This Friday the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize is announced in Oslo, at 11 local time.

And, with a war developing in Europe for seven months, the Ukrainian president,

Volodimir Zelensky and the Ukrainian people

themselves sneak into the pools.

Could you take it away?

As is often the case with Nobel Prize winners - and with almost all prestigious awards - wishes often go unfulfilled.

And this is so because the selection of the winner has certain criteria, a very extensive list of proposals and, above all, a calendar.

In addition to the fact that the war has not yet ended -and it is not yet clear how or when it will end- it happens that the period for submitting nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize ended on January 31, almost a month before Russia decided to invade its neighboring Ukraine and thus begin a war that has claimed at least

100,000 deaths.

In fact, the fact that the European continent is in the middle of a war conflict has triggered speculation about the possibility that

the prize will be declared void

, something that has happened on nineteen occasions, the last one in 1943, in the middle of World War II.

In this regard, the Mexican president, López Obrador, criticized a few days ago the MEPs who have proposed that Zelensky win the Nobel Peace Prize.

"With all due respect to the European Parliament, proposing the President of Ukraine as a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize, regardless of whether we participate in favor of one or the other,

how is one of the actors in the war conflict going to receive the Nobel Peace Prize ?

Peace? Why not Pope Francis, the UN director himself (António Guterres)?

", he declared.

The Mexican president questioned the support of dozens of European politicians who since March have demanded that the Nobel Committee consider Zelenski and the people of Ukraine for the prize that is awarded this Friday.

Although it is true that the members of the Nobel Committee can propose their candidates at a meeting that takes place months before the award - this year it was held in March - as explained by the director of the Peace Institute (PRIO) in Oslo, Henrik Urdal, it is very difficult for both Zelensky and the Ukrainians to receive the award.

Urdal named the Belarusian opponent

Svetlana Tijanóvskaya

and the Russian activist

Alexei Navalny

;

also to

the International Court of The Hague;

the Hindu Harsh Mander;

Uyghur Ilham Tohti, Hong Kong activists Agnes Chow and Nathan Law;

and the Human Rights Data Analysis Group and the CANVAS center which advocates the use of nonviolent resistance in promoting human rights and democracy.

Another of the clear favorites for the Nobel is the

fight for the defense of the environment,

a recurring candidate in recent years, personified above all in the Swedish activist

Greta Thunberg

, but also in other figures such as David Attenborough or the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Tuvalu, Simon Kofe.

However, the Norwegian Nobel Committee already recognized in 2007 the former US vice president Al Gore and the Indian Rajendra Pachauri, who was then chairing the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), for laying the foundations for action to counter climate change.

The World Health Organization (WHO), the Black Lives Matter movement, Pope Francis, the journalist Julian Assange and the Prime Minister of New Zealand, Jacinda Ardern, among others, also appear in the pools.

According to the will of Alfred Nobel, the Swedish tycoon who instituted the prizes that bear his name, university professors of Law, History and Political Science, parliamentarians, former laureates and members of international tribunals, among others, can nominate candidates for the Peace Award. .

Only if those who propose a person or organization make it public can the identity of the candidates be known, since the Norwegian Nobel Committee only publishes the total number of applicants -

343 in 2022, the second highest figure -

and does not confirm names until 50 years later.

Thus it is known that among the nominees this year are also the Arctic Council, the Burmese civil disobedience movement and the Honduran scientist María Elena Bottazzi, for her contribution to humanity with the Corbevax vaccine against covid.

The Nobel Peace Prize recognized last year for the first time two journalists, the Filipino Maria Ressa and the Russian Dmitri Murátov, "for their efforts to defend freedom of expression, a precondition for democracy and lasting peace," according to the failed.

This is the only one of the six prizes that is awarded and delivered outside of Sweden, in Oslo, at the express wish of the creator of the awards, the Swedish tycoon Alfred Nobel, since in his time Norway was part of the neighboring country.

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