ElBaradei says Peace Prize a 'shot in the arm'

UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei said yesterday winning the Nobel Peace Prize would give him and his agency a much-needed "shot in the arm" as they tackle nuclear crises in Iran and North Korea.

The award was recognition of his agency's work and an encouragement to continue its efforts, Dr ElBaradei told reporters at the United Nations complex in Vienna.

"The award sends a very strong message: 'Keep doing what you are doing - be impartial, act with integrity', and that is what we intend to do," Dr ElBaradei said after applause from UN staff.

"The advantage of having this recognition today, it will strengthen my resolve."

The 63-year-old Egyptian lawyer and the International Atomic Energy Agency won the 2005 prize for their battle to stop states and terrorists from acquiring the atom bomb and ensure safe civilian use of nuclear energy.

"The fact that there is overwhelming public support for our work definitely will help to resolve some of the major outstanding issues we are facing today, including North Korea, including Iran and nuclear disarmament.

"It is a responsibility but it is also a shot in the arm."

Dr ElBaradei told reporters he had been certain he would not win, despite being favoured, because he had not received the traditional advance telephone call from the Nobel Committee. He only learnt of his win while watching the televised ceremony.

"This came as an absolute surprise to me," he said. "I was watching television with my wife at 11 o'clock fully aware that we did not make it because I did not get the call.

"And then I heard in Norwegian the (IAEA) and my name still in Norwegian is the same, and I was just on my feet with my wife, hugging and kissing and full of joy and full of pride," he said.

The Nobel Committee said before the announcement it had tightened secrecy after Reuters published the names of the 2003 and 2004 winners before the official announcements.

Dr ElBaradei, the first Egyptian winner since President Anwar Sadat in 1978, has faced criticism from many quarters, most recently from the United States and Iran, over his efforts to investigate Tehran's nuclear programme.

Despite that, Dr ElBaradei said he had had a pleasant conversation with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

"Just before coming here, I had a very wonderful talk with Secretary Rice, who wished me well and we agree that we will have to continue to work together."

Factbox

Following are five facts about the IAEA and Dr ElBaradei:

¤ Founded in 1957 in response to the growth of nuclear energy, the agency polices the global pact against the spread of atomic weapons, the 1970 nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) which oversees nuclear safety and promotes the use of peaceful nuclear technology.

¤ After the discovery in Iraq of Saddam Hussein's atomic weapons programme in 1991 after the Gulf War, the IAEA invested heavily in new inspection technology and pushed for countries to sign up to more intrusive, short-notice inspections.

¤ North Korea withdrew from the NPT and expelled IAEA inspectors on December 31, 2002, becoming what Dr ElBaradei called a "serious and immediate challenge to the nuclear non-proliferation regime". Pyongyang announced it had nuclear weapons but agreed at six-party talks last month to scrap its atomic arsenal. In return, South Korea, the United States, Japan, Russia and China expressed a willingness to provide aid and security guarantees. Dr ElBaradei has said he hopes IAEA inspectors return soon.

¤ The IAEA has been investigating Iran's nuclear programme for two-and-half years to determine whether its aims are peaceful as Tehran says or aimed at producing weapons as Washington charges. While it has said it has found no evidence of a weapons programme, Dr ElBaradei's last report on Iran said the Vienna-based IAEA was "still not in a position to conclude that there are no undeclared nuclear activities or materials in Iran".

¤ Despite strong US opposition over his differing views with Washington on Iran and Iraq, Dr ElBaradei was re-elected this year to a third four-year term as IAEA director general after Washington abandoned its campaign to oust him.

Brief History

¤ A record 199 individuals and organisations were nominated for 2005. But getting your name on this list is no great honour - past nominees have included Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler and Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.

¤ Mother Teresa refused to attend a traditional Nobel banquet in Oslo when she came to collect her prize in 1979, saying that the money would be better spent on the poor. The banquet was cancelled.

¤ The International Committee of the Red Cross is the most successful winner with prizes in 1917, 1944 and 1963. And Red Cross founder Henri Dunant of Switzerland shared the first award in 1901.

¤ Protesters threw snowballs at the US ambassador to Oslo when he came to collect the 1973 prize on behalf of Secretary of State Henry Kissinger for brokering a failed peace deal to end the Vietnam war. North Vietnamese leader Le Duc Tho turned down the joint award, the most controversial in the prize's history.

¤ Adolf Hitler banned Germans from accepting Nobel Prizes in disgust after the 1935 award went to pacifist anti-Nazi writer Carl von Ossietzky. The ruling affected three German scientists awarded prizes for chemistry and medicine in the late 1930s.

Winners since 1980

2005: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and its Director General, Mohamed ElBaradei of Egypt

2004: Kenyan environmentalist Wangari Maathai

2003: Iranian human rights lawyer Shirin Ebadi

2002: Former US President Jimmy Carter 2001: The United Nations and Secretary-General Kofi Annan

2000: South Korean President Kim Dae-jung

1999: Medical aid charity Medecins Sans Frontieres

1998: Northern Ireland politicians John Hume and David Trimble

1997: The International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) and campaign coordinator Jody Williams

1996: Roman Catholic Bishop Carlos Belo and Jose Ramos Horta, campaigners for human rights in East Timor

1995: Veteran anti-nuclear campaigner Joseph Rotblat and his Pugwash organisation

1994: Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and PLO chairman Yasser Arafat

1993: African National Congress leader Nelson Mandela and South African President F.W. de Klerk

1992: Rigoberta Menchu, Guatemalan campaigner for Indian human rights

1991: Detained Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi

1990: Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev

1989: The Dalai Lama, exiled spiritual and political leader of Tibet 1988 - UN Peacekeeping Forces

1987: Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, author of a peace plan for Central America

1986: Elie Wiesel, Jewish author and human rights campaigner

1985: International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, led by Yevgeny Chazov of the Soviet Union and Bernard Lown of the United States

1984: Desmond Tutu, head of Anglican Church in South Africa and anti-apartheid campaigner

1983: Lech Walesa, leader of Poland's Solidarity trade union

1982: Shared by Sweden's Minister for Disarmament Alva Myrdal and Mexican diplomat and former foreign minister Alfonso Garcia Robles

1981: Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees

1980: Argentine human rights campaigner Adolfo Perez Esquivel