Nobel | Pakistan

LET us make no mistake. Donald Trump has not received the Nobel Peace Prize. He has simply acquired the medal. This is akin to holding a friend’s Oscar during a selfie and then captioning it ‘great night’. The distinction, however, has never really troubled the American president, who had campaigned for the honour for years. He had listed his achievements numerous times, compared himself favourably to past winners and expressed bafflement that the committee kept missing the point — him. That pursuit was not subtle. President Trump spoke of the Nobel as something he had earned but been unfairly denied, a prize that history had misplaced. The grievance lingered, resurfacing whenever foreign policy or legacy came up. What irony then, that María Corina Machado, the actual Nobel laureate, simply handed the medal to him. With the trophy now sitting on Mr Trump’s desk, destiny must feel restored. The custodians of the prize were quick to clarify matters. The Norwegian Nobel Institute reminded everyone that the Nobel...

Nobel laureate and Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado emerged from hiding to make her first public appearance in almost a year, waving to supporters from the balcony of her Oslo hotel early on Thursday. Machado, who won the Nobel for challenging Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s grip on power, did not arrive in Norway in time for Wednesday’s prize ceremony. Her daughter collected the prestigious award on her behalf, and delivered a blistering acceptance speech in her stead. The Venezuelan democracy campaigner made it to the Norwegian capital hours later, and went straight to see her family, Nobel Prize Committee Chair Jorgen Watne Frydnes said. From the balcony of the Grand Hotel, Machado later greeted a crowd of jubilant supporters, who sang and shouted “libertad” (freedom), according to AFP journalists. Machado, who has been living in hiding in Venezuela, was last seen in public on January 9, when she protested Maduro’s inauguration for his third term. In her Nobel acceptance speech, the ...

Joel Mokyr, Philippe Aghion and Peter Howitt won the 2025 Nobel economics prize on Monday for their work on how innovation and the forces of “creative destruction” can drive economic growth and lift living standards across the globe. Their research explains how technology gives rise to new products and production methods which replace old ones, resulting in a better standard of living, health and quality of life. “Over the last two centuries, for the first time in history, the world has seen sustained economic growth. This has lifted vast numbers of people out of poverty and laid the foundation of our prosperity,” the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, which awards the prize, said in a statement. Economic growth not guaranteed The laureates have also shown that such progress cannot be taken for granted, the Academy said, while two of the prize winners highlighted that US President Donald Trump’s trade policies would impinge on growth. “Economic stagnation, not growth, has been the norm for most of human histo...

Palestinian-origin Omar Yaghi, Susumu Kitagawa and Richard Robson won the 2025 Nobel chemistry prize for developing a new form of molecular architecture, yielding materials that can help tackle challenges such as climate change and lack of fresh water. The three laureates worked to create molecular constructions, known as metal-organic frameworks or MOFs, with large spaces through which gases and other chemicals can flow and that can be utilised to harvest water from desert air, capture carbon dioxide or store toxic gases. Describing the “unheard of properties” of these materials, the award committee said some had a remarkably large surface area — a porous material roughly the size of a small sugar cube could contain as much surface area as a large football pitch. “A small amount of such material can be almost like Hermione’s handbag in Harry Potter. It can store huge amounts of gas in a tiny volume,” Olof Ramstrom, member of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry, said. Uses could include dealing with ‘forever ch...