Denounce the atrocities of the war in Ukraine or sound the alarm over the catastrophic effects of global warming? The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded on Friday in Oslo in news loaded with threats.
As D-Day approaches, experts are divided between those who prefer a prize in the form of criticism of the offensive launched by Russian President Vladimir Putin, and those who anticipate a reminder of the urgency of stopping the push of the thermometer. .
With no less than 343 candidates this year (the list is not public), the Nobel Committee may also thwart the predictions and go down a completely different path. It will take 50 years to know the official list, but the Nobel committee has revealed that there are 252 people and 92 organizations.
• Alexei Navalny
For Henrik Urdal, director of the Oslo Peace Research Institute (Prio), the figurehead of the Belarusian opposition in exile Svetlana Tikhanovskaïa and the Russian opposition figure Alexeï Navalny, imprisoned after being the target of a poisoning attempt, deserve to be crowned jointly .
“They are two champions of nonviolent activities in favor of democracy in their respective countries,” he argues.
According to a survey by the Reuters news agency of Norwegian parliamentarians who “are used to choosing the winner”, they have been nominated in any case. Norwegian parliamentarians are among the long list of people who can be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
• Volodymyr Zelensky
The President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, is also one of the names returning to the bookmakers. But for Henrik Urdal, it’s still pretty unlikely.
“The committee would probably think twice before awarding the prize to a president at war … even if Ukraine is a victim of this war,” he said. “There will always be atrocities, even on the Ukrainian side.”
While an interstate conflict has never been this close to Oslo since World War II, another way to mark the occasion would be to award the Nobel Prize to actors who document alleged war crimes in Ukraine, such as the International Criminal Court (ICC) in La Is. or the Bellingcat research site.
Reuters reports that the Ukrainian daily The Kyiv independent is also named by the experts as a possible winner.
Thousands of people around the world (parliamentaries and ministers from all countries, former winners, certain university professors, etc.) have the right to submit an application before the deadline of January 31.
Members of the Nobel committee can present their own suggestions at their first meeting, which took place shortly after the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24.
• Greta Thunberg
For other observers, the mobilization in the face of the climate emergency would also be worthy of a Nobel after a year again marked by extreme weather events, from the record heat wave recorded this summer in Europe to the devastating floods in Pakistan.
“By awarding the Peace Prize to the climate cause, the Nobel Committee has a unique opportunity to say that the many crises facing the world must be resolved together,” said Oda Andersen Nyborg, director of the Norwegian Peace Council.
Among the names mentioned in this area are the young Swedish climate muse Greta Thunberg and/or her Fridays for Future movement, the British naturalist and pedagogue David Attenborough, as well as other activists. Greta Thunberg was already given as a favorite in 2019.
Mention is also made of Tuvalu’s Foreign Minister, Simon Kofe, whose country is threatened by rising sea levels.
• A UN agency
The experts contacted by Reuters also cite UN agencies, such as the WHO, in the spotlight since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, Unicef, dedicated to the condition of children, or even the United Nations High Commissioner for United for Refugees.
The Secretary General of the UN, Antonio Guterres, and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) are also mentioned. In 2020, the UN World Food Program received the award.
Outside the UN, Chinese, Afghan or Iranian rights and freedoms activists, the anti-corruption NGO Transparency International, the International Committee of the Red Cross or the International Court of Justice (ICJ) are also considered eligible for the Nobel Prize.
• Priceless?
According to Sverre Lodgaard, a researcher at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (Nupi), the Nobel committee could also refrain from awarding the prize, as it last did 50 years ago.
“No one can claim a breakthrough in peace, conflicts seem endless and treaties seem made to be broken,” he told AFP.
Last year, the Nobel Prize was awarded to two champions of press freedom, Filipino Maria Ressa and Russian Dmitri Mouratov, whose respective outlets are threatened with closure or have had their licenses revoked. Dmitry Muratov also auctioned off his Nobel Prize medal for $103.5 million in June, donated to the UNICEF program dedicated to war-affected Ukrainian children.
Source: BFM TV
