A total of 329 candidates have been nominated for the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize, the Nobel Institute announced on Monday March 1, a list kept secret but which would include names as eclectic as the WHO, Donald Trump, Greta Thunberg, Alexeï Navalny or again Black Lives Matter.
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Applications, which fall short of the record number of 376 recorded in 2016, are divided between 234 individuals and 95 organizations, the Nobel Institute said.
The names of the candidates remain secret for at least 50 years, but their sponsors - parliamentarians and ministers from all countries, former laureates, some university professors ... - can choose to publicly announce the name of their foal.
Among the known candidates are the World Health Organization (WHO), the Vaccine Alliance (Gavi) and the Coalition for Innovations in Epidemic Preparedness (Cepi), at the forefront of the mobilization against Covid -19, a plague that has plagued the planet for a year.
"
It has been a special year, marked by the Covid, and it would have been surprising if this was not reflected in the nature of the candidatures
", commented to AFP the director of the Nobel Institute, Olav Njølstad, without want to say more.
Press freedom NGOs such as Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), opponents such as Belarusian Svetlana Tikhanovskaïa or Russian Alexeï Navalny, the Black Lives Matter movement have also been proposed. , and the face of the climate cause, the Swedish Greta Thunberg.
Also in the running are former US President Donald Trump, his son-in-law Jared Kushner, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Emirati Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, credited with advancing peace in the Middle East by working the rapprochement between Israel and countries of the Muslim world.
Being nominated for the prize does not in itself have an endorsement by the Nobel Committee which, before awarding the Nobel Peace Prize, accepts all nominations as long as they have been sent before the deadline. of January 31 by persons authorized to do so.
Other names of well-known candidates include NATO, pro-democracy forces in Hong Kong, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR), a campaign to ban killer robots and the movement. Scout.
The Nobel committee will unveil its choice on October 8.
In 2020, the Peace Prize crowned the World Food Program (WFP), the world's largest humanitarian organization in the fight against hunger.
