Spain Culture News
Prince Felipe, Prince of Asturias, hands out his awards in an emotional ceremony in Oviedo
By h.b.
Oct 26, 2007 - 9:45 PM

The 27th edition of the Prince of Asturias Awards, held in Oviedo tonight, was an emotional event.

The Prince of Asturias, Don Felipe, called for everyone to work together for a more cohesive Spain, which he described as ‘this grand company’. He called for a society which was ever more solid and based around the principles and values of the Constitution, and as heir to the throne, he promised all of his efforts to that end.

He described the prize winners this year as an example of how people with differences can live together, and that their diversity was ‘a source of mutual enrichment’.

The winners represented the fight for fundamental rights, especially for the lives and dignity of people. ‘They are the defenders of freedom and democratic values’ said the Prince.

Al Gore receiving his Prince of Asturias Award for Cooperation - Photo EFE

Don Felipe had special words for the winner of the Award for Cooperation this year, Al Gore. He said the award was in recognition for his action to preserve the environment, and to broadcast his concerns that climate change is one of the main threats to mankind, and that we must fight it with rigour and urgency, as well as on a global basis.

In his acceptance speech, Al Gore warned that ‘political will is a renewable resource’.
‘We have to have the moral courage to act, to choose the future in which we want to live’, he said

The winner of the Arts award this year, Robert Allen Zimmerman, better known as Bob Dylan, was unable to attend the ceremony, but sent a message. The Prince praised his sensitivity and the strength of his dreams.

British biologist, Peter Lawrence, and his Spanish counterpart, Ginés Morata, the winners of the scientific research award, were being recognised for their work in what the Prince described as ‘the last mystery of life’.

The winner in the Literature category, the Israeli Amos Oz, was praised by the Prince. ‘You open his books and you are trapped’, he said. He also recognised the writer’s dedication to the most immediate realities facing his country, Israel.

Mazaltov Behar, one of the survivors of the Nazi genocide, in the Campoamor Theatre in Oviedo - Photo EFE

The directors of the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem, and the survivors of the holocaust, who had travelled to Oviedo, were honoured in what was perhaps the most emotional moment of the proceedings, and were granted the Concordia award.

The Prince said that honouring them ‘allows us to express our respect, recognition and affection for the millions of innocent victims of the Holocaust, men, women and children, cruelly persecuted and exterminated’.

Prince Felipe said such people always move us and symbolise ‘the compromise which we all have to human rights, to the freedom of man, and his inalienable dignity’.

Other awards went to the Nature and Science magazines, for the communication and humanity awards.

Ralf Dahrendorf won the Social Sciences prize.

Michael Schumacher won this year’s Sports prize.