Nobel Prize as a Weapon?

Nobel peace and literature awards have become a weapon in the hands of the Western European democracies. They use it to admonish rogue governments. They wanted to punish the Chinese after the Tiananmen Square massacre and the prize went to His Holiness, the Dalai Lama. Chinese squirmed but could not do anything. To punish the Myanmar’s junta, they gave the award to Aung San Suu Kyi. To punish the Iranians, the award went to Shirin Abedi. In the aftermath of 9/11 terror attack, the literature award went to Sir V S Naipaul who has never shied away from taking the Muslims to task. It seems that this year, the award is going to go to Chinese democracy activist Liu Xiaobo that has left the Chinese seething. The deputy Foreign Minister went to Norway to threaten the Nobel committee with consequences. It remains to be seen if they are going to show the same fortitude this time as they did when the award went to His Holiness the Dalai Lama or they are going to buckle down under the newly powerful and rich Chinese. Now I am OK with all these actions of the Nobel committee. Shaming these criminals is a good idea. However, when they allegedly relented to the British and denied M K Gandhi under the British pressure, then they are on the wrong. Whether you like Gandhi or not, the peace prize was meant for a man like him. For the Nobel committee to bow down to the Churchillian might, was a sign of moral weakness and it has tarnished this award for me forever.

Nobel Committee faces down the dragon
By Sreeram Chaulia
The director of the Nobel Institute, Geir Lundestad, revealed last week that Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister Fu Jing had met him in Oslo in June to deliver a warning that the "unfriendly gesture" of honoring Liu with the prize "would have negative consequences" for bilateral relations between China and Norway.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry confirmed that pressure was being exerted on the Nobel Committee on the grounds that Liu had never promoted "peace between peoples, international friendship and disarmament." According to a ministry spokeswoman, awarding Liu would be contrary to the ideals of the prize's founder, Alfred Nobel.
The article can be read at:
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LJ06Ad02.html