Finnish diplomat Martti Ahtisaari wins Nobel Peace Prize
Martti Ahtisaari has quietly worked to resolve conflicts in Iraq, Northern Ireland, Kosovo and Namibia. 'He never gives up,' the head of the Nobel Prize committee says.
Calling him an "outstanding international mediator," the Norwegian Nobel Committee on Friday awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 2008 to former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari for his efforts to resolve international conflicts across the globe, from Northern Ireland and Namibia to Kosovo, Indonesia and Iraq.
His efforts over three decades, including convening secret meetings in Finland this year between warring Sunni and Shiite groups from Iraq, "have contributed to a more peaceful world and to 'fraternity between nations' in Alfred Nobel's spirit," the committee said in announcing the award.
"He is a world champion when it comes to peace and he never gives up," said Ole Danbolt Mjoes, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel awards committee.
The lifelong diplomat, who heads a nongovernmental organization called the Crisis Management Initiative, is known as a quiet, self-effacing negotiator willing to step out of the way until needed and then to take a firm hand and, at times, risks to broker peace.
"Martti is a brilliant negotiator and mediator with a tremendously effective personal style that combines charm and good humor with an iron determination," said Gareth Evans, president of the International Crisis Group, of which Ahtisaari is chairman emeritus.
Ahtisaari told Norwegian public broadcasting NRK that he considered his work as U.N. special envoy to Namibia to be his greatest accomplishment. He shepherded the country through a decade of negotiations between South-West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO) guerrillas and the South African apartheid government, resulting in Namibian independence in 1990.
"Of course Namibia is absolutely the most important since it took so long," Ahtisaari said.
He said he would use the prize money of about $1.4 million to continue funding his Crisis Management Initiative.
Ahtisaari has the peacemaker's advantage of coming from the neutral country of Finland. He was born in Karelia, which he left at the age of two during a 1939 Soviet invasion, an experience he has described as giving him a sensitivity to the plight of refugees caught up in wars.
As a young man he set up a teacher training college in Pakistan for a Swedish charity, and joined the Finnish Foreign Ministry in 1965. He began his international diplomatic career as Finland's ambassador to Tanzania in 1973, serving as his country's youngest ambassador. He then served at the United Nations in New York and became U.N. Commissioner for Namibia in 1977. He was named the U.N. envoy there the following year.
