map of the site - other languages - contents

World Citizenship - Registry of World Citizens - ASCOP - Peoples Congress

Esperanto

Français

English

Español

The Agency - Information - News

48 - December 1983

THE NOBEL PREACE PRIZE
Bertha von SUTTNER, who gave Nobel the idea of a Peace Prize, always maintained that LAW, NOT FORCE should govern conflicts between nations.

She must turn in her grave when the Peace Prize is announced, for the majority of recipients have given no proof of wishing to place law above force in the establishment of peace, although a few like Henri La Fontaine, John Boyd Orr, Linus Pauling, Philip Noël Baker, and René Cassin were moving in that direction.

  • Sadat, Begin, Kissinger, Le Duc Tho were backed by strong armies designed, as always, to impose peace by force and not through law.
  • Mother Teresa has never made proposals for peace, although her marvelous work with people living and dying in misery certainly deserves some Nobel Prize, perhaps a prize for love among people.
  • Esquirel did not uphold any peace plan when claiming the Falklands for Argentina. He strengthened the nationalism of a state, whereas hi should have said that the islands belong to humanity as a whole and should be place under the guardianship of the United Nations.
  • Walesa, brave champion of a trade unionism free from government direction, and hence a strong supporter of human rights, has also never put forward a plan for peace between states.
  • Finally there are organizations such as the International Red Cross, which certainly bring help when there is a war but which are not orientated towards avoiding it, or like Amnesty international which fight for human rights without being concerned in the establishment of peace, or the International Labor Office, which plays a social role without helping to organize a state of peace.

"LAW, NOT FORCE, AMONG NATIONS" ought to be the mention warranting the award of the Nobel Peace Prize, but such promotion of the rule of law among states would mean putting into question the very principle on which states now are based : that of unconditional national sovereignty.

It is a pity that those responsible for the award of the Nobel Peace Prize do not from time to time read the writings of Bertha von SUTTNER. the organization for peace could be advanced and we might find the solutions that will avoid the final suicide of the race through the confrontation of Sovereign states.

AMIP - Mundialist News Agency

About the Site