Barack Obama arrives in Norway to receive Nobel Peace Prize
A scientist who escaped suicide bombers, a writer who endured years of persecution in communist Romania and an American president who has yet to serve his first full year in office are among those to be honoured on Thursday with this year's Nobel Prizes.
Obama stepped off Air Force One into the crisp morning air of this Norwegian city after flying overnight from Washington with his wife, Michelle, and a small group of friends and relatives who are accompanying him on a brief trip to Norway.
The president will have a morning meeting with Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg and a private audience with King Harald V and Queen Sonja at the Royal Palace of Norway.
The day’s events culminate in the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony, where Obama will accept the 2009 award and deliver a speech before an audience of about 1,000 people at Oslo City Hall. He will address members of the Nobel committee, who stunned the world and Obama himself on Oct. 9 by presenting him with the award only nine months into his presidency.
“Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future,” the committee wrote in explaining its decision.
The president’s speech on Thursday, which aides said he was still writing and editing during the seven-hour flight from Washington, will focus directly on the paradox of the moment for Obama as he accepts a prize for peace nine days after announcing that he would escalate the war in Afghanistan by sending in 30,000 new American troops.
Romanian-born author Herta Mueller will receive the Nobel literature award for her critical depiction of life behind the Iron Curtain, work drawn largely from her personal experiences. Mueller's mother spent five years in a communist gulag, and the writer herself was tormented by the Securitate secret police because she refused to become their informant."I've had the experience of fear of persecution. It's emotional, it bothers me, it makes me angry," the 56-year-old said at the traditional laureates' news conference before the ceremony.
Mueller said she was very happy to receive the award but wouldn't reveal what she would do with the 10 million kronor (USD 1.4 million) prize money. "But I'm not buying a yacht so don't worry," she joked.
The Nobel awards in medicine, physics, chemistry, literature and economics are presented in the Swedish capital, Stockholm. President Barack Obama will receive the peace prize in Oslo, Norway, in line with the 1895 will of prize founder Alfred Nobel.
