Nuclear Arms Inspectors Get Peace Prize

Nobel Committee Chairman Ole Danbolt Mjoes, in making the announcement beneath crystal chandeliers in a small vaulted room at the Norwegian Nobel Institute in Oslo, denied the award was meant as a slap at the Bush administration. "This is not a kick in the legs to any country."

But some were unconvinced.

"I've got to believe that the role ElBaradei personally played, and the agency played, in the build-up to the war in Iraq was a major factor in the committee's decision," said Joseph Cirincione, a nuclear expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "ElBaradei was pleading to give inspectors more time, he was on the verge of declaring that Iraq had not reconstituted its nuclear weapons program, which was the major justification for the war, and we now know he was right."

Others suggested the committee sought to bolster ElBaradei as he attempts to navigate a crisis with Iran, which says the nuclear program it built in secret is aimed at producing energy, not bombs. No proof of a weapons program has been found, but the United States and other governments believe Iran should face the threat of U.N. sanctions for concealing its activities. "The message here is that diplomacy is the best approach to take in dealing with tough proliferation cases," said Charles Ferguson with the Council on Foreign Relations.

Despite disagreements over Iraq, Bush administration officials acknowledge that the IAEA's Iran investigation, in its third year, has been thorough and that the agency has uncovered far more than U.S. intelligence could have learned without it.

But ElBaradei has faced criticism for stepping beyond his mandate, playing diplomatic mediator when many officials in Washington and beyond want him and his agency to make more decisive and hard-nosed pronouncements on Iran and other nuclear threats.

"Mohamed really has a more political profile than many people expect of a technical agency," said Robert Einhorn, assistant secretary of state for nonproliferation until 2001. "When he steps outside his appropriate role but in favor of a U.S. policy, we applaud him. But when we don't like this recommendations, we put him in the doghouse," Einhorn said.

As the recipient of what many consider the world's most prestigious award, ElBaradei joins a winners list that includes Woodrow Wilson, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, the Dalai Lama, Jimmy Carter, Mother Teresa and a host of agencies connected, like the IAEA, with the United Nations, including the United Nations itself and Secretary General Kofi Annan. ElBaradei and the agency will share about $1.3 million in prize money.

Nuclear weaponry and peacemaking have been consistent themes of the awards, created by the will of Alfred Nobel, the Swede given credit for the development of dynamite.

The Vienna-based IAEA, established under United Nations auspices in 1957, coordinates nuclear safety around the world and monitors materials that could be diverted for weapons use. It has played pivotal investigative roles in four major crises in recent years: Iran, Iraq, North Korea and the nuclear black market run by one of Pakistan's top scientists.