Christine Ahn
Christine Ahn is a Korean-American peace activist and a foreign policy analyst. She is the 2020 winner of the US Peace Prize for her work for peace on the Korean peninsula and her advocacy for women's leadership in peace-building efforts. Early life and education. Ahn was born in South Korea and immigrated to the United States at age three. She is the youngest of 10 children, and according to Ahn, her mother, who was the breadwinner of the family, grew up in Korea during the period of Japanese colonial rule and had a sixth-grade  education. Ahn graduated with a bachelor's degree in political science from the University of Colorado, Boulder in 1998, and she earned a master's degree in foreign policy from Georgetown University and a certificate in ecological horticulture from the University of California, Santa Cruz. Ahn is an American citizen and lives in Hawaii. Career. Ahn was a policy analyst with the Korea Policy Institute and a co-founder of Korean Americans for Fair Trade. Ahn is a co-founder and Executive Director of a non-profit group, Women Cross DMZ, which is known for organizing a group of thirty  female activists in crossing the demilitarized zone (DMZ) between North and South Korea in 2015. Ahn and other activists, such as Gloria Steinem and Nobel Peace laureates, Mairead Maguire of Northern Ireland and Leymah Gbowee of Liberia, crossed the DMZ to bring attention to the need for peace between the two nations and for a formal declaration of the end of the Korean War. Critics have claimed that Ahn has not adequately addressed human rights violations committed by the North Korean government and that the event would be used for propaganda by the North Korean regime. In 2017, Ahn was  barred from entering South Korea on her way to China; the Justice Ministry of South Korea stated that Ahn was denied entry because of a concern that she could “hurt the national interests and public safety” of South Korea. Ahn said that her 2015 Women Cross DMZ campaign may have caused the conservative administration of President Park Geun-hye to put her on a blacklist. In 2017, Ahn organized a letter writing campaign to the Trump administration with female activists from more than 40 countries to defuse tensions on the Korean peninsula and to express their concerns that inaction could  lead to nuclear war.