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Marina Silva

Senator for the Green Party — State of Acre; Potential candidate in the Presidential election in 2010

Marina Silva was Minister of the Environment from January 2003 to May 2008. She is in her second term in the Senate, until January 2011. Before becoming a Senator, Ms. Silva was an active student and union leader, a state senator and representative, as well as a Professor of History. Her political career began in 1984 when, with Chico Mendes, she founded CUT (Central Única dos Trabalhadores), a labor union, in the state of Acre. In 2007, the British newspaper The Guardian ranked her amongst "the 50 people that can save the planet." The list of recognitions and awards Ms. Silva has received is extensive. Among others, she received the “Champions of the Earth” award in 2007, the highest prize awarded by the United Nations in the field of environmentalism. On October 29, 2008, in a ceremony in London’s Saint James palace, Prince Philip of England awarded Ms. Silva the medal “Duke of Edinburg in recognition for her career trajectory and struggle for the defense of the Brazilian Amazon,” the most important award given by the World Wildlife Fund. In June 2009, she won the Sophie Prize in recognition for her work in defense of the environment. The Sophie foundation of Norway awards the prize created by the writer Jostein Gaarder, author of the best-seller “Sophie’s World.”