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No impact of media attention: Nobel committee amid push for peace prize to Trump
Kristian Berg Harpviken, secretary of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee, stated that the committee focuses on individual merits when selecting laureates.
The Nobel Peace Prize Committee has reportedly signalled that Donald Trump is unlikely to receive the award, stating that media attention around a candidate does not influence its decisions.
Over the past few months, Trump has repeatedly claimed credit for stopping seven wars and said that he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize for it. The seven wars he claims credit for ending include the India-Pakistan conflict, the Israel-Iran war and, more recently, the Armenia–Azerbaijan conflict.
Talking to the new agency AFP, the secretary of the committee, Kristian Berg Harpviken, said the committee has noticed that there is a lot of media attention towards particular candidates, but "that really has no impact on the discussions that are going on in the committee." He further said that the committee considers each individual nominee based on his or her own merit.
This year's laureate will be announced on October 10.
Berg Harpviken stated that simply being nominated is not a significant achievement; the true achievement is becoming a laureate. He also added that the list of individuals who can nominate is quite long, adding that the eligible members to nominate include members of parliament and cabinet ministers from every country, former laureates and professors.
This year, the committee will pick the winner from a longlist of 338 individuals and organisations.
Talking about the process of selection of laureates, Berg said that "it's the knowledge base that frames the discussion. It's not whatever media report has received the most attention in the last 24 hours."
He also said that there are several campaigns each year, and we take efforts to structure the process in such a way that these campaigns don't affect the decision.
Who has backed Trump's claims?
Several countries, including Pakistan, Cambodia, Israel, and Azerbaijan, have backed Trump in the past on his claims to the Nobel Peace Prize. He has on multiple instances claimed credit for brokering peace between India and Pakistan, especially in May this year, when hostilities between the two countries calmed down. New Delhi, meanwhile, has clarified many times that the cessation of hostilities between the two countries was reached bilaterally. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also nominated him for the award, stating that “Trump is forging peace.”
Recently, adding to the claims, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt also supported Trump, saying that the conflict between India and Pakistan could have turned into a “nuclear war” had Trump not intervened.
While Norway’s parliament select five members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, the committee insists its decisions are taken independently of party politics and the sitting government.
"The Nobel Committee acts entirely independently and cannot allow itself to take those considerations into account when it discusses individual candidates," Berg Harpviken said.
Halvard Leira, research director at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI), said that this kind of pressure often ends up being counter-productive. "If the committee were to give the prize to Trump now, it would obviously be accused of kowtowing" and flouting the independence it claims to uphold, he told AFP.
