Nobel Peace Prize laureate to be announced in Oslo”/>
The Norwegian Nobel Committee will announce the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize winner in Oslo on Friday.
As Day.Az reports with reference to TASS, the Peace Prize, according to the will of Alfred Nobel, is awarded to “the person who has achieved the greatest success, or who has done more than others in uniting peoples and reducing the number of active armies, as well as for holding peace congresses and attracting them to attention.” According to the scientist’s last will, this prize, unlike other awards established in accordance with his will, is awarded not in Stockholm, but in Oslo. Nobel clarified that the decision to award the prize should be made by a committee of five people appointed by the Norwegian Parliament. Traditionally, committee members are mainly retired Norwegian politicians and former party leaders.
These days, the more than century-old formulation is interpreted quite broadly, which is why the committee’s decisions are often criticized. Recipients of the award in recent years have included politicians, human rights activists, political activists and humanitarian organizations with achievements in a variety of fields.
In 2023, the award was given to Iranian human rights activist Narges Mohammadi “for her fight against the oppression of women” as well as her “struggle to promote human rights and freedom for all.”
Nomination of candidates
There are 285 candidates nominated for the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize – 196 individuals and 89 organizations. Among them, as reported by the media, are former NATO Secretary General and former Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg, American billionaire Elon Musk, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, former US President Donald Trump, Pope Francis, and UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres. The record for the number of applicants was set in 2016, when there were 376.
As in previous years, candidates for the award could be nominated until January 31. Nomination rights are then retained only by committee members, who can exercise them during their first meeting, usually in February.
The full list of candidates is traditionally kept strictly confidential and can only be made public after 50 years have passed after the awards have been made. Despite this, every year information about the nomination of certain candidates ends up in the media from organizations or individuals with the right to nominate. Among them are former and current members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee and its consultants, peace prize laureates of previous years, members of national parliaments, university professors specializing in history, philosophy, law, and theology.
Possible candidates
The head of the Norwegian Peace Research Institute, Henrik Urdal, who compiles a list of possible nominees each year, said it is likely that this year’s award will go to the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR). Other possible candidates, Urdahl suggests, could be Sudan’s Emergency Response Rooms, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) and its Commissioner General Philippe Lazzarini, the International Court of Justice (UN), UNESCO and the Council of Europe .
On bookmaker sites, for the third year in a row, the top line of the list of contenders is occupied by the President of Ukraine Vladimir Zelensky. Next with equal chances are Uyghur rights defender Ilham Tokhti and ex-presidential candidate of Belarus Svetlana Tikhanovskaya. Bets are also being accepted on the possible victory of Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg, the International Court of Justice and the World Health Organization.
About the award
The Nobel Peace Prize was first awarded in 1901. There have been years when the winner in this category was not announced, the last time this happened in 1972. The reasons were the First and Second World Wars, contradictions between committee members and the “lack of worthy candidates.”
The award ceremony will take place in Oslo on December 10, the anniversary of Nobel’s death.
The monetary component of the Nobel Prize in each category this year will be 11 million crowns ($1.09 million).
Nobel week began on October 7. The names of the laureates of prizes in physics, chemistry, medicine and literature have already become known.