Ten days ago, the 2013 winner of the Nobel Peace Prize was announced. This year featured a record number of nominations for the award, and the committee was no doubt hard-pressed to choose a winner among so many deserving people and organizations. When the decision was announced, many were shocked to hear that the winner of the 2013 Nobel Peace Prize was the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
While it is hard to say that this award wasn’t deserved, it is equally difficult to see the justice in giving an award to an organization that is literally performing the task it was created to accomplish: to verify both the prohibition and elimination of chemical weapons by the signatories of the Chemical Weapons Convention. It is an important goal, but the work seems less than equal to the reward — an award whose recognition would be better afforded to many of the other nominees.
Take, for example, Malala Yousafzai, a voice for women’s right to education in her home district of Swat in Pakistan. For taking a stance, she was targeted by assassination and shot by Taliban gunmen. When she first started speaking out, she was 11 years old; at the time of the assassination attempt she was 15.
Contrast her story with that of the OPCW. While both espouse ideals that appeal to our Western frame of mind, Malala’s story carries with it the weight of someone who stuck to her beliefs and principles despite threats and action taken against her. So far, it has cost the OPCW nothing to oversee the dismantling of Syria’s chemical weapons, it has just brought the organization publicity as the world focuses on the nation’s ongoing civil war.
So far, it has cost the OPWC nothing to oversee the dismantling of Syria’s chemical weapons.
No one has threatened to dismantle the organization, nor have the members of the organization become targets for assassination. But Ms. Yousafzai nearly paid for her principles with her life at an age when most of us are thinking about getting a driver’s license.
It seems to me that the Peace Prize has become a political award. Were it not for the conflict in Syria bringing the issue of chemical weapons to the forefront, it is doubtful this organization would have been recognized, as they have yet to pressure either the United States or the Russian Federation to destroy their stockpiles.
When Barack Obama received the prize, he had been in office for less than a year, and won for the peace processes and demilitarization initiatives he intended to accomplish (and still hasn’t). Since winning the Peace Prize, President Obama has ordered numerous drone strikes, and even violated the territorial sovereignty of the nation of Pakistan in order to capture Osama Bin Laden, something that could technically be construed as an act of war. Yasser Arafat also collected a Nobel Peace Prize for his role in the Oslo Peace Accords, despite having used violent terrorist tactics against the State of Israel for decades.
Parties such as these are not worthy of recognition by such an august body as the Nobel Committee. It’s time they stopped awarding these prizes based on politics, and reward those who take great risks for the greater good of humanity.
