5 ms·

Many in Norway and Sweden distanced themselves from the Nobel Peace Prize at the time it was awarded to Machado because it was obvious it was such a bad decisio

by k1m 9mo ago

Many in Norway and Sweden distanced themselves from the Nobel Peace Prize at the time it was awarded to Machado because it was obvious it was such a bad decision. Julian Assange even filed a criminal complaint in Sweden last month to try to stop the Swedish Nobel Foundation paying out over $1 million dollars to her, arguing it's going against Alfred Nobel's will, and they have a responsibility to respect his will. He wrote last month: "Using her elevated position as the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, Machado may well have tipped the balance in favour of war, facilitated by the named suspects." I find it funny that what many saw as a terrible decision has now come to pass, and the Nobel Institute is scrambling to save face. https://x.com/wikileaks/status/2001260159432290686 https://x.com/wikileaks/status/2001260159432290686

fencepost 9mo ago
I'm just wondering if they'll end up revising the blurb about her on their website to include the words "craven pandering."
ajross 9mo ago
Machado seems fine. There are always going to be controversies around any political figure, and the complaints ahead of the award were... kinda routine, I thought? She was an opposition leader who was denied power won by democratic election, and didn't start an insurrection or whatever. Checks the right boxes. Make the call and move on. Now, sure, she then went on to personally hand over the medal (or statue or whatever it actually is, I genuinely don't know) to the thin-skinned leader of a foreign superpower in a transparent attempt to be corruptly granted the office by an interventionist coup de tête. Not a great look! But to claim that this is "what many saw" is sort of ridiculous. No one saw this. The world we live in is simply too ridiculous for predictions like that.
- topaz0 9mo ago
  It is what many saw, just not the people who take the US foreign policy establishment at its word.
- timmytokyo 9mo ago
  Assange's lawsuit is kind of silly, but his point about the incorrectness of the award to Machado stands up to scrutiny. She overtly encouraged military intervention by the US in Venezuela. That's a blatant contradiction of everything the Nobel Peace Prize is purported to stand for.
- k1m 9mo ago
  The world's oldest peace organisation, the Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society, distanced itself from the Nobel Peace Prize, writing in October: "...it is becoming increasingly clear that she is a political actor who also gives her support to Trump and Israel, and with an agenda that stands far from peace, disarmament and reconciliation between peoples. Not least, her uncritical positions in favor of Israel, the USA's violations of international law in attacks against ships in the Caribbean and for a military intervention in Venezuela raise a multitude of questions about how the Nobel Committee made its choice." https://www.facebook.com/svenskafreds/posts/pfbid02aoK2T5BdWeEADsx5TfgHZj1o1cDX88bBuYmB2Xr4jw3GZksYSMKJJHr8f2vu97yMl https://www.facebook.com/svenskafreds/posts/pfbid02aoK2T5BdW... In Norway, the Norwegian Peace council also distanced itself: 'The Norwegian Peace Council announced that it will not organize this year's traditional torchlight procession through downtown Oslo on the day the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded due to its disagreement with the choice of Venezuelan far-right politician María Corina Machado as the winner. 'The organization, which brings together 17 Norwegian pacifist organizations and some 15,000 activists, declared on Friday, October 24, that it made this decision because its members "do not feel that this year’s winner is in line with the fundamental values of the Norwegian Peace Council."' https://orinocotribune.com/norwegian-peace-council-will-not-celebrate-maria-corina-machados-nobel-peace-prize/ https://orinocotribune.com/norwegian-peace-council-will-not-...
  - vintermann 9mo ago
    Yes. I believe it's the first time the Peace Council refused to organize the march. They got an NGO of exile-Venezuelans to organize it instead.
  - platybubsy 9mo ago
    As a Swede, "Svenska Freds" is not an entirely uncontroversial organization.
    - lysace 9mo ago
      That's an understatment. They have long been aligned with the Soviet Union and later Russia.
- vintermann 9mo ago
  > didn't start an insurrection or whatever. Well, she did call on Trump to intervene violently, which he did. She also defended the bombing of civilian boats. Even if you don't count those as insurrection, I certainly count them as a pretty damning whatever.
istjohn 9mo ago
To be fair, it's not the first extremely questionable Nobel Peace Prize award, for example, Henry Kissinger. While not nearly as egregious, Barack Obama was a bizarre choice, too.
- pletnes 9mo ago
  I cannot recall Obama doing one single thing for peace internationally? Which conflict did he help stop?
  - rmckayfleming 9mo ago
    It was ridiculous. He got it less than a year into his presidency.
  - Normal_gaussian 9mo ago
    Lifting quotes liberally from the wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Nobel_Peace_Prize https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Nobel_Peace_Prize > "We have not given the prize for what may happen in the future. We are awarding Obama for what he has done in the past year. And we are hoping this may contribute a little bit for what he is trying to do," > Jagland said the committee was influenced by a speech Obama gave about Islam in Cairo in June 2009, the president's efforts to prevent nuclear proliferation and climate change, and Obama's support for using established international bodies such as the United Nations to pursue foreign policy goals. > Nominations for the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize closed just 11 days after Obama took office. Obama entered office on Jan 20th; was nominated before February; was announced in October; and it was justified by actions he'd taken between nomination and announcement. Obama's own acceptance speech included > "perhaps the most profound issue surrounding my receipt of this prize is the fact that I am the commander-in-chief of the military of a nation in the midst of two wars." It does seem like a bizarre choice, and it does seem like an attempt to raise the awards profile which has meaningfully cheapened it.
  - koolba 9mo ago
    > I cannot recall Obama doing one single thing for peace internationally? Which conflict did he help stop? It's an interesting choice for sure. In 2009, he had only killed 50-100 civilians via drone strike by the time they awarded the prize. And he didn't kill US citizens via drone strike abroad until 2011. Being realistic about things, it's because he was black.
bawolff 9mo ago
The problem with the peace prize is it seems like its given out to people who they hope will bring peace instead of people who actually have brought peace. We don't award the chemistry one to people with a promising research program, we award it to people who actually have discovered things that we actually know changed the field. If we awarded the peace prize based on actual accomishments judged with the benefit of hindsight instead of expected accomplishments, it would work a lot better.
- volleyball 9mo ago
  They didn't give it to Machado hoping she would bring peace. In fact, they did it for the opposite reason. They awarded it at the height of tension and build-up of US forces outside Venezuela, while they were blowing up boats in the Carribean, to encourage Trump to go even further. Something btw which Machado wholeheartedly supported and encouraged.
  - jacquesm 9mo ago
    And you know this how?
    - volleyball 9mo ago
      It is just basic logic really. Hypothetically, If the Nobel committee was to right now announce that this year's Nobel Peace Prize was to be awarded to a Greenlandic independence/opposition activist - Some one who applauds and supports all of Trump's current rhetoric and actions wrt Greenland, someone calling for armed intervention/invasion. What would that say about the committee's opinion on the matter. What would the timing of such an announcement signal to the Trump regime and the wider world? What conclusion could one draw reasonably?
vintermann 9mo ago
I'm pretty sure he just wants an "I told you so" on the record. I don't think he has many illusions about recourse through the Swedish court system.
- k1m 9mo ago
  I think it's currently the best route to challenge the way the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded. See my earlier comment. In 2012 the Stockholm County Administrative Board ruled that the Swedish Nobel Foundation is legally responsible for ensuring the Norwegian committee follows Alfred Nobel's will. So that's probably a reason Assange went the route he went with the criminal complaint.
rvz 9mo ago
Aged perfectly. [0] The peace prize has lost all credibility. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46473999 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46473999
deleted 9mo ago
[deleted]

by k1m 9mo ago

fencepost 9mo ago

I'm just wondering if they'll end up revising the blurb about her on their website to include the words "craven pandering."

ajross 9mo ago

Machado seems fine. There are always going to be controversies around any political figure, and the complaints ahead of the award were... kinda routine, I thought? She was an opposition leader who was denied power won by democratic election, and didn't start an insurrection or whatever. Checks the right boxes. Make the call and move on. Now, sure, she then went on to personally hand over the medal (or statue or whatever it actually is, I genuinely don't know) to the thin-skinned leader of a foreign superpower in a transparent attempt to be corruptly granted the office by an interventionist coup de tête. Not a great look! But to claim that this is "what many saw" is sort of ridiculous. No one saw this. The world we live in is simply too ridiculous for predictions like that.

topaz0 9mo ago
It is what many saw, just not the people who take the US foreign policy establishment at its word.
timmytokyo 9mo ago
Assange's lawsuit is kind of silly, but his point about the incorrectness of the award to Machado stands up to scrutiny. She overtly encouraged military intervention by the US in Venezuela. That's a blatant contradiction of everything the Nobel Peace Prize is purported to stand for.
k1m 9mo ago
The world's oldest peace organisation, the Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society, distanced itself from the Nobel Peace Prize, writing in October: "...it is becoming increasingly clear that she is a political actor who also gives her support to Trump and Israel, and with an agenda that stands far from peace, disarmament and reconciliation between peoples. Not least, her uncritical positions in favor of Israel, the USA's violations of international law in attacks against ships in the Caribbean and for a military intervention in Venezuela raise a multitude of questions about how the Nobel Committee made its choice." https://www.facebook.com/svenskafreds/posts/pfbid02aoK2T5BdWeEADsx5TfgHZj1o1cDX88bBuYmB2Xr4jw3GZksYSMKJJHr8f2vu97yMl https://www.facebook.com/svenskafreds/posts/pfbid02aoK2T5BdW... In Norway, the Norwegian Peace council also distanced itself: 'The Norwegian Peace Council announced that it will not organize this year's traditional torchlight procession through downtown Oslo on the day the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded due to its disagreement with the choice of Venezuelan far-right politician María Corina Machado as the winner. 'The organization, which brings together 17 Norwegian pacifist organizations and some 15,000 activists, declared on Friday, October 24, that it made this decision because its members "do not feel that this year’s winner is in line with the fundamental values of the Norwegian Peace Council."' https://orinocotribune.com/norwegian-peace-council-will-not-celebrate-maria-corina-machados-nobel-peace-prize/ https://orinocotribune.com/norwegian-peace-council-will-not-...
- vintermann 9mo ago
  Yes. I believe it's the first time the Peace Council refused to organize the march. They got an NGO of exile-Venezuelans to organize it instead.
- platybubsy 9mo ago
  As a Swede, "Svenska Freds" is not an entirely uncontroversial organization.
  - lysace 9mo ago
    That's an understatment. They have long been aligned with the Soviet Union and later Russia.
vintermann 9mo ago
> didn't start an insurrection or whatever. Well, she did call on Trump to intervene violently, which he did. She also defended the bombing of civilian boats. Even if you don't count those as insurrection, I certainly count them as a pretty damning whatever.

istjohn 9mo ago

To be fair, it's not the first extremely questionable Nobel Peace Prize award, for example, Henry Kissinger. While not nearly as egregious, Barack Obama was a bizarre choice, too.

pletnes 9mo ago
I cannot recall Obama doing one single thing for peace internationally? Which conflict did he help stop?
- rmckayfleming 9mo ago
  It was ridiculous. He got it less than a year into his presidency.
- Normal_gaussian 9mo ago
  Lifting quotes liberally from the wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Nobel_Peace_Prize https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Nobel_Peace_Prize > "We have not given the prize for what may happen in the future. We are awarding Obama for what he has done in the past year. And we are hoping this may contribute a little bit for what he is trying to do," > Jagland said the committee was influenced by a speech Obama gave about Islam in Cairo in June 2009, the president's efforts to prevent nuclear proliferation and climate change, and Obama's support for using established international bodies such as the United Nations to pursue foreign policy goals. > Nominations for the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize closed just 11 days after Obama took office. Obama entered office on Jan 20th; was nominated before February; was announced in October; and it was justified by actions he'd taken between nomination and announcement. Obama's own acceptance speech included > "perhaps the most profound issue surrounding my receipt of this prize is the fact that I am the commander-in-chief of the military of a nation in the midst of two wars." It does seem like a bizarre choice, and it does seem like an attempt to raise the awards profile which has meaningfully cheapened it.
- koolba 9mo ago
  > I cannot recall Obama doing one single thing for peace internationally? Which conflict did he help stop? It's an interesting choice for sure. In 2009, he had only killed 50-100 civilians via drone strike by the time they awarded the prize. And he didn't kill US citizens via drone strike abroad until 2011. Being realistic about things, it's because he was black.

bawolff 9mo ago

The problem with the peace prize is it seems like its given out to people who they hope will bring peace instead of people who actually have brought peace. We don't award the chemistry one to people with a promising research program, we award it to people who actually have discovered things that we actually know changed the field. If we awarded the peace prize based on actual accomishments judged with the benefit of hindsight instead of expected accomplishments, it would work a lot better.

volleyball 9mo ago
They didn't give it to Machado hoping she would bring peace. In fact, they did it for the opposite reason. They awarded it at the height of tension and build-up of US forces outside Venezuela, while they were blowing up boats in the Carribean, to encourage Trump to go even further. Something btw which Machado wholeheartedly supported and encouraged.
- jacquesm 9mo ago
  And you know this how?
  - volleyball 9mo ago
    It is just basic logic really. Hypothetically, If the Nobel committee was to right now announce that this year's Nobel Peace Prize was to be awarded to a Greenlandic independence/opposition activist - Some one who applauds and supports all of Trump's current rhetoric and actions wrt Greenland, someone calling for armed intervention/invasion. What would that say about the committee's opinion on the matter. What would the timing of such an announcement signal to the Trump regime and the wider world? What conclusion could one draw reasonably?

vintermann 9mo ago

I'm pretty sure he just wants an "I told you so" on the record. I don't think he has many illusions about recourse through the Swedish court system.

k1m 9mo ago
I think it's currently the best route to challenge the way the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded. See my earlier comment. In 2012 the Stockholm County Administrative Board ruled that the Swedish Nobel Foundation is legally responsible for ensuring the Norwegian committee follows Alfred Nobel's will. So that's probably a reason Assange went the route he went with the criminal complaint.

rvz 9mo ago

Aged perfectly. [0] The peace prize has lost all credibility. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46473999 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46473999

deleted 9mo ago

[deleted]