A petition to give the Nobel Peace Prize to Afghan Nuclear Scientists
April 13, 2002 6:06 AM Subscribe
A petition to give the Nobel Peace Prize to Afghan Nuclear Scientists for hiding radioactive material that could have been used for a nuclear bomb by Al Qaeda. I think it's an inspired and appropriate suggestion, and the petition could be of great use in attraction the attention of nominators and Nobel committee.
Source article: Al Qaeda sought nuclear scientists, to this point ignored by the wire services.
Thanks for posting this; as I noted in the signatures section, the real credit for the idea should go to Kathy Kinsley. This is as much a tweak of the dim bulbs in Norway who have so internalized a detestably racist double standard ("West must be responsible; non-West -- well, heck, they're practically savages") that they would bemoan they can't take away the prize of Shimon Peres while defending giving it to Arafat as well. (Not to mention the shame they ought to feel over the Rigoberta Menchu prize.)
Interestingly, drug and terror judge Garzon of Spain has been nominated this year (2002 nominations closed weeks ago). In Spain, which retains vestiges of Napoleonic law, judges are magistrates who conduct investigations.
In any case, I'm happy with the progress it's made in barely 36 hours; it's already been signed by one person at Lawrence Livermore Labs.
327: petitiononline has abysmal privacy options. I can't even guarantee they'll keep the e-mail addresses secure. Perhaps you'll volunteer to code an alternative site?
In the end the petition carries no weight in any regard. Nominations for the peace prize are by invitation only. The point here is publicity, to catch the eye of people who do have access. That is all.
posted by dhartung at 10:51 AM on April 13, 2002
Thanks for posting this; as I noted in the signatures section, the real credit for the idea should go to Kathy Kinsley. This is as much a tweak of the dim bulbs in Norway who have so internalized a detestably racist double standard ("West must be responsible; non-West -- well, heck, they're practically savages") that they would bemoan they can't take away the prize of Shimon Peres while defending giving it to Arafat as well. (Not to mention the shame they ought to feel over the Rigoberta Menchu prize.)
Interestingly, drug and terror judge Garzon of Spain has been nominated this year (2002 nominations closed weeks ago). In Spain, which retains vestiges of Napoleonic law, judges are magistrates who conduct investigations.
In any case, I'm happy with the progress it's made in barely 36 hours; it's already been signed by one person at Lawrence Livermore Labs.
327: petitiononline has abysmal privacy options. I can't even guarantee they'll keep the e-mail addresses secure. Perhaps you'll volunteer to code an alternative site?
In the end the petition carries no weight in any regard. Nominations for the peace prize are by invitation only. The point here is publicity, to catch the eye of people who do have access. That is all.
posted by dhartung at 10:51 AM on April 13, 2002
kfury, only in the most general sense: Last week, the two Afghan scientists, Mohammed Jan Naziri, a professor of applied nuclear physics, and Jora Mohammed Korbani, a nuclear physics professor, revealed how they had concealed their knowledge from the Taliban.
Kabul University was founded by the USSR in the 1950s, had a fairly decent regional reputation by the 1970s, when it served as the locus of the indigenous Marxist movements, and turned out thousands upon thousands of engineers. I would bet these guys, though, got their own education at a combination of Arab (or Pakistani) schools and Moscow University.
posted by dhartung at 10:25 PM on April 13, 2002
Kabul University was founded by the USSR in the 1950s, had a fairly decent regional reputation by the 1970s, when it served as the locus of the indigenous Marxist movements, and turned out thousands upon thousands of engineers. I would bet these guys, though, got their own education at a combination of Arab (or Pakistani) schools and Moscow University.
posted by dhartung at 10:25 PM on April 13, 2002
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posted by 327.ca at 8:07 AM on April 13, 2002