International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) bags 2017 Nobel Peace Prize

The Nobel Peace Prize for the year 2017 was awarded to The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) on Friday afternoon which was nominated as the winner for the prestigious crown by a panel appointed by the Norwegian parliament from a total of 318 known and reported candidates.

The committee said ICAN had received the prize for "its work to draw attention to the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons and for its ground-breaking efforts to achieve a treaty-based prohibition of such weapons."

The Nobel Peace Prize, worth nine million Swedish crowns ($1.10 million), will be presented to ICAN in Olso, Norway on December 10.  ICAN is a joint venture of non-governmental organisations from around 100 different countries across the globe. ICAN is termed as one of the leading civil society actor for its efforts to achieve a prohibition of nuclear weapons under the international law. The Nobel Committee stated that the next steps towards attaining a world free of nuclear weapons must involve the nuclear-armed states.