The Norwegian Nobel Committee in Oslo will end the suspense by announcing the winner on Friday at 11:00 a.m. (09:00 GMT).
The context is grim: the number of armed conflicts around the world involving at least one state has never been higher than in 2024, since Sweden’s Uppsala University launched its global conflict database in 1946.
Trump has repeatedly said he deserves the prestigious award for resolving “eight conflicts,” but experts predict he won’t be the commission’s pick — at least not this year.
“No, it won’t be Trump this year,” said Swedish professor Peter Wallensteen, an expert on international affairs. AFP.
“But maybe next year? By then, the dust will have settled around his various initiatives, including the Gaza crisis,” he added.
Many experts consider Trump’s claims to be a “peacemaker” to be exaggerated and express concerns about the consequences of his “America First” policy.
Donald Trump insists he deserves the prize for resolving “eight conflicts,” a claim experts doubt.
“Beyond attempts to negotiate peace in Gaza, we have seen policies that actually go against the intentions and what is written in the will of (Alfred) Nobel, notably to promote international cooperation, the brotherhood of nations and disarmament,” said Nina Graeger, who heads the Oslo Peace Research Institute.
For Graeger, the list of Trump’s actions that fall short of the Nobel Peace Prize’s ideals is long.
Trump withdrew the United States from international organizations and multilateral treaties, launched trade wars against allies and enemies, threatened to take Greenland from Denmark by force, ordered the National Guard into American cities, and attacked academic freedoms as well as universities’ free speech.
“We look at the whole picture,” said Jorgen Watne Frydnes, chairman of the five-member committee awarding the peace prize.
“The whole organization or the whole personality of that person matters, but what we look at first and foremost is what they actually accomplished for the sake of peace,” he said.
An undisputed choice?
This year, 338 people and organizations were nominated for the Peace Prize, with the list kept secret for 50 years.
Tens of thousands of people are eligible to nominate candidates, including lawmakers and cabinet members from all countries, past laureates, some university professors and members of the Nobel committee.
The committee chairman said its five members would take everything into account when awarding the prize
In 2024, the prize was awarded to the Japanese atomic bomb survivor group, Nihon Hidankyo, for their efforts to ban nuclear weapons.
Without a favorite this year, several names were making the rounds in Oslo before Friday’s announcement.
Sudan’s Emergency Response Rooms – a network of volunteers risking their lives to feed and help people enduring war and famine 1 – were mentioned, as were Yulia Navalnaya, the widow of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny, and the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, an election watchdog.
The Nobel committee’s choices in recent years have demonstrated “a return to more microscopic things, a little closer to classical ideas of peace,” with an emphasis on “human rights, democracy, press freedom and women,” said Halvard Leira, director of the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs.
Japanese atomic bomb survivor group Nihon Hidankyo won the 2024 prize for its efforts to ban nuclear weapons.
“My gut feeling would probably be maybe to have a candidate that’s not so controversial this year,” he said.
The Nobel committee could also choose to reaffirm its commitment to a world order currently being challenged by Trump by awarding the prize to United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres or to a U.N. body like the refugee agency, UNHCR, or the Palestinian humanitarian agency, UNRWA.
It could also give the green light to international tribunals such as the International Court of Justice or the International Criminal Court, or even defend press freedoms currently under threat by entrusting it to the Committee to Protect Journalists or to Reporters Without Borders.
But the committee could also do as it has done many times before and pick a completely unexpected winner.
