France has be­stowed the “Knight of the Le­gion of Ho­n­our” the low­est rank in the coun­try’s high­est civil­ian or­der, on Suri­namese med­ical prac­ti­tion­er, Dr. Ruben del Pra­do.

French Am­bas­sador, Nico­las de La­coste said the award was giv­en for “his com­mit­ment to med­i­cine, the fight against AIDS, the HIV pan­dem­ic, pub­lic health on all con­ti­nents, and the re­vival of the Al­liance Française in Suri­name”.

Cre­at­ed in 1802 by Napoleon Bona­parte, this Le­gion of Ho­n­our is award­ed to cit­i­zens on be­half of the French head of state as a re­ward for out­stand­ing achieve­ments.

De La­coste, speak­ing at the cer­e­mo­ny on Tues­day evening,  said the award was pre­sent­ed at the re­quest of French Pres­i­dent, Em­manuel Macron.

The diplo­mat praised Dr. Del Pra­do’s work in the health sec­tor, both lo­cal­ly and glob­al­ly. He has re­ceived nu­mer­ous awards for this work, both in Suri­name and abroad, in­clud­ing from Johns Hop­kins Uni­ver­si­ty, UN­AIDS, and the WHO/PA­HO.

De La­coste said that his nu­mer­ous pub­li­ca­tions at­test to his com­mit­ment to pro­mot­ing pub­lic health, HIV pre­ven­tion, ed­u­ca­tion, and strate­gic think­ing.

He said Del Pra­do thus con­tributes to a more sus­tain­able and health­i­er world, a goal of French diplo­ma­cy and co­op­er­a­tion, high­light­ing al­so his ded­i­ca­tion and ac­tivism for the LGBT com­mu­ni­ty, their recog­ni­tion, and the de­fence of their rights.

“France has al­ways nour­ished me with in­spi­ra­tion, in­tel­lec­tu­al rich­es, a deep sense of hu­man­ism and sol­i­dar­i­ty. Tonight, that hu­man­ism res­onates in the room, and I feel ho­n­oured to be part of that tra­di­tion,” said Del Pra­do, re­flect­ing on his ca­reer, which be­gan with the Med­ical Mis­sion dur­ing the “hor­rif­ic civ­il war”.

He said that his work took him to var­i­ous coun­tries and that “each step has shaped me,” be­fore set­tling back in Suri­name af­ter 20 years and that the award is not a per­son­al achieve­ment but a recog­ni­tion for Suri­name: from its own pro­fes­sion­als to its front­line work­ers.

“For all who demon­strate dai­ly what a coun­try is ca­pa­ble of when de­ter­mi­na­tion, cre­ativ­i­ty, and sol­i­dar­i­ty come to­geth­er.”

De La­coste al­so paid trib­ute to his pre­de­ces­sor, Am­bas­sador An­toine Joly, who en­trust­ed Del Pra­do with the mis­sion to re­vi­talise the Al­liance Française.

“You have tak­en on this mis­sion with ex­cep­tion­al per­son­al ded­i­ca­tion and bound­less en­thu­si­asm,” he said, not­ing that to­geth­er with the Al­liance Française Suri­name (AFS) team, there is once again an ac­tive and dy­nam­ic or­gan­i­sa­tion for French lessons and film screen­ings, among oth­er things.

“France is ex­treme­ly grate­ful for this,” the am­bas­sador said.

CMC/gh/ir/2025

PARA­MARI­BO, Suri­name, Nov 19, CMC -