Rome, Mar. 5, 2008 (CWNews.com) - Rada Khrushchev, the daughter of the late Soviet dictator Nikita Khrushchev, will visit the Vatican to commemorate the 1963 ceremony in which Pope John XXIII was presented the Balzan Peace Prize.
The Balzan prizes were established by an Italian donor, as a counterpart to the Nobel prizes. In 1963 the international peace prize was awarded to Pope John XXIII-- a decision that had the approval of the Soviet leadership.
The Balzan peace prize was not awarded again until 1978, when it was bestowed on Mother Teresa of Calcutta. The award has subsequently been given Abbé Pierre (1991) and the St. Egidio community (2004); as well as the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (1986), the International Red Cross (1996), and Pakistani activist Abdul Sattar Edhri (2000).
Rada Khrushchev was present in Rome for the presentation of the first Barzan peace prize to Blessed John XXIII. She made the trip in the company of her husband, Aleksei Adzhubei, who at that time was head of the Izvestia news service.