Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed at the European Council headquarters in Brussels Jan. 24, 2019. AP Photo/Francisco Seco

43-year-old Ahmed was also recently congratulated for his role in helping create a powersharing deal in Sudan, after a political crisis that led to the arrest of Omar al-Bashir, who was the ruler of the country for nearly 30 years.

Berit Reiss-Andersen, Chairwoman of the five-member Norwegian Nobel Institute that awards the Nobel Peace Prize said Ahmed was named for his moves to end his country's conflict with next door Eritrea within months of coming to office in 2018. He signed a "Joint Declaration of Peace and Friendship," with Eritrean Prime Minister Isaias Afwerki.

Within the Nobel Peace Prize there is a long history of prizes going to statesmen associated with ending conflicts, most recently Colombia's Juan Manuel Santos who was awarded the prize in 2016 for helping to bring his country's 50 year civil war to an end.

The winner of the 100^th Nobel Peace Prize was announced at 11 AM CEST (5 AM Eastern Time), after careful deliberation. There were a total of 301 candidates running for 2019’s prestigious award. Among them were 223 inpiduals and 78 organizations.

“I think what Abiy did with the Eritrea issue was very courageous and remarkable. I think a lot of people have considered that what he has done is worthy of such a recognition. The two countries are no longer in the state of war. Families have been reunited because flights are now running between the two countries. Relations that have been severed for 20 years have been rekindled,” Awol Allo, an associate professor of law at Keele University in the United Kingdom, told the media.

2018’s Nobel Peace Prize was given to former ISIS slave Nadia Murad and Dr. Denis Mukwege, from Congo.

Le Duc Tho, former Secretary of the Central Party Committee shared the Nobel Peace Prize with former US Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger, with whom he negotiated the Paris Peace Accords of 1973. But Tho turned it down, saying peace had not yet been achieved.

“Peace has not yet really been established in South Vietnam. In these circumstances it is impossible for me to accept the 1973 Nobel Prize for Peace which the committee has bestowed on me.”

Tho made the history with this statement, by being the first and only person who refused to accept Nobel Peace Prize.

2009- Barack Obama “for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.”

2010 – Liu Xiaobo “for his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China”

2011 – Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, Leymah Gbowee and Tawakkul Karman “for the security and women’s rights”

2012 – European Union “for having over six decades contributed to the advancement of peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights in Europe”

2013 – Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons for its work in destroying chemical weapons

2014 – Kailash Satyarthi (India) and Malala Yousafzai (Pakistan) “for their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education.”

2015 – Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet “for its decisive contribution to the building of a pluralistic democracy in Tunisia in the wake of the Jasmine Revolution of 2011”

2016 – Juan Manuel Santos “for his resolute efforts to bring the country’s more than 50-year-long civil war to an end, a war that has cost the lives of at least 220,000 Colombians and displaced close to six million people”

2017 – International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapon “for its work to show the humanitarian crisis of any use of nuclear weapon and for its ground-breaking efforts to achieve a treaty-based prohibition of such weapons.”

2018 – Denis Mukwege, Nadia Murad “for their efforts to end the use of sexual violence as weapon of war and armed conflict.”