The Nazis tried to discredit a brave Nobel Peace Prize winner just as China is doing to Liu Xiaobo

The Nobel Peace Prize will be awarded today to Liu Xiaobo, a writer and pro-democracy activist who has been imprisoned by the Chinese government for daring to urge greater freedoms for his countrymen.

China is doing all it can to cow the world into ignoring Liu and make him a forgotten man. The authorities have placed Liu’s wife under house arrest to prevent her from accepting the award on his behalf, blocked TV and Internet reports from Norway and, yesterday, they presented their own award, the Confucius Peace Prize.

This was history repeating.

First, it was the Nazis who replaced the peace prize with their own award. The laureate then was Carl von Ossietzky, who had disclosed that Germany was rearming. He was thrown into a concentration camp, where his health failed. He then died in a hospital under Gestapo guard.

Hitler took a personal interest.

In 1937, he ruled: “In order to avert such shameful occurrences for all future time, I decree with this day the foundation of a German national prize for art and science. Acceptance of the Nobel Prize is herewith forbidden to all Germans for all future time. Executive orders will be issued by the Reich Minister for Popular Enlightenment and Propaganda.”

Hermann Goering followed up: “When we see attempts to insult Germany before the world by awarding a peace prize to a traitor, to a person punished with penal servitude, then such action does not shame Germany but merely makes those ridiculous who are responsible for it.”

Joseph Goebbels banned German newspapers from reporting on von Ossietzky’s Nobel.

How eerily the Nazi statements and actions parallel those of the Chinese.

For example: “Liu Xiaobo is a criminal who has been sentenced by Chinese judicial departments for violating Chinese law. Awarding the peace prize to Liu runs completely counter to the principle of the award and is also a desecration of the Peace Prize.”

For example: “We will not change because of interference by a few clowns; we will not change our path. We will stick to the path of ruling the country by law and its national conditions.”

Now serving an 11-year sentence, Liu was part of the 1989 Tiananmen protests, and two years ago today, on the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, he was a lead author of Charter 08, a call for freedom.

The U.S. is properly sending its ambassador to Norway to today’s ceremony. But 19 of the 65 countries that have embassies in Oslo have declined to participate so as not to anger the Chinese or simply because they, too, have little use for human rights.

The dishonor roll: Afghanistan, Colombia, Cuba, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Morocco, Pakistan, the Philippines, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Tunisia, Ukraine, Venezuela and Vietnam.

Most dishonorably of all, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay is shunning the proceedings.

Yesterday, the Confucius Prize chairman belittled Liu, saying, “In 500 years you will see history is on our side.” Wrong. History is on the side of freedom. It came to Germany, and courageous souls like Liu will bring it to China, too.

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