ISRAEL’S nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu has asked for his name be removed from the list of candidates for the Nobel Peace Prize. But his name would stay on the list – and he had little chance of winning anyway, the institute’s head, Geir Lundestad, said.
Lundestad said Vanunu wanted his name removed because “he is not interested in receiving a prize that Shimon Peres had received, since he considers Shimon Peres the father of the Israeli atomic bomb”. Vanunu, who has long figured on a list of candidates for the prestigious prize, was jailed in 1986 for disclosing the inner workings of Israel’s Dimona nuclear plant to Britain’s The Sunday Times newspaper.
“He can write all the letters he wants. He has been proposed by people who are eligible to nominate candidates, so his name will remain on the list,” Lundestad said, adding he was unlikely to win the award.
Mordechai is the most unlikely of heros. He worked in the then secret Israeli nuclear facility at Dimona, and in 1986 revealed that Israel had the bomb to the London Times. He was lured back to Israel by a Mossad agent posing as a "chick" where he was arrested and imprisoned for 18 years. Since then, he’s been a thorn in Israel’s side – refusing to play ball with their attempts to quiet him. Daniel Ellsberg, America’s number one whistleblower, refers to him as "the preeminent hero of the nuclear era."
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