(Newswire.net— April 30, 2018) — One of the largest UK betting agencies, Coral, doesn’t exclude the possibility that the Nobel Prize for peace could end up in the hands of Donald Trump, Kim Jong-Un or Vladimir Putin. The chances, however, are slim.
Two leaders often criticized for threatening World peace, North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un and US President Donald Trump are the unexpected leads for the peace prize, Russia Today reports. Kim and South Korean President Moon Jae-in are the odds-on favorites at 4/6, followed by Trump at 10/1, according to Coral’s betting list.
The odds given to Trump who bragged that he was “very proud” after 92 people were killed when he dropped the “mother of all bombs” on Afghanistan in 2017, is almost the same as the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
Kim Jong-Un’s odds for winning the Nobel Peace Prize sky-rocketed after a historical meeting held last week with South Korean President Moon, who could be nominated along with his northern counterpart.
Russian President Vladimir Putin is a choice on Coral’s betting list, but with slim chances 50/1 to win. However, the Russian leader has twice the odds of winning the Noel Prize for Peace compared to UK’s Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn who sits at 100/1.
The Nobel Prize for Peace Laureates differs from other categories by focus of the Nobel Awards Committee on what candidates could do rather than what they did, which often leads to harsh criticism in public.
When US President Barack Obama received the prestigious award in 2009, just a few months after taking office, he said he was surprised. As he came to Oslo to receive the award at the end of the year, he ordered the tripling of the number of US soldiers in Afghanistan. Surprised or not, Obama accepted the Nobel Prize believing he deserved it.
The only politician who ever rejected the glory of this prestigious prize is Vietnamese leader Le Duc Tho who didn’t want to share the prize with US State Secretary Henry Kissinger who was later accused of playing a significant role in America’s secret bombing of Cambodia in 1969 and 1975.
The Nobel Prize was founded by Alfred Nobel, inventor of dynamite, who also enriched himself from producing and selling weapons. The Peace Prize, worth 9 million Swedish crowns ($ 1.1 million), can be awarded to one or more individuals or organizations.
A number of winners of the Peace Prize later launched wars or caused the escalation of global conflicts.