COMMENTARY: The Norwegians, they did it again

There is a tradition of disappointed Finnish presidents when the Nobel Peace Prize is handed out

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By Unto Hämäläinen
     
      At 11:43 on the morning of Friday October 13th, the Finnish News Agency STT sent an urgent message down the wires:
      "In the event that President Martti Ahtisaari is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize: at 12:45, President Tarja Halonen will be available to speak to media representatives in the Presidential Palace".
      A few seconds after 12 o'clock it became apparent that Tarja Halonen would not need to hold a press conference.
      All the same, the sending of an invitation was an interesting gesture. It revealed that the Finnish leadership believed to the very last that Ahtisaari was firmly in the frame to win the Peace Prize.
      Preparations had been made for the announcement, and a congratulatory statement had already been written up for Halonen, which she would have presented on radio and TV.
     
When the prize went elsewhere, it felt as if Finland as a whole had somehow been winged. The media, too. Whole spreads of richly-illustrated Ahtisaari profiles and background stories went unread as the "publish" buttons remained unpressed.
      My own piece was one of them.
      It would have been headlined Blessed are the Peacemakers.
     
From the outset, Ahtisaari's Nobel candidacy was a state project. Already last December, the members of Parliament's Grand Committee and Foreign Affairs Committee had put forward a formal suggestion that Ahtisaari be rewarded for his efforts.
      All political groupings were behind the venture. This was necessary and important, since the Peace Prize is decided on by a five-member committee appointed by the Norwegian Parliament. The members are former Norwegian politicians and come from all the major groupings, from the left, centre, and right of the political spectrum.
     
The Finnish MPs based their nomination on Ahtisaari's work in securing a solution to the Aceh peace talks and his long service in other peacemaking activities.
      The Nobel Committee began its selection process in March of this year. The choice was made in complete secrecy, and the documentation surrounding it will become public only fifty years from now.
      The general feeling in Finland was that Ahtisaari's stock was rising. The deal struck between the Indonesian government and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) had proved a lasting one, and the anniversary of its signing was celebrated with much fanfare in August.
      This was a good moment for a party, as the Peace Prize Laureate was chosen during August and September.
     
Finns also banked a good deal on the fact that Ahtisaari's current role - as UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan's Special Envoy for the process of determining the final status of Kosovo - would score extra points.
      The Kosovo connection was seen as providing a gentle reminder to the Nobel Committee of an earlier Ahtisaari peacemaking success: the ending of the fighting and the NATO bombing in Yugoslavia in 1999.
      That agreement was signed with Slobodan Milosevic on the basis of a proposal put forward by Ahtisaari, the former Russian Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin, and the U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott.
      Ahtisaari's merits were not enough to sway the Committtee. He did not receive the prize, and President Tarja Halonen's congratulatory speech will be buried away in the archives.
     
This is not an unprecedented event. At least once before, much the same procedures were followed.
      In the CSCE year of 1975, when leaders from the U.S., the Soviet Union, and across Europe signed the Helsinki Final Act, the then President Urho Kekkonen was a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize.
      On that occasion, too, the sense that the award was in the bag was so firm that a speech of thanks was written for Kekkonen to deliver.
      He never got to read it out, as instead of Kekkonen getting the Peace Prize it went that year to the Soviet nuclear scientist and dissident Andrei Sakharov.
      In his biography of Kekkonen, Juhani Suomi took the view that the decision even coloured Kekkonen's attitude towards Norway. In the last years of his presidency, Kekkonen was rather chilly towards the Norwegians.
     
Is it possible that Ahtisaari's treatment could have the same effect on Finnish-Norwegian relations?
      Hardly. The Norwegians are just as good and helpful neighbours as they always have been.
      We still remember how nicely the Norwegian head coach apologised to the Finns at the Lillehammer Winter Olympics in 1994, when our cross-country medal hope Mika Myllylä broke a ski-pole and received no help from a trackside Norwegian team official.
      This time Finland suggested Martti Ahtisaari, whose great-grandfather on his father's side had emigrated from Norway. It was not enough.
      We do not have any statesmen with more Norwegian credentials to offer, so let the prize go.
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 15.10.2006


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Ex-President Ahtisaari does not want to be Nobel candidate any more (16.10.2006)
  Ahtisaari and the fourth chair (3.10.2006)
  Ahtisaari calls Aceh treaty surprisingly successful on first anniversary (15.8.2006)
  The Negotiator (21.2.2006)

UNTO HÄMÄLÄINEN / Helsingin Sanomat
unto.hamalainen@hs.fi