(MENAFN- Live Mint) The Nobel committee, which selects the winners of the Nobel Prize, has announced on Friday that the Peace Prize for the year 2025 is being awarded to Maria Corina Machado , the opposition leader of Venenuzela,“for her tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy.”

This comes in the wake of US President Donald Trump repeatedly claiming in the past few months that he should be awarded the Nobel prize for“helping” stop what he claims are 'wars' around the world.

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The chairperson of the Nobel committee, Jørgen Watne Frydnes was asked during the announcement of the 2025 peace prize winner why Donald Trump was not considered for the same, to which he replied,“This committee sits in a room filled with the portraits of all laureates, and that room is filled with both courage and integrity.”

Listen to what the chairperson says at 15:16 minute of the video.

“We base our decisions on the work and the will of Alfred Nobel,” he also said.

Trump's dilemma: US has backed Machado's cause

Trump will have a hard time arguing against the Nobel committee's decision since the US government has itself been critical of current Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro .

"I think the main takeaway is that the committee is again demonstrating its independence, that they wouldn't be swayed by popular opinions or political leaders to award the prize," said Halvard Leira, research director at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, to Reuters.

Also Read | Who is Maria Corina Machado? Venezuelan opposition leader wins Nobel Peace Prize

“Trump will interpret this as he wants to, but this is a prize given to a cause which the United States has very much supported over the years,” she said, adding, "The democratic opposition of Venezuela is something that the US has been eager to support. So, in that sense, it would be hard for anyone to constitute this as an insult to Trump."

Can Trump be nominated next year?

The committee took its final decision before the Israel-Gaza ceasefire and hostage deal under the first phase of Trump's initiative to end the war in West Asia was announced on Wednesday, which means Trump was too late to achieve the goal that would have given him the strongest possible reason behind staking his claim on the prize earlier awarded to four American presidents, namely, Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Jimmy Carter, and Barack Obama.

Ahead of the Nobel announcement, experts on the award had also said Trump was very unlikely to win as his policies were seen as dismantling the international world order the Nobel committee cherishes.

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