Trump Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize for Kosovo-Serbia Agreement

Trump Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize for Kosovo-Serbia Agreement
President Donald Trump, center, participates in a signing ceremony and meeting with the President of Serbia Aleksandar Vucic, left, and the Prime Minister of Kosovo Avdullah Hoti, right, in the Oval Office of the White House on Sept. 4, 2020. (Anna Moneymaker-Pool/Getty Images)
Zachary Stieber
9/11/2020
Updated:
9/11/2020

President Donald Trump was nominated Friday for the Nobel Peace Prize, the second such nomination this week.

Magnus Jacobsson, a member of Sweden’s national legislature, said he submitted the nomination for the Trump administration and the governments of Kosovo and Serbia “for their joint work for peace and economic development, through the cooperation agreement signed in the White House.”

“Trade and communications are important building blocks for peace,” he added in a statement.

Jacobsson is a member of the Christian Democrats.

Pressed on social media on whether the agreement was substantive, Jacobsson said it was “incredibly good” to see the parties sit down and sign a deal after 20 years of open conflict.

“For my part, I hope that it will be the beginning of a process that can result in a peace agreement and mutual recognition,” he added.

Trump oversaw the historic deal in Washington last week. The agreement revolved around Serbia and Kosovo agreeing to normalize economic relations.

The countries had been locked into an ongoing conflict that saw Kosovo declare independence from Serbia in 2008.

Adviser to the president on Serbia-Kosovo Richard Grenell told reporters that the deal wouldn’t have been possible without Trump’s “outsider” perspective.

President Donald Trump delivers remarks at the White House in Washington on Sept. 9, 2020. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters)
President Donald Trump delivers remarks at the White House in Washington on Sept. 9, 2020. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters)

“All of the insiders in Washington said, ‘You’re not talking about recognition, you’re not talking about this symbolic word.’ And what we tried to do is ignore that and from an outsider perspective, go in and dig deep,” he said.

Mutual recognition was not part of the deal.

A Norwegian lawmaker, Christian Tybring-Gjedde, nominated Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize earlier this week.

Tybring-Gjedde said Trump’s role in another historic agreement, between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, drove his submission.

“As it is expected other Middle Eastern countries will follow in the footsteps of the UAE, this agreement could be a game changer that will turn the Middle East into a region of cooperation and prosperity,” he wrote in the letter to the Norwegian Nobel Committee.

A committee spokesman told The Epoch Times via email that he couldn’t comment on the reported nomination, citing a confidentiality clause.

Submissions for the 2020 prize closed in January. The 2021 prize will be announced next October.

Tom Ozimek contributed to this report.