Trump says he deserved 8 Nobel Peace Prizes for wars he claims to have settled
US President Donald Trump has criticised Norway for not awarding him the Nobel Peace Prize, claiming he deserved eight prizes for the wars he says he helped end.
Addressing a rally in Syracuse on Friday, Trump also claimed to have saved 50 million lives by preventing a war between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan.
“The United States of America, represented by me as your president, should have received the Nobel Peace Prize, but didn’t. And this is an indelible stain on the country of Norway, and those people that made such a disgraceful and embarrassing decision,” Trump said.
He further accused the Nobel Peace Prize decision-makers of discrediting the award, describing them as “radical ideologues” who were “anti-democracy” and “enemies of civilisation”.
“We will not forget, Norway, that you didn’t give this prize,” Trump said.
The US President also criticised the choice of this year’s laureate, South African human rights lawyer Navi Pillay, a former United Nations human rights chief. Trump described the recipient as someone “nobody ever heard of”.
“The Nobel Prize was given out today (Friday) to a liberal person who works at the United Nations, who nobody has ever heard of. I've never heard of the person, but congratulations anyway,” he said.
Trump then listed the conflicts he claims to have helped settle, saying he was working towards ending two more — the conflicts involving Iran and Russia-Ukraine.
“We will not forget Norway, that you didn't give this prize with the greatest record in history — eight wars, we should have had eight Nobel Prizes for each war — but that you didn't give the Nobel Prize for Peace to the United States of America,” he said.
Trump also claimed that he had prevented Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and saved more lives than anyone in history.
“Additionally, I stopped Iran from having a nuclear weapon and blowing up the entire Middle East and ultimately far beyond the Middle East, including Europe, perhaps the US, and I saved more lives than anyone in history,” he said.
Four US presidents have received the Nobel Peace Prize: Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama.
Obama received the award in 2009, during his first year in office. Trump has repeatedly criticised the decision, arguing that Obama received the prize despite, in his view, having done little to merit it.
