The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos on Friday for his efforts to end his country’s 52-year-long war with guerrilla forces.
The Nobel committee stated the prize should also be seen as a tribute to the Colombian people who continue to hope for a“just peace” despite abuses and hardships.
A peace accord signed between the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) was rejected by the Colombian people in a recent referendum. Results had 50.2% opposing the deal; 49.8% in favor of it. The civil war has killed nearly 220,000 Colombians and displaced almost six million people.
“The fact that a majority of the voters said ‘No’ to the peace accord does not necessarily mean that the peace process is dead. The referendum was not a vote for or against peace,” the committee stated in its announcement.
“This is a great, great recognition for my country,” Santos commented in an interview, USA Today reports. “I receive this award in their name: the Colombian people who have suffered so much in this war,” he said. “Especially the millions of victims that have suffered in this war that we are on the verge of ending.”
Peace accord negotiators, which includes a representative of the Obama administration, are presently in Cuba attempting to save the agreement that took four years to broker.
FARC commander Timoleon Jimenez commented on the Nobel award by stating in his tweet that “the only award we want is peace with social justice.”
A five-person committee selected by Norway’s parliament awards the prestigious prize worth $930,000 every year to an individual or group who is working for longstanding peace.
Santos, aged 65, is from Bogota, hails from one of the country’s richest families and was educated at Harvard. Married, he has a daughter and two sons.
A former defense minister, Santos became well known after ordering a string of key military operations against the Colombian rebels. One of these FARC camp bombing operations took place in Ecuador and was controversial because he did not inform that country of the strike. For this, critics say, Santos is an unlikely peacemaker.
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