South African Jurist Nabi Pillay Awarded Nobel Peace Prize

The Norwegian Nobel Committee announced on Friday that South African jurist Nabi Pillay will be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts to promote peace and international law. Unlike other Nobel Prizes, which are presented in Sweden, the Peace Prize is awarded in Oslo, Norway, as stipulated in Alfred Nobel's will.

Last year's prize was awarded to Maria Corina Machado, an opposition leader in Venezuela, for her fight for democracy. The White House at the time criticized the choice, stating that President Trump would continue to forge peace agreements and end wars, and that the committee preferred politics over peace. Trump had considered himself a candidate for the prize, calling himself "the peace president" and claiming to have ended six or seven wars during his term, including conflicts between Israel and Iran, and tensions between India and Pakistan, and Thailand and Cambodia.

Individuals or organizations can be nominated by "nominators," which include national assembly members, government officials, members of international courts, university professors, and former Nobel laureates or committee members. The committee does not publicly disclose the nominees' names for 50 years.

As of 2024, the Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded 105 times to 142 recipients, comprising 111 individuals and 31 organizations. Among the laureates, 92 are men and 19 are women. Three Israelis have received the award: Menachem Begin, Yitzhak Rabin, and Shimon Peres. The first Nobel Peace Prize related to the Middle East was awarded to American Ralph Bunche for mediating the 1949 Rhodes armistice agreements, which ended the War of Independence.

In other Nobel Prize announcements for 2026, Canadian writer Anne Carson will receive the Nobel Prize in Literature. French chemist Henri B. Kagan and Japanese chemist Kenso Suehi will be awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their work on nonlinear effects and autocatalysis in asymmetric organic synthesis. Belgian-American researcher Francis Halzen will receive the Nobel Prize in Physics for his contributions to the IceCube Neutrino Observatory in Antarctica and the discovery of high-energy neutrinos from astrophysical sources. American scientist Karl Deisseroth and German scientists Peter Hegemann and Georg Nagel will be awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their discoveries concerning light-activated ion channels and optogenetics.