Germany's Helmut Kohl among favorites for Nobel Peace Prize (Roundup)

Oct 7, 2010, 9:51 GMT

Oslo - A record 237 nominations for the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize, which is to be announced Friday, gave the secretive Norwegian Nobel Committee plenty of choice.

The five-member committee's surprise pick in 2009 was US President Barack Obama, who had barely entered office when the nomination deadline expired.

On the eve of this year's announcement, former German chancellor Helmut Kohl has again been mentioned as a possible winner. But this may be his lucky year, according to Norwegian broadcaster NRK.

The 80-year-old conservative politician, who led the Federal Republic of Germany, or West Germany, from 1982 to 1990. He was a driving force behind east-west reunification in 1990.

The last German to win the Nobel Peace Prize was then-chancellor Willy Brandt in 1971.

Speculation has otherwise centred on the likelihood of a Chinese dissident winning. One name in the spotlight is Liu Xiaobo, the jailed dissident writer who has been pushing for democratic reforms in China.

Liu authored Charter 08, a political manifesto similar to the Charter 77 of one-time Czech dissidents. He has been endorsed by, among others, Nobel peace laureates Desmond Tutu, South Africa's former Anglican archbishop, and the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibet.

Other Chinese nominees include AIDS activist Hu Jia and human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng.

Nominees for 2010 also include the Russian human rights organisation Memorial and human rights defender Svetlana Gannushkina, who has campaigned for migrants and refugees.

Congolese physician Denis Mukwege, who has treated hundreds of women subjected to gang rapes in the conflict-ridden country, has also been put forward for the prize.

'If an individual gets it, it has to be someone who has stood up for something, who has taken personal risks,' Norwegian Nobel Committee head Thorbjorn Jagland said in a recent interview.

Some observers said this could mean the committee will name an activist.

Sima Samar, a former United Nations special envoy to Sudan and the head of Afghanistan's human rights commission, tops the shortlist compiled by the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO).

Samar has had to contend with criticism from 'conservative religious leaders' as she has struggled for the rights of women, said PRIO director Kristian Berg Harpviken.

Among the 237 nominees this year were 38 organizations.

Harpviken has tipped the Special Court for Sierra Leone as possible laureates, should the committee choose an organisation for its role in the aftermath of armed conflicts.

The exile Myanmar media organization, Democratic Voice of Burma, that broadcasts to the military-ruled country is another tip.

The peace prize is one of the awards endowed by Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite. Earlier this week Nobel prizes for medicine, physics, chemistry and chemistry were awarded. The literature prize is to be announced Thursday and the economics prize on October 11.

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