The Norwegian Nobel Institute, which assists the Committee that awards the Nobel Peace Prize, announced on Saturday that the laureate, Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, will attend the award ceremony in person on December 10 in Oslo, as she herself has assured.
"We spoke with her last night and she said she will be in Oslo," said Erik Aasheim, head of communications at the Nobel Institute, to EFE. The representative highlighted that the institution could not provide any further details about Machado's trip, who lives in hiding in Venezuela, or about her arrival time for security reasons.
The government of Paraguay announced this week that President Santiago Peña will travel to Norway to accompany Machado to receive the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize, as will the presidents of Panama, José Raúl Mulino, and Ecuador, Daniel Noboa. It is also expected that Venezuelan opposition leader Edmundo González Urrutia, exiled in Spain, and who faced Nicolás Maduro in the July 2024 elections, will attend.
Machado was awarded the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize "for her tireless work in promoting the democratic rights of the Venezuelan people and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy," announced the Norwegian Nobel Committee on October 10 last year.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee stated on November 14 last year that Machado has made it clear that she will travel to Oslo to receive the prize.
However, the leader of the Nobel Committee, Jørgen Watne Frydnes, considered in statements to the public channel NRK that it is "a dangerous trip because the Venezuelan regime has expressed that it wants to get rid of her," so he said he hopes that the opposition leader's security will be guaranteed and that she can get to Norway, but also return to the country.
Machado stated last October to the Norwegian newspaper 'Dagens Næringsliv' that for her to travel to this Nordic country, Venezuela had to be "free" and said that as long as Nicolás Maduro is in power, she cannot leave the place where she is for security reasons.
