EU wins 2012 Nobel Peace Prize

The Nobel Peace Prize was on Friday awarded to the European Union, an institution wracked by the euro crisis but credited with bringing more than a half century of peace to a continent ripped apart by World War II.

"The union and its forerunners have for over six decades contributed to the advancement of peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights in Europe," Nobel Committee president Thorbjoern Jagland said in Oslo.

In a first reaction from one of the three main EU institutions, European Parliament head German Socialist Martin Schulz said on Twitter he was "deeply touched, honoured that the EU has won the Nobel Peace Prize. Reconciliation is what the EU is about.

It can serve as an inspiration." European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso said it was a "great honour" for the entire 27-member bloc.The prize for the EU, however, is a shocker at a time when European solidarity is facing its most daunting challenge in decades amid deep rifts between a south drowning in debt and a wealthier north, led by Germany, only reluctantly coming to the rescue.

Whether or not that begrudging assistance will keep the European project afloat remains to be seen, but the deep crisis has broadened the gulf already felt between citizens in the different member states and a Brussels long seen as too distant and bureaucratic. "The EU is currently undergoing grave economic difficulties and considerable social unrest," Jagland acknowledged Friday.

AFP