The founder of an orphanage in Burundi who defied death threats and witnessed unspeakable violence as she saved thousands of children from ethnic slaughters in the 1990s is the winner of a new prize created in memory of the Armenian genocide a century ago.

The winner, Marguerite Barankitse, was one of four finalists considered for the prize, which was announced on Sunday at a ceremony in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia.

“No one can stop love,” Ms. Barankitse said in accepting the award from George Clooney, the activist actor, who was a co-chairman of the selection committee. “Not armies, not hate, not persecution, not famine, nothing.”

Vartan Gregorian, a prominent American philanthropist and scholar of Armenian descent, had helped lead deliberations over the choice of a winner since March, when the finalists were chosen from nearly 200 submissions.