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(CNN) - The Nobel Committee has caused numerous controversies in its long history with the award of several Peace Prize winners.
His decision to award the prize to the European Union in 2012 was mocked, given the financial crises, rights records and foreign policies of some of the member states of the block.
Three Nobel laureates, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Mairead Maguire and Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, said the European Union did not qualify for the award and asked the board not to hand it over.
(OLIVIER MORIN / AFP / Getty Images)
The 2009 Barack Obama award was a surprising decision, even for the then president of the United States, who acknowledged that he was not expecting it.
"I don't see it as a recognition of my own achievements, but rather an affirmation of American leadership in the name of people's aspirations in all nations," Obama said after accepting the award.
In 1973, the award went to Henry Kissinger for reaching an agreement to end the Vietnam War, but his role in that conflict as Richard Nixon's national security adviser caused observers to question whether it was an appropriate option.
And in 1948, nobody won the award because the committee did not feel that anyone met the criteria, although many asked that Mahatma Gandhi, killed at the beginning of the year, be awarded posthumously.
Peace Nobel
