Venezuelan opposition chief and Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado waves to supporters outdoors the White Home following a gathering with U.S. President Donald Trump on January 15, 2026 in Washington, DC.
Chip Somodevilla | Getty Photos Information | Getty Photos
Norwegian lawmakers reacted with shock and dismay over Venezuela opposition chief María Corina Machado’s determination to current U.S. President Donald Trump together with her Nobel Peace Prize medal.
“It is fully remarkable,” Janne Haaland Matlary, a professor of worldwide politics on the College of Oslo and former state secretary within the overseas affairs ministry, informed public broadcaster NRK on Friday.
She known as Machado’s gesture “disrespectful” and “pathetic,” saying it undermined the worth of the prize, which the Norwegian Nobel Committee awards yearly.
Raymond Johansen, a Norwegian lawmaker for the center-left Labour Occasion and former governing mayor of Oslo, stated in a Fb submit it was “extremely embarrassing and damaging to one of many world’s most revered and necessary prizes,” in keeping with a Google translation.
Machado, who met Trump on the White Home for the primary time on Thursday, stated the present to the U.S. president was a “profound expression of gratitude for the invaluable help of President Trump and america to the Venezuelan individuals.” It comes after a U.S. army operation seized Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, on Jan. 3.
The U.S. president thanked Machado on social media, describing it as a “fantastic gesture of mutual respect.” The White Home later posted a photograph of Trump and Machado, with the U.S. president holding up a big, gold-colored body displaying the medal.
A bust of Swedish chemist, engineer, inventor, businessman, and philanthropist Alfred Nobel (1833-1896) is pictured outdoors the Norwegian Nobel Institute in Oslo, Norway on January 8, 2026.
Jonathan Nackstrand | Afp | Getty Photos
The Nobel Peace Heart, a museum in Norway’s capital devoted to the Nobel Peace Prize, stated in a submit on X: “A medal can change house owners, however the title of a Nobel Peace Prize laureate can’t.”
The Norwegian Nobel Committee and the Norwegian Nobel Institute had beforehand stated: “The details are clear and properly established. As soon as a Nobel Prize is introduced, it can’t be revoked, shared, or transferred to others. The choice is ultimate and stands forever.”
“Whoever has obtained the prize has obtained the prize,” Trygve Slagsvold Vedum, chief of Norway’s Centre Occasion, informed NRK. “The truth that Trump accepts the medal says one thing about him as a kind: a traditional scapegoat who will adorn himself with different individuals’s awards and work,” he added.
The White Home was not instantly obtainable to remark when contacted by CNBC on Friday.
‘Politics over peace’
Trump has often spoken about his need to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. The White Home responded to the Nobel Committee’s determination to award Machado the medal in October final 12 months by saying that they had “proved they place politics over peace.”
Some Norwegian lawmakers appeared blissful to brush off Machado’s gesture, nonetheless, saying it shouldn’t be seen as a sign of who the award rightfully belongs to.
Dag-Inge Ulstein, chief of Norway’s center-right Christian Democratic Occasion, informed NRK that there’s “little question” that the Nobel Peace Prize nonetheless belongs to Machado.
Ine Eriksen Søreide, Norway’s former protection minister and a member of the center-right Conservative Occasion, agreed with Ulstein.
“Though Trump has now obtained the medal, it doesn’t imply that he has obtained the Peace Prize,” Søreide stated.
