VARIOUS: Reactions ahead of European Union receiving Nobel Prize at royal ceremony in Oslo on Monday

Record ID: 349646

  • Title: VARIOUS: Reactions ahead of European Union receiving Nobel Prize at royal ceremony in Oslo on Monday
  • Date: 9th December 2012
  • Summary: BRUSSELS, BELGIUM (OCTOBER 12, 2012) (REUTERS) BARROSO RECEIVING FLOWERS FROM NORWEGIAN AMBASSADOR ALTE LEIKVOLL, THE TWO SHAKING HANDS FLOWERS (SOUNDBITE) (English) EU COMMISSIONER FOR TRADE, KAREL DE GUCHT, SAYING: "I am particularly proud, I always believed the that European Union is the biggest peace project of the 20th and also the 21st century and especially in th
  • Embargoed: 24th December 2012 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Norway, Belgium, Finland
  • City:
  • Country: Belgium Norway Finland
  • Topics: International Relations,European Union,Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVAE070Z38MLXESWUTIED9S1OXGW
  • Story Text: Representatives from the European Union will be presented with the Nobel Peace Prize at an official ceremony in Norway on Monday (December 10).
    The EU won the Nobel Peace Prize in October for promoting peace, democracy and human rights over six decades, a morale boost for the bloc as it struggles to resolve its economic crisis.
    The award served as a reminder that the EU had largely brought peace to a continent that tore itself apart in two world wars in which tens of millions died.
    In Oslo, where the ceremony is set to take place on Monday, the Nobel committee's choice to award the union has been met with varied opinions.
    Rut Scheliski said it was a good idea and mentioned the bloc's enlargement as something positive.
    "I think it's very good because the EU has done a lot to preserve peace in Europe. Looking back historically there was a lot of unrest in Europe before the European Union, and the United Nations also of course. I think they have done a lot of good to preserve peace and that is that they have expanded eastwards which means that they've been able to stabilise Eastern Europe," she said.
    But Linnea Gyllensvard did not agree and could not see why the EU had been awarded the prize when there were, in her view, more deserving people.
    "I just don't think it's good, It's crazy. What has the EU done? Surely there are people who have done better things," she said.
    Kjersti Tratt said it would have been better to have given the union the award a while back rather than now.
    "I don't know. They have done good things but the prize comes at a wrong time. They could have received it earlier. At the moment, I think it's much too late, they could well have gotten it a long time ago," she said.
    The 1980 winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, Adolfo Perez Esquivel, had some criticisms of this year's award being given to the European Union.
    "We're surprised by the last designations by the Nobel committee; in the case of Obama, Al Gore, and now the European Union, when these are countries at war. They are part of NATO. They invade, plunder, kill. We've seen it in Libya, Syria, we see it all over the world. The military bases they have in the Malvinas Islands (Falklands). So, we're worried a prize like the Nobel, which has to be for contributing to peace, can be used in this way," Adolfo Perez Esquivel said.
    While welcomed by European leaders, the award will have little practical effect on the debt crisis afflicting the single currency zone, which has brought economic instability and social unrest to several states.
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