Sadat Rahman from Bangladesh wins Children’s Peace Prize

Sadat Rahman from Bangladesh won the International Children’s Peace Prize 2020. The award was presented to Sadat by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai during a ceremony in the Netherlands on Friday.

He was awarded the prize for his involvement in setting up his social organisation and mobile app ‘Cyber Teens’ to stop cyberbullying, KidsRights said in a statement on its website.

The International Children’s Peace Prize is an initiative of the international children’s rights organization KidsRights. From an impressive 142 applicants from 42 countries, the KidsRights’ Expert Committee selected Sadat Rahman from Bangladesh as winner.

By winning the award, he has gained an international platform which enables him to spread his message among an audience of hundreds of millions of people worldwide.

This prestigious prize was launched in 2005 during the World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates in Rome, chaired by Mikhail Gorbachev. Since then, the prize has been presented by a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate every year. The International Children’s Peace Prize 2020 was presented by the youngest Nobel Peace Prize winner in history Malala Yousafzai.

Cyberbullying app ‘Cyber Teens’

Sadat is a 17-year-old boy from Bangladesh. A story about a 15-year-old girl who committed suicide after suffering from cyberbullying moved Sadat so much, that he founded his own organisation and created the anti cyberbullying app ‘Cyber Teens’ to give helpless teenagers a place to go for help, according to the statement.

One of the major issues around cyberbullying is that young people are afraid to report it to the police or to inform their parents. The app gives young people information about internet safety and gives them the possibility to report cyberbullying confidentially.

Cyber specialists, social workers and the police are brought together via his organisation. The app has already supported over 300 victims of cyberbullying, including by reporting fake social media accounts and providing support for mental health problems. The app has led to the arrest of eight perpetrators of cybercrimes so far.

Sadat has also reached over 45,000 teenagers with internet safety seminars in schools and colleges. He has created “Cyber Clubs” in every school in his local area. In these clubs, young people are educated on digital literacy knowledge. He now wants to spread the app beyond his local area to help victims of cyberbullying across Bangladesh.