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Crossing Borders to Heal Brings
them the Nobel Doctors Without
Borders( Medicines Sans Frontieres ), an international
humanitarian physicians group, has won the Nobel Peace
Prize for its aid work around the globe. The prize
includes cash award of about $ 960,000.
The Nobel Committee
said Friday that this prestigious award went to the
doctors' group for recognition of its work, which
includes medical assistance this year in East Timor,
helping victims of last August's earthquake in Turkey and
providing aid in Kosovo. "National boundaries and
political circumstances or sympathies must have no
influence on who is to receive humanitarian help,"
the committee said in a statement. "By maintaining a
high degree of independence, the organization has
succeeded in living up to these ideals."
The group MSF was
founded in Paris in 1971 by a small group of French
doctors. The organization now has 23 offices worldwide
with more than 2,000 volunteers sent to some 80 nations
each year, often Third World countries.
Unlike the other
Nobel Prizes, which are awarded in Stockholm, Sweden, the
Nobel Peace Prize is awarded in Oslo, Norway. The awards
ceremony is Dec. 10.
The MSF volunteeres have a reputation of being first in
and last out in the often very dangerous situations in
which they work.
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