Nobel Prize not awarded objectively, Erdoğan says

ANKARA

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stepped up his criticism of various international institutions on Dec. 3. AA Photo

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has continued his criticism of various international institutions, claiming that “even the Nobel Prize is not awarded objectively.”

"Do not hope for objective points of view in a world where international institutions decide according to their own ideologies, politics and beliefs. Is the Nobel awarded objectively? No. Does the UN Security Council make objective decisions? No, never," said Erdoğan, speaking at the Presidential Awards Ceremony on Dec. 3.

With his latest criticism, the president has slammed the Nobel Committee for the second time. He also blasted the committee in August 2013, for awarding the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize to Egyptian politician Mohammad ElBaradei, who he said had “sided with the makers of the military coup” in Egypt.

“We cannot abandon our cinema, literature and art. Turkey cannot silently watch while hegemons write the history of arts and science,” Erdoğan said on Dec. 3.

His words come one day after heralding a revamped curriculum for schools in Turkey, after complaining that students know about foreign figures like Albert Einstein but not Muslim and Turkish ones. Last month, Erdoğan instructed Turkey’s educational institutions to highlight the contribution of Islam to global science and arts, including “the discovery of the American continent by Muslim sailors 300 years before Columbus.”

In his Dec. 3 speech, Erdoğan also criticized the U.N. Security Council for allowing “only five major powers to effectively make all decisions,” Anadolu Agency reported. "The UN, which was established on the post-World War I international system, is short of representing the whole world. The entire world's destiny cannot be in the hands of five countries only," he said.

The Norway Nobel Committee has refused to comment on the Turkish president’s latest statements, stressing that it “does not respond to personal opinions,” according to Cihan News Agency.