The foundation that awards the Peace Prize said that the will of Alfred Nobel stipulates that it can’t be transferred.
The Nobel Foundation said Sunday reiterated its prestigious Nobel Peace Prize cannot be passed on to another person after a Venezuelan opposition leader gifted the prize that she won to President Donald Trump last week.
During a meeting at the White House on Jan. 15, the leader, Maria Corina Machado, gave her Peace Prize medal to Trump, which the president accepted.
However, the Nobel Foundation weighed in on the matter on Sunday, asserting that the prize can’t be transferred.
“One of the core missions of the Nobel Foundation is to safeguard the dignity of the Nobel Prizes and their administration. The Foundation upholds Alfred Nobel’s will and its stipulations,” it said in a statement, referring to the Swedish chemist and inventor of dynamite who started the foundation in the late 19th century.
The will of Nobel had said that the prizes should be given to people who “have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind,” the statement said, adding that his will also “specifies who has the right to award each respective prize.”
“A prize can therefore not, even symbolically, be passed on or further distributed,” the foundation said.
After the prize was awarded to Machado last year, she said she would give it to Trump. She also backed the U.S. military operation that led to the capture of Venezuelan socialist leader Nicolás Maduro earlier this month, although Trump has said that he would not support installing Machado as the leader of Venezuela and instead suggested that Maduro’s vice president, Delcy Rodriguez, be in charge of the country.
In a social media post on Jan. 15, Trump wrote that “Maria presented me with her Nobel Peace Prize for the work I have done. Such a wonderful gesture of mutual respect. Thank you Maria!”
Machado last week said the gift was in recognition of what she called his commitment to the freedom of the Venezuelan people. The White House later posted a photo of Trump and Machado with the president holding up a large, gold-colored frame displaying the medal.
