Edward Snowden, Chelsea Manning Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize

[BalanceOfPower]

Edward Snowden, Chelsea Manning Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize

Posted by: Humaima Malik February 5, 2014

US Whistleblowers Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning have been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize 2014 in a joint nomination by Sweden’s and Iceland’s Pirate Party representatives.

“We are nominating Manning and Snowden together because the courage of Manning inspired in Snowden and both of them have inspired thousands of people all over the world to speak truth to power and demand transparency and accountability in their own societies,” stated a joint letter by representatives in the EU parliament from Pirate Party of Iceland and MPs of Pirate Party of Sweden.

The joint nomination letter for the whistleblowers was submitted by the ‘Pirates’ shortly before the February 1 deadline.

The Pirate Party’s Nobel Peace Prize nomination for Snowden is fourth request of its nature. The first formal nomination in this made was filed by a Swedish professor in July 2013 while a group of Norwegian MPs, which included an ex-government minister, and another EU official named the whistleblower their nominee in January 2014.

30-year-old Snowden, a US National Security Agency (NSA) contractor and CIA employee who revealed the agencies’ highly-confidential surveillance programme information to international press in June last year before getting temporary one-year asylum in Russia, was also nominated for Nobel Peace Price 2013 by the 58-member Green/European Free Alliance group in the European Parliament. However, the award went to Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) which dismantled the chemical weapons stockpiles in Syria.

26-year-old Manning, while serving as US Army personnel in Iraq, leaked thousands of confidential documents through whistleblowing website, WikiLeaks. The files included gruesome videos of bloodshed US troops carried out of Iraqi people. Last year Manning was sentenced to 35 years after he was found guilty of leaking the classified information.

The sentimental text of the letter written by Pirate MPs of Iceland and the Pirate MEPs of the European Parliament stated that the Snowden and Manning are “outstanding candidates… have achieved and exceeded all the qualifications required to be worthy laureates of the Nobel Peace Prize”.

The document stated that Manning’s leaks “foster public dialogue on the legitimacy, suitability, and relevancy of the military interventions carried out by US troops,” but also “fueled democratic uprisings around the world, including a democratic revolution in Tunisia” and “helped motivate the democratic Arab Spring movements.”

Referring to Snowden’s revelations the document mentioned: “Citizens, researchers and politicians need insight into these methods to be able to weigh the social consequences and the possible resulting damage to the global society. Mass surveillance erodes the fundamentals of modern democracies; making local laws to protect privacy meaningless within its global scope.”

Nobel Peace Prize is awarded annually on December 10 to those who have “done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies.”

Pakistani teenage education advocate, Malala Yousafzai, who survived an assassination attempt by Taliban in October 2012, has also been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize a second time.

Labour Party legislators Magne Rommetveit and Freddy de Ruiter, who nominated Malala, said she deserves the Nobel Peace Prize “for her brave support for girls’ right to education.”