Italian actress Monica Bellucci received a prestigious world prize for women Thursday night and paid tribute to a preteen Yemeni girl who was prevented from attending the ceremony after becoming a global icon against forced marriages.
Nojoud Muhammad Nasser, 10, was not allowed out of Yemen to accept the honour in the World Hope category.
Receiving her World Actress Award, the 44-year-old Bellucci said ''(Nasser) is too dangerous for her country, that's why they won't let her out''.
Nasser made headlines in April 2008 when she won a Yemeni court battle to divorce a 30-year-old man who sexually abused her.
Bellucci, whose credits include Malena, Matrix Reloaded, The Passion of the Christ and The Brothers Grimm, was awarded the acting prize ''for outstanding merit,'' organisers said.
Another Italian actress, Claudia Cardinale, was honoured in Vienna for her humanitarian and pro-women work.
The Tunisian-born 1960s-70s sex symbol, 70, received the Benazir Bhutto World Tolerance Award.
Another Italian prize winner was designer Angela Missoni, daughter of high-end knitwear icon Ottavio Missoni, who received the World Fashion Award.
Other honorees included Northern Irish Nobel peace laureate Betty Williams, who called for a protest outside the Yemeni embassy over the Nasser case; US pop singers Anastacia and Kelly Clarkson; Australian ex-supermodel Elle Macpherson; and British singer and actress Marianne Faithful who received the Lifetime Achievment Award.
Past winners of the event have included German former supermodel Claudia Schiffer; the late Pakistani prime minister Bhutto; US actress and human rights campaigner Susan Sarandon; and US talk show host Oprah Winfrey.
The Women's World Awards were set up in 2004 to be ''a global platform aimed at recognizing the works of extraordinary, strong and successful women committed to the cause of improving the world''.
