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It’s Official: European Union Awarded Nobel Peace Prize — And Not Everyone’s Happy

Dec. 10, 2012 11:20am Becket Adams

Nobel Prize Committee Officially Awards European Union Nobel Peace Prize | EU Wins Nobel Prize

(AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

OSLO, Norway (TheBlaze/AP) — The European Union received the Nobel Peace Prize on Monday for “promoting peace and human rights in Europe following the devastation of World War II,” and the bloc was urged to use that unity in its battle with the region’s economic crisis.

About 20 European government leaders, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande, and British Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, attended the ceremony in the Norwegian capital.

But not everyone approved the decision to give the prize to the EU, which was created 60 years ago.

Three Peace Prize laureates — South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Mairead Maguire of Northern Ireland, and Adolfo Perez Esquivel from Argentina — have demanded that prize money of $1.2 million not be paid this year. They said the bloc contradicts the values associated with the prize because it relies on military force to ensure security.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Mairead Maguire, and Adolfo Perez Esquivel (AP)

Amnesty International said Monday that EU leaders should not “bask in the glow of the prize,” warning that xenophobia and intolerance are now on the rise in the continent of 500 million people.

Prize committee Chairman Thorbjoern Jagland handed the Nobel diplomas and medals to EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, EU Council President Herman Van Rompuy and president of the EU Parliament Martin Schulz at a ceremony of in Oslo’s City Hall.

Jagland said the EU was instrumental in making “a continent of war (become) a continent of peace.”

“In this process the European Union has figured most prominently,” he told an applauding gathering of several hundred people.

This year’s prize comes against a backdrop of protests as the debt crisis for countries using the euro currency triggers tensions within the union, causing soaring unemployment and requiring massive austerity measures.

(AP)

In his speech, Jagland said that European unity has become even more important as the EU battles its financial problems.

“The political framework in which the union is rooted is more important now than ever,” he said. “We must stand together. We have collective responsibility.”

Jagland said the awarding committee had decided to honor the EU, which grew out of the conviction that ever-closer economic ties would make sure that century-old enemies such as Germany and France never turned on each other again.

(AP)

He described that reconciliation as “probably the most dramatic example in history to show that war and conflict can be turned so rapidly into peace and cooperation.”

He said the presence of Merkel and Hollande on Monday made “this day very particular, symbolic for all of us,” prompting applause and bows from the two leaders.

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Featured image courtesy the AP.

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Comments (50)

enderwiggen
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 2:04pm
The Nobel Peace Prize is a joke.

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- Cemoto78
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 2:20pm
  Ever since they awarded it to Dear Leader Obama for doing nothing but getting elected, it has been a joke. The Nobel prize for economics is even more of a joke since they awarded it to Paul Krugman.
  
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- REPUBLICANINCALI
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 2:43pm
  Just like our schools.Everyone gets a trophy. No need to work to earn it.
  
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- Secret Squirrel
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 7:19pm
  If you’ve won a Nobel peace prize, don’t tell anyone.
  They’ll laugh at you.
  
  Report this comment
- Rebalee
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:23pm
  The first time I considered it a joke was when they gave it to Jimmy Carter for interfering where ever he could in foreign affairs. Then they confirmed how bogus it is by giving it to Al Gore. Then after becoming mildly interested in it and why. I find they seem to find the least likely person deserving and award them with it. LOL because it truly is a joke!
  
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- grunkentomp
  Posted on December 13, 2012 at 2:31pm
  The prize has been a joke. Have you heard about Dr. Xu? He is suing them for giving the award for something that’s already been invented – by him! I kid you not :
  
  It’s potentially what we’ve all been waiting for: medicine that stimulates regeneration and reparation in the body; it’s the first step towards guiding our own evolution with technology. Only, we might not get that chance if this lawsuit doesn’t succeed. Dr. Xu is seeking credit for his work wrongly misattributed in last year’s Nobel awards; let’s hope he succeeds. Read about this development here: http://bit.ly/TV18zw
  
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Xiccarph
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 2:04pm
It would befit the EU to demand payment in Chinese ren min bi. haha

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Budrow
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 1:51pm
They may have “won it” but (like O-bomb-o) what the hell did they do to “earn it”? What a crock-full of crap that organization has become. I think O-bomb-o should be nominated for an Oscar for his many well done theatrical performances. He was able to lure all of the mac&cheese and illegals and phone-less to vote for him, that was an award winning performance for sure. Go Barry go!

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Frederick_Douglass_Republican
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 1:44pm
The nobel peace prize has been hijacked by the mentally ill (liberals).
It is now well known that whomever or now whatever the prize is awarded to is a destructive force in the world.

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Xiccarph
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 1:43pm
Guess this is the modern application of NBP. No more individuals, just left wing PC, touchy-feely groups, both governmental and not. “You didn’t build that”…you-had-lots-of-help type of thing. Of course Obama, being the True One in distribution and equity, got the NBP because of his agenda…oh, and his “nice words and good ideas”. Real nice how this peace and human rights thing is going, isn’t it??

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VoteRightDammit
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 1:27pm
Nobel Peace Prize couldn’t be more absurd than it has become.

These wombats destroyed their credibility more effectively than if they sought to do just that on purpose.

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- Silvertruth
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 1:40pm
  I disagree, they were being charitable. Now they can waste the prize money helping to bail out Greece!
  
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Josiah13
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 1:26pm
Ah the beauties of “collective responsibility.” Basically no one is responsible for anything. The EU wins a prize for taking a passionate, artistic and meaningful culture and reducing it to penury in the course of a few years. This is the ultimate trophy. They are trying desperate to reward Europe with something to keep them hanging on long enough for us to follow them down into the abyss. The union should have a public ceremony, dissolving itself and throwing these medals into the water at Normandy.

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fgarvin
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 1:04pm
Ain’t it funny that all of Europe now relies on Germany to save its sorry a$$. How sad is the rest of Europe that a country like Germany can be torn down repeatedly and still come back to kick all your a$$es over and over again. “You’re all weak and worthless now drop and give me 20.” Germany, get out of the EURO so as America collapses, the producers here have a place to go!

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Pauln
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 12:46pm
When are we going to STOP giving money to this losers, and let their pathetic Euro and Union go to hell once and for all. The only reason they still exist is because of our money. And they even have the nerve to attack, insult and make fun of us, and even try to take our land? How long are we going to put up with it? Perhaps instead of writing all this comments we should be writing to congress

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- moreteaplease
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 1:37pm
  True, but then what good would that do? Recent history has proven that no one in congress is listening to us anymore.
  
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- Pauln
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 9:45pm
  Yes I agree, but what other way can we all take, unless we somehow find the way to “force” them to do the right thing for our country? any thoughts?
  
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caleejr
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 12:33pm
I’m sure they can use the money – LOL

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rsanchez1
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 12:14pm
If that’s the reason they gave, the US should have been awarded the prize. We, more than anyone else in the entire world, “promoted peace and human rights in Europe following the devastation of World War II.” We stationed our men and women throughout Europe. We gave Europe free money to rebuild.

We should take our money and military out of Europe. Let them deal with the Russians on their own.

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- TheBurningTruth
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 1:22pm
  Too right you are! In fact, even the EU’s predecessor the EEC didn’t exist until 1953 and the EU itself came into being in the 1972 with only three members. Nothing like the EU existed for many decades after WW2.
  
  The Marshall Plan (conceived by an army General and not a damned politician) gave Western Europe over $2B in 1948 dollars (probably more like $20B today) to feed people and rebuild industry. The millions of Americans and billions of American dollars kept it free of the Soviet Union for 40 years. Now those political hacks in Helsinki give the EU the Peace Prize? For what?
  
  Well, if a bonobo can receive it for nothing, I guess anybody can.
  
  Report this comment
toiletclogga
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 12:08pm
The ESPY’s have more credence than this POS award!

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COFemale
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 12:03pm
This was once a noble award that has now been turned into a joke by Progressives. Their self-adulation just amazes me. Why do Liberals have the need to hear they are special? You AREN’T SPECIAL, YOU ARE LIKE THE REST OF US. Heaven forbid you don’t get your participation trophy.

Yes, little johnny playing with yourself is you exploring your self awareness, mean while little johnny becomes your next sex offender and Liberals wonder why.

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- cptenn94
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 12:31pm
  they wont wonder why little johney became the sex offender, they will likely say it was the one he offendeds fault, and then blame republicans, and what conservatives stand for….you should know by now….if something goes wrong, it is always the right wings fault….
  
  but i agree….the nobel award has been turned into something pathetic, a mere shadow of its former self..
  
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UNALIEN
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 12:01pm
A Socialist Committee giving anther Socialist person/organization a gold star for participation…

“As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began.
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool’s bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return! “

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RightUnite
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:54am
You’ve absolutely got to be kidding me??!!

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SilentReader
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:50am
All the awards in the world will not hide the fact that the Nazi and Fascist-founded EU is a criminal organization that is seeking to shut up everyone in Western Civilization and create a Fabian Socialist nightmare where they will erase Sovereign Nations and take them over.

During Clinton-NATO’s illegal war on the former Yugoslavia they brought in the al Qaeda and Mujahedeen terrorist into Bosnia in NATO planes to wreak havoc on the Christian Serbs there and 300,000 Serbs were terrorized into leaving their homes in Croatia. There were no consequences for the criminal globalists who got away with their crimes. The real Srebrenica story was the 3,500 Serbs who were horrifically murdered in their small villages in and around Srebrenica by criminal Oric and he was let go with a 2-year imprisonment by the criminals at the Hague and then he only served 6 months of that sentence and was let go by Izetbegov’s Bosniak terrorist state! Now he is free to commit new crimes.

The EU is enriching itself with the proceeds from the criminal KLA Muslim Albanian Mafia in Kosovo and Albania, the Mujahedeen-Ustashe Nazi government in Croatia, and the Montenegrin Mafia that they have been colluding with in Montenegro. And the EU are importing terrorists into Europe via the former Republics of Yugoslavia that have become terrorist states, Bosnia, Kosovo, Montenegro, and Croatia, and changing the demographics there to favor the vile Islamists.

No award will cover up their treachery!

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- Walkabout
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 12:25pm
  I did know that Albania & Kosovo had so much criminal activity that it was a major support of the economy. The region is a great conduit of sexploitation & sex trafficking. Well they are showing that the red light district of Pompey supported the wealthy. I should have suspected that people (who need characterization) in the EU profit from this.
  
  What I didn’t know was Oric.
  
  2,000 people killed by one side is the same order of magnitudes as 8,000 on the other side. Yet the difference in sentence handed out show favoritism. Depending which one comes 1st then it show : naiveity by the EU.
  
  Maybe you don’t publish your posts as prominently as they should. This Oric information is disturbing. Maybe I read it & forgot. Maybe the press kept a lid on it. I am fairly well informed about foreign events at least compared to 90% to 98% of the population. Yet I did not remember or know of Oric. I’ll have to verify. Post more da_mn it
  
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- Walkabout
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 12:29pm
  Prosecutors had asked for an 18-year jail-term for Oric, who was sentenced by the UN’s International Tribunal for War Crimes in the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) to two years in jail for failing to prevent men under his command killing and mistreating Serb civilians in the town of Srebrenica in 1992-1993.
  
  http://www.jihadwatch.org/2006/07/bosnia-convicted-war-criminal-returns-to-heros-welcome.html
  
  http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/744158/posts
  
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- Walkabout
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 12:31pm
  . In the book “A Chronicle of Our Cemetery”, Milivoje Ivanisevic, listing the names of the people killed and the locations where crimes occurred
  
  http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/744158/posts
  
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AUsername
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:47am
don’t forget to give the federal reserve and the tsa their nobel peace prize.

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- Walkabout
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 12:49pm
  Was it as good form you as it was for the TSA?
  
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Silversmith
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:44am
The criteria for this prize has completely eroded. And what will the award do for the EU?? Nothing monetary really. It’s small change for the freakin’ mess they have become.

Silversmith

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RaydocX
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:41am
why is ANYONE surprised, when this august body voted the same prize to Obama less than a year after taking office?

Nobel’s intent was honorable and there have been some truly inspired men and women honored by the prize, but frankly, there have been several dubious, clearly politically motivated choices, selected over more deserving individuals, or representing years in which no prize should have been awarded.

as to giving the EU the award, the prize money will be a blip gone in an instant with the simmering financial problems still threatening the member nations.

and when countries like france have insisted on dealing with Iran, and the union as a whole is intended to leverage better return from unaligned nations, the entire premise seems laughable.

as to Desmon et al’s complaint, a nation without security forces will not long be a nation, so the logic is flawed, unless they are actually lobbying that no ‘body’ should be the recipient over individuals.

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Hodmokrin
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:40am
I was nominated for a Nobel peace prize simply by utilizing a courtesy flush in the restroom. Then they gave it to Obama anyway…. can you believe that? I had done more than for humanity then he had when he was awarded the prize.

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- BODYBAG
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:50am
  Dang. You beat me to it.
  
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RANGER1965
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:40am
Is this like the participation trophy kids get in 6th grade for….showing up?

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BasketFullOfPuppies
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:33am
No surprise here. They gave BO the prize before he had done anything. Now they are giving the prize to those that have done everything wrong.

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doomytram
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:30am
Well that’s about as ridiculous as awarding Obozo the nobel prize. Remember, the USA is going to be a bigger more corrupted and bankrupted Greece soon, very soon. Obozo is hell bent on his Ba-effing-na-na Republic being the most excellent third world country in the world. Go Bozo!

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Rothbardian_in_the_Cleve
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:26am
Ha! I’m not sure what’s funnier, the EU winning it or Barry Soetoro? In one case you have riot cops beating the heck out of the populace on a daily basis and in the other you have expansion of wars to include the bombing of now 6 nations, extrajudicial killings of citizens, global gun running, etc.

I’ll still say Barry’s was more of a joke, but this one is certainly up there.

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- Gary_K
  Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:34am
  Next year they will give it to either Morsi or the UN.
  
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Zipit
Posted on December 10, 2012 at 11:25am
HMMMM! It has been, it is, and it always will be the “LIBERAL WAY”! REWARD FAILURE!!!!

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