THE COURAGE TO STAND WHEN THE WORLD LOOKS AWAY

What connected the honorees was not ideology, religion, or ethnicity. It was the understanding that freedom is not merely a right; it is a responsibility.

- DEAN BAXENDALE

I attended the 2025 National Endowment for Democracy Freedom and Democracy Service Awards in Washington this week, and left with a renewed understanding of what courage looks like when stripped of theatrics, politics, and public applause. These awards honour those who resist authoritarian power at the greatest personal cost. What we all witnessed was not simply recognition; it was the affirmation of lives reshaped by sacrifice, loss, and moral clarity.

This year's honorees were bound by a common adversary: the totalizing ambitions of the Chinese Communist Party. Each recipient represented a community under pressure, surveillance, repression, or direct assault. Yet each stood for something the CCP has never been able to extinguish: the human insistence on freedom.