Nobel committee secretary Olav Njolstad said it appears the same person was responsible for forging nominations in 2017 as well

This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

The Norwegian Nobel Committee, which selects winners of the peace prize, has said that someone using a stolen identity has nominated Donald Trump for the award.

The Norwegian news agency NTB quoted committee secretary Olav Njolstad as saying it appears the same person was responsible for forging nominations in 2017, as well.

Njolstad who could not immediately be reached for comment, declined to identify the person, adding that Norwegian police have been informed.

“Every year, we get lots of invalid nominations, but these are nominations that are not valid because those who nominate are not qualified to do so,” Njolstad told NTB. “As far as I know, this is the first example of someone nominating someone by stealing another person’s identity.”

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Norway’s Nobel Committee keeps candidate names secret for 50 years. However, those who can nominate candidates – parliament members, university professors, directors of peace research and international affairs institutes, and former recipients – can go public with candidate’s names.

In January, Henrik Urdal, manager of the Peace Research Institute Oslo, told the Associated Press that Trump had been nominated for the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize but said the nomination “still lacks a strong academic justification”.

The leader of the independent Norwegian peace institute said it was “an American player with the right to nominate a candidate” who told him the person had tapped Trump. Urdal declined to name the person.