As part of the Aurora Humanitarian Initiative, an annual awards ceremony was created, the Aurora Prize for Awakening Humanity.[13] The award was named in honor of Aurora Mardiganian, who played an important role in creating awareness of the Armenian Genocide amongst the public, reliving her horrors through her book "Ravished Armenia" which inspired the eponymous film. The Aurora Prize is awarded annually in Yerevan to recognize modern day heroes and the exceptional impact their actions have made on preserving human life and advancing humanitarian causes in the face of adversity.

The co-chairman of the selection committee is the filmmaker and philanthropist George Clooney. The first co-chair of the selection committee was the Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel, from March 2015 until his death in July 2016. The commission consists of the Aurora Humanitarian Initiative co-founder Vartan Gregorian, Nobel Peace Prize Laureates Leymah Gbowee, Shirin Ebadi and Óscar Arias, Director of the Institute of Global Health Innovation at Imperial College London Lord Ara Darzi, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and former President of Ireland Mary Robinson, former United Nations Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Human Rights Defenders Hina Jilani, Honorary President of the International Crisis Group and former Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans, Director of the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, former President of Mexico Ernesto Zedillo, co-founder of Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders), former French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner and former US Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruben_Vardanyan_(businessman)