Nobel Prize winner chosen but not named

The Nobel Peace Prize committee today chose this year’s winner of the award it hopes will send the right message to a world still in shock from last year’s terrorist attacks and at odds over US plans to attack Iraq.

As always, the secretive five member committee offered no hints.

Committee secretary Geir Lundestad, would only say that a decision was made in Oslo after a series of meetings through the year and would be revealed on October 11.

“We have noted in the media that there is no clear favourite,” Lundestad said about speculation on the coveted prize, first awarded in 1901. A record 156 - 117 individuals and 39 groups – were nominated.

Many reflected the terror attacks on the United States and their aftermath, including former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

Nominations, which can be made by former winners, committee members, some university professors and selected organisations, are kept secret for 50 years, although those making them often announce their choice.

President George Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair were among the known nominees for leading the war against terrorism but were seen as unlikely winners in the wake of unpopular efforts to convince the world of the need to overthrow Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.

“The committee isn’t that crazy,” said Sverre Lodgaard, director of the Norwegian Institute of International affairs.

“Impossible,” said Stein Toennesson, director of the International Peace Research Institute, Oslo.

“The Nobel Peace Prize committee would lose all credibility in Europe.”

Both said any prize to an American would probably be an indirect criticism of current US policies.

“You have to think like a Norwegian,” agreed Haakan Wiberg, a senior researcher at the Copenhagen Peace Research Institute in Denmark. In a recent survey, about 75% of the Norwegians polled opposed a new war in Iraq.

Other known candidates were the Salvation Army, the Peace Corps, the Rome-based Catholic group Church of Sant’Egidio for peace and humanitarian efforts, the Mission of Mercy humanitarian group for work in Latin America and the SOS Children’s Villages aid group.