By DPA,
Stockholm : The Nobel Peace Prize is regarded as the top award for efforts towards a more peaceful world and prominent laureates include Mother Teresa (1979), the Dalai Lama (1989) and Nelson Mandela (1993).
The award is handed out by a committee of the Norwegian parliament and the winners since 1998, including the citations given by the academy, were:
2008 – Martti Ahtisaari, Finnish ex-president and veteran peace broker was awarded the prize, with the Nobel Committee citing his efforts to solve conflicts on several continents and over three decades.
2007 – Former US vice president Al Gore and the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – “for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change”.
2006 – Economic expert Muhammad Yunus and founder of the Grameen Bank, Bangladesh, and the Grameen Bank – “for their efforts to create economic and social development from below”.
2005 – The UN International Atomic Energy Agency, Vienna, and IAEA General Secretary Mohamed ElBaradei – “for their efforts to prevent nuclear energy from being used for military purposes and to ensure that nuclear energy for peaceful purposes is used in the safest possible way”.
2004 – Wangari Muta Maathai, Kenya – “for her contribution to sustainable development, democracy and peace”.
2003 – Shirin Ebadi, Iran – “for her efforts for democracy and human rights. She has focused especially on the struggle for the rights of women and children”.
2002 – Former US president Jimmy Carter – “for his decades of untiring effort to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights, and to promote economic and social development”.
2001 – The UN, and former UN General Secretary Kofi Annan of Ghana – “for their work for a better organised and more peaceful world”.
2000 – Former president of South Korea Kim Dae-Jung – “for his work for democracy and human rights in South Korea and in East Asia in general, and for peace and reconciliation with North Korea in particular”.
1999 – Doctors without Borders (Medecins sans frontieres), Geneva – “in recognition of the organization’s pioneering humanitarian work on several continents”.
1998 – John Hume and David Trimble, Britain – “for their efforts to find a peaceful solution to the conflict in Northern Ireland”.