Source : Perth Now news
The Nobel Peace Prize, often considered the most prestigious award on the planet, is set to be announced in Oslo, Norway.
Prognosticators say possible contenders include the International Space Station, emergency teams in Sudan, children’s advocates in Ukraine and two top international courts.
Prime Minister Mark Carney of Canada has attracted attention in prediction markets.
US President Donald Trump – who is waging a war against Iran – has long coveted the prize and repeatedly said he deserved it.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee in Oslo received nominations for 287 candidates for the 2026 prize, and just more than a quarter of them are organisations.
Experts say the committee typically focuses on the durability of peace, the promotion of international fraternity and the quiet work of institutions that strengthen those goals.
In 2026, Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado won the Nobel Peace Prize for her struggle to achieve a democratic transition in the South American nation, winning recognition as a woman “who keeps the flame of democracy burning amid a growing darkness”.
Machado gave Trump her Nobel medal shortly after the United States ousted then-president Nicolas Maduro.
But it was largely a symbolic gesture: the Nobel Committee has said the honour itself cannot be transferred.
Nominations can be made by a select group of people and organisations, including heads of state or politicians serving at a national level, university professors, directors of foreign policy institutes, past Nobel Prize recipients and members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee itself.
Four of the 2026 Nobels were announced this week.
The Nobel for medicine went to three scientists whose work led to a tool that uses light to help unravel how the brain works.
The physics award recognised a scientist’s efforts to demystify a rare group of neutrinos.
The chemistry prize recognised two scientists for untangling mysterious mirror images in molecules, a discovery that has been used to develop countless drugs.
Canadian poet, essayist and translator Anne Carson won the literature prize on Thursday.
The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences will be announced on Monday.
The prize money is 12 million Swedish kronor ($A1.7 million), whether for an individual, small group of laureates or organisation.
The year 2026 marks the 125th anniversary of the peace prize, which has gone to 112 individuals and 28 separate institutions since its inception in 1901.
The Red Cross has won three times and the UN refugee agency twice.
Just 20 of the 112 individual laureates have been women, but eight of those women received the prize in the past 15 years.
Education activist Malala Yousafzai is the youngest laureate; she won at 17 in 2014.
The prize has gone unawarded on 19 occasions, most of them during the world wars.
