New member proposed for Norwegian Nobel Committee

Nov 10, 2011, 11:03 GMT

Oslo - The Norwegian Labour Party has nominated Berit Reiss-Andersen as a new member of the five-member committee that selects the Nobel Peace Prize winner, reports said Thursday.

At a meeting of Labour Party parliament members Wednesday evening, Reiss-Andersen was proposed to replace Sissel Ronbeck, who has been a committee member since 1994, business daily Dagens Naeringsliv reported.

Reiss-Andersen, 57, is a lawyer who served as state secretary in the Justice Ministry from 1996 to 1997.

Labour Party parliamentary leader Helga Pedersen told the daily that Reiss-Andersen had 'strong political and personal integrity, and was very capable.'

In recent years there have been calls to change the composition of the committee, since many members have, for instance, served in parliament before joining the committee.

Former parliament member Inger-Marie Ytterhorn, of the opposition Progress Party, has also been nominated for a new six-year term. She has served on the committee since 2000.

The terms of the other three committee members expire in 2014.

The Peace Prize is one of the prizes endowed by Swedish industrialist and dynamite inventor Alfred Nobel.

The coveted award is presented in Oslo on December 10, the anniversary of Nobel's 1896 death. Separately, awards for medicine, physics, chemistry, literature and economics are presented in Stockholm - also on December 10.

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