Salman Rushdie receives prestigious German Peace Prize

Frankfurt: British-Indian writer Salman Rushdie was on Sunday presented with the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade in Frankfurt's historic St Paul's Church.

The German Peace Prize comes with a €25,000 ($27,300) payment and is one of the most prestigious awards in Germany. It was first awarded in 1950.

Praising Rushdie in a speech, his friend and fellow writer Daniel Kehlmann described the author as "possibly the most important defender of freedom of art and speech of our time"

Rushdie, who survived a stabbing attack last year, also pledged to continue defending the freedom of speech.

Previously, the jury said that the celebrated writer deserved the award for "his indomitable spirit, for his affirmation of life and for enriching our world with his love of storytelling."

"In his novels and non-fiction, he melds narrative foresight with unfailing literary innovation, humour and wisdom," the jury said in a post on the prize's website.

Rushdie was announced as the winner of the prize in June but the award ceremony took place at the closing of the Frankfurt Book Fair on Sunday.

"A remarkable list of people have it [German Peace Prize]. So I'm just very gratified to have my name added to that list,” he said during an interview with DW earlier this week.

By winning the award, Rushdie joins the list with Margaret Atwood, Orhan Pamuk, Susan Sontag, Amos Oz, Vaclav Havel among others.

The globally acclaimed author shot to fame after his 1981 masterpiece 'Midnight's Children' for which he also received the Booker Prize.

Rushdie has written more than 14 novels and his latest novel 'Victory City' which was published this year, is about the stabbing attack.