Egyptian activist Mona Seif of the No to Military Trials Campaign has been announced as one of the three final nominees for the 2013 Martin Ennals Award (MEA) for Human Rights Defenders.

Seif has been a leading advocate against the military trials of civilians since the ouster of long-time President Hosni Mubarak in early 2011.

The nominees for the Geneva-based MEA established in 1993 are selected by a jury of ten rights organisations, including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Human Rights First, FIDH, World Organisation against Torture, the International Commission for Jurists, Front Line Defenders, International Service for Human Rights, German Diakonie and HURIDOCS.

The two other nominees for the award are founding member of Russia's Joint Mobile Group, Igor Kalyapin, investigating rights abuses in Chechnya, and rights lawyer Mario Joseph from Haiti.

The prize is 20,000 Swiss Francs, given for use in the field of human rights.

The No to Military Trials Campaign, which Seif helped found, started its work in February 2011 when Hosni Mubarak was ousted in the revolution and the military took over power of Egypt. The campaign worked to provide legal and popular support to victims of military trials and their families and later campaigned for the end of the military trials of civilians.

The Cairo Centre for Human Rights released a statement on Saturday declaring its nomination and support of Seif for the MENA.