Daria Egereva Nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize: What It Means for Indigenous Peoples

At the beginning of September, it became known that Selkup human rights defender Daria Egereva had been nominated for the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize. Her nomination was put forward by former UN Special Rapporteur on the rights of Indigenous Peoples James Anaya and Øyvind Ravna, a professor at the Arctic University of Norway.

On September 10, the Basmanny District Court in Moscow extended her detention in pre-trial custody until December 9. The nomination did not stop the court. That says a great deal about what is actually at stake.

Who Is Daria Egereva?

Daria Egereva is a member of the Selkup people, an Indigenous People of Western Siberia. She is co-chair of the International Indigenous Peoples’ Forum on Climate Change. In November 2025, she coordinated the forum’s participation in the UN climate conference.

She was detained in Moscow in December. Investigators have linked Egereva to the association of Indigenous Peoples experts known as the “Aborigen Forum” and charged her with participation in the activities of a terrorist organization. Human rights organizations believe the prosecution is connected to her work at international forums. There has been no verdict.

In April, ten UN experts sent a communication to the Russian authorities, stating that, in their view, prosecution for cooperation with UN mechanisms could constitute reprisals or intimidation. More than 100 human rights and environmental organizations called for the release of Daria and Natalia Leongardt, who faces charges in the same case.

What the Nomination Means — and What It Does Not

Precision matters here. Being nominated does not mean being “selected.” The deadline for nominations expired on January 31. The Norwegian Nobel Institute registered 287 candidates: 208 individuals and 79 organizations. Anyone entitled to nominate can put forward a name, including a law professor, a member of parliament, or a former official of an international institution.

The Nobel Committee does not publish the names for 50 years. So we know about Egereva’s nomination from the nominators themselves, not from the committee. We do not know whether she made the shortlist. There is no basis for speculation about her chances.

Ravna himself has explained the purpose of the nomination directly. He hopes to draw attention to the situation of Indigenous Peoples in Russia and elsewhere, to those fighting climate change, and to the suppression of opposition in Russian civil society. There is no claim of an expected victory in those remarks.

So the most accurate way to describe the nomination today is this: its main result is attention. Attention to the case of two women held in pre-trial detention. Attention to the fact that cooperation with the UN can result in criminal prosecution. For those following the fate of Daria and Natalia, that is already significant. Any new court decision will now be read in both Oslo and Geneva.

Why a Victory Would Matter

And yet, let us imagine a different outcome. Not because it is likely, but because it helps show what the broader issue is about.

If the prize were awarded to someone defending Indigenous Peoples’ rights, it would not simply be another human rights award. It would be a signal that Indigenous Peoples’ rights belong on the global agenda, rather than only on specialized UN forums.

We have seen this before. In 1992, the Nobel Peace Prize went to Rigoberta Menchú, a K'iche' Maya woman from Guatemala. In its citation, the committee explicitly referred to “social justice and ethno-cultural reconciliation based on respect for the rights of Indigenous Peoples”.

The story of her nomination is familiar to us as well. As the Nobel Committee writes, Indigenous organizations promoted her candidacy. They wanted to remind the world that the 500 years since Columbus arrived in the Americas had meant destruction and displacement for Indigenous peoples. Menchú grew up in a country where the army killed her parents and brother. She was later forced to flee. Four years later, in 1996, Guatemala signed a peace agreement, with Norway serving as a mediator. In her Nobel Lecture, Menchú said that the medal would remain in Mexico City until there was peace in her country. She later became a UN Goodwill Ambassador for Indigenous Peoples.

In this way, a prize whose nomination was driven by Indigenous organizations contributed to real change.

Who Else from Indigenous Peoples Has Been Nominated?

Menchú remains the clearest example, but she is not the only one. In 2007, Sheila Watt-Cloutier, an Inuit leader and former chair of the Inuit Circumpolar Council, was nominated for the prize. Two Norwegian parliamentarians nominated her together with Al Gore, for highlighting the connection between climate change and human rights in the Arctic. The prize went to Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Watt-Cloutier did not receive the Nobel, but in 2015 she received the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes known as the “Alternative Nobel Prize.”

In 2019, Brazilian anthropologists and environmentalists from the Darcy Ribeiro Foundation put forward Chief Raoni Metuktire, a leader of the Kayapó people, for the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize. He was 89 at the time. The foundation said the committee had preliminarily accepted the nomination; it still had to be formally completed. The 2020 prize went to the World Food Programme.

A common feature of all three stories is that the nominations were intended to draw attention to Indigenous peoples and their lands. Only one of the three resulted in the Nobel Prize.

Who Has the Committee Honored in Recent Years?

It is worth looking at what the committee has recognized in recent years. A noticeable pattern emerges.

In 2025, the prize went to María Corina Machado, leader of Venezuela’s opposition. The committee cited her “tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela”. In 2024, the award went to the Japanese organization Nihon Hidankyo, representing survivors of the atomic bombings.

In 2023, the prize went to Iranian human rights defender Narges Mohammadi. The committee recognized her “fight against the oppression of women in Iran”. She had been sentenced to a total of 31 years in prison and 154 lashes. She learned about the award while behind bars. In December 2025, the committee condemned her renewed detention.

In 2022, the prize went to Russia’s Memorial, Ukraine’s Center for Civil Liberties, and Belarusian human rights defender Ales Bialiatski.

In 2021, the prize was shared by journalists Maria Ressa and Dmitry Muratov “for their courageous fight for freedom of expression”.

What does this mean for Egereva? Only that her case fits the broad themes recognized in recent years: civil liberties, persecuted human rights defenders, and pressure on independent voices. But there is an important qualification. The rights of Indigenous Peoples have not been explicitly mentioned in the citations of these recent awards. If Egereva were to receive the prize, that would therefore represent something new.

Returning to Daria

We do not know whose name will be announced in Oslo on October 9. It may not be Egereva’s. There are 287 candidates, and for most of them we will know nothing more for another 50 years.

But imagine that a reader in Tomsk, New York, or Quito learns from this story for the first time that the Selkup people exist, that Indigenous activists are being imprisoned for international cooperation, and that this is being discussed in Norway. For those defending the rights of our peoples, that is already a result.

Menchú also began with a nomination in 1992. Daria Egereva has spent years working to ensure that Indigenous Peoples have a voice where decisions affecting them are made. Perhaps we will yet see that voice heard more loudly than in a courtroom.

On October 9, the name of the Nobel Peace Prize laureate will be announced in Oslo.

On December 9, the current detention order expires.

We will be watching.

Free Daria and Natalia!