A total of 305 nominations have been received for this year’s Nobel Peace Prize, the Nobel Institute announced on Wednesday in Oslo.
The nominations, which remain below the record number of 376 registered in 2016, include 212 individuals and 93 organisations, the institute said on its website.
In accordance with the Nobel statutes, their names will remain secret for 50 years, but the thousands of sponsors - parliamentarians and ministers from all countries, former laureates, university professors etc. - are free to reveal the identities of their nominees.
As occurred last year, many of the known nominations relate to the war in Ukraine: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, his Turkish counterpart Tayyip Recep Erdogan, Nato chief Jens Stoltenberg and a working group working to set up an international war crimes tribunal for Ukraine.
From Russia's Alexei Navalny to Myanmar's defiant ambassador
Also included are Russians critical of President Vladimir Putin: opposition figure Alexei Navalny, journalist Vladimir Kara-Mourza and the pro-democracy youth movement Vesna.
Other names expected to make the list include two young climate activists, Sweden’s Greta Thunberg and Uganda’s Vanessa Nakate, Iranian feminist Masih Alinejad and her anti-hijab movement My Stealthy Freedom, and the Salvation Army.
Also reportedly on board are Chinese pro-democracy activists Chow Hang-tung, Peng Lifa and the Uighur Tribunal group, Myanmar's UN ambassador, Kyaw Moe Tun (sacked by the junta but still in office) and the anti-junta coalition NUCC, and Egyptian humanitarian Maggie Gobran.
Last year’s Nobel Peace Prize went to a highly symbolic trio: Memorial - the NGO the Russian judiciary ordered disbanded in December – the Ukrainian Centre for Civil Liberties and imprisoned Belarusian activist Ales Bialiatski.
