing to occur”.She is currently an ad hoc judge at the International Court of Justice, working on a case deciding whether Myanmar's crackdown on the Rohingya breached the 1948 UN Genocide Convention, with a ruling expected in the coming months.- Ends