EU awarded Nobel Peace Prize 2012
According to the Norwegian Nobel Committee the European Union and its forerunners have contributed to peace and reconciliation for six decades, but professor Peter Walensteen at Uppsala University says the organisation has done little in recent years to justify the prize.
Today 12 October the European Union was presented as the winner of 2012 year’s Nobel Peace Prize, stating that ‘The union and its forerunners have for over six decades contributed to the advancement of peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights in Europe. ’
The Nobel Committee writes in its press release that ‘Over a seventy-year period, Germany and France had fought three wars. Today war between Germany and France is unthinkable.’
Peter Wallensteen, Professor of Peace and Conflict Research at Uppsala University, still thinks that the EU could have done more for peace, especially in recent years:
‘It is of course correct that there haven’t been any wars in Western Europe since World War II and the European cooperation has contributed to this fact, that is indisputable I think. What has been lacking is peace work outside Europe.’
In 2010 Peter Wallensteen together with a number of other researchers published a report on the European Union’s peace work. The report concludes that the EU and its member states had increased their participation in war, but not in peace efforts.
‘We thought the EU was not making use of the possibilities available within the organisation’, says Peter Wallensteen.
‘I don't think we have seen anything in recent years that justifies giving the peace prize to the EU. The EU plays a very small part in a number of different contexts where it could be a more important participant.’
David Naylor