For those of us who are
discouraged in times when the unpredictability of war is promoted as the best
answer, this is a bit of encouraging news and long overdue. May there be many more men and women like
this. Shalom. KWC
2002 Nobel Peace Prize Awarded to Carter: By THE NEW YORK TIMES 10.11.02
The 2002 Nobel Peace
Prize was awarded today to former President Jimmy Carter.
Noting that Mr. Carter had devoted decades
of his life to the peaceful resolution of international conflicts, the chairman
of the committee that awards the prize said that Mr. Carter's selection
"must be interpreted as a criticism of the present U.S.
administration." Mr. Carter, who brokered the 1978 Camp David peace accord between
Israel and Egypt and has been involved in efforts to ease conflicts from North
Korea to Haiti since leaving the White House, was chosen from a record field of 156 candidates that were said to have included
President Bush, former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani of New York and President
Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan. "The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided to award the
Nobel Peace Prize for 2002 to Jimmy Carter for his decades of untiring effort
to find peaceful
solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights,
and to promote economic and social development," the committee said in its announcement. "In
a situation currently marked by threats of the use of power, Carter has stood
by the principles that conflicts must as far as possible be resolved through
mediation and international cooperation based on international law, respect for
human rights and economic development." But comments by the committee's chairman, Gunnar Berge, were
expected to generate as much interest as Mr. Carter's selection. In remarks to reporters after the announcement, Mr. Berge
said that Mr. Carter had been nominated for the peace prize "many, many
times" but that a major reason that he was finally selected was that he
represented a counterpoint to the militancy of President Bush. "I hope it will help strengthen what Carter has to
say," said Mr. Berge. "He has a more moderate point of view than the
sitting administration." Mr. Berge said the Bush administration seemed all too
willing to act unilaterally against Iraq. "They should be sticking more to
principles of mediation and international cooperation," he said. Another member of the prize committee, Inger-Marie
Ytterhorn, challenged Mr. Berge's observations. "The way I see it, that
was not the intention of the committee," she said in an interview with NRK
radio. The White House spokesman, Ari Fleischer, declined to
comment this morning on Berge's statement. He said that President Bush had
congratulated Mr. Carter during a two-minute telephone conversation today. The Nobel Peace Prize often has political overtones, but
rarely does the committee chairman, in announcing the award, enunciate so
clearly the five-member committee's view of current events. Indeed, according to a statement on the Nobel Committee's
Web site: "There must be no mention in the minutes of any Nobel Committee
meetings of the contents of discussions relating to choices of candidates for
the various awards, nor must any differences of opinion in committees be
divulged in other ways. For that reason, committee members take no part in the
public debates which follow the announcement of decisions." Mr.
Carter said in a statement that he was "deeply grateful" for the
honor. "I
hope this award reflects a universal acceptance and even embrace of this
broad-based concept of human rights," he said. "This honor serves as
an inspiration not only to us, but also to suffering people around the world,
and I accept it on their behalf." He
did not address Mr. Berge's comments about President Bush. In an interview this morning on CNN, Mr. Carter said: "I don't want to comment specifically
on President Bush's policies, but I do think that in every way before we go
into a war of any kind we should exhaust all other alternatives including
negotiation, mediation or, if that's not possible in the case of Iraq, working
through the United Nations." Mr. Carter, a Democrat who was president from 1977 to 1981,
now heads the Atlanta-based Carter Center, which advocates human rights and
peaceful resolutions of conflicts and promotes public health issues. Mr. Berge said he called Mr. Carter at home in Atlanta at
4:30 a.m. Eastern time, a half-hour before the announcement in Oslo, to notify
him. Mr. Berge said the committee had also recognized that Mr.
Carter should have
shared the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize, which was largely meant to honor the Camp David peace
accords between Israel and Egypt that Mr. Carter had brokered. The 1978 prize was awarded to Prime Minister Menachem Begin
of Israel and President Anwar el-Sadat of Egypt, who jointly began the peace
process in 1977 that culminated in the accords at Camp David in September 1978.
Mr. Carter was excluded because he was not nominated by the Feb. 1 deadline
that is strictly enforced by the Norwegian Nobel Institute. "He should have had the prize in 1978," said Mr.
Berge. "But he couldn't because he wasn't nominated in time. That was a
mistake that we now have the opportunity to set straight." Mr. Carter is the third United States
president to be given the Peace Prize, after Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow T.
Wilson. Nominations may be submitted by members of national
assemblies and governments, university professors, international court judges,
past and present Nobel committee members and former peace prize winners. |
