Trump Calls Norway a “Stain” for Denying Him the Nobel Peace Prize

US President Donald Trump has blasted the Nobel Peace Prize decision as “disgraceful,” declaring it has left an “indelible stain” on Norway and insisting the honour should have gone to him.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee on yesterday named South African judge and human rights advocate Navi Pillay as this year’s laureate, citing her work tackling war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Speaking at a rally in Syracuse, New York, Mr Trump dismissed the selection as “a disgraceful and embarrassing decision,” adding that he had “never heard of” Ms Pillay.

“I never heard of this particular person, but congratulations anyway,” he said.

“The United States of America, represented by me as your president, should have received the Nobel Peace Prize, but didn’t.”

Mr Trump said awarding the prize to Ms Pillay had put “an indelible stain on the country of Norway”.

The move came after the Nobel Prize was awarded to former ICC judge Navi Pillay

Since returning to the White House in January 2025, Mr Trump has repeatedly signalled he wants to win the Nobel Peace Prize.

However, before Ms Pillay was announced as laureate, experts in Oslo said his war against Iran, his territorial expansion ambitions as in Greenland, his hard line on migrants, and his attacks on multilateralism and the media ruled him out.

The Nobel Peace Prize includes a gold medal, a diploma and a $1.2 million prize sum.

“The Nobel Peace Prize has been forever discredited by a handful of radical ideologues who are anti-democracy and really enemies of civilisation,” Mr Trump said.

After the award was announced, Ms Pillay made a light-hearted remark about the US president, telling an applauding crowd: “If you clap a little bit more, I may share this prize with Trump.”

Read more:

Navi Pillay: From global rights activist to Nobel Peace Prize winner

Her quip appeared to allude to Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, who handed her Nobel gold medal to Mr Trump after winning the prize last year.

ICC sanctions

Mr Trump’s criticism of the Nobel committee came as his administration moved to impose sanctions on the International Criminal Court within hours of Ms Pillay — one of its former judges — being awarded the prize.

The Nobel committee said it was explicitly using the award to signal support for such tribunals at a moment when “judges and institutions of international law are under political attack”.

The International Criminal Court denounced the move as an ‘assault on the rule of law’

The ICC condemned the US action as an “assault on the rule of law and on the very foundations of the international legal order,” urging its 125 member states to take steps to defend the court.

“The court cannot stand alone. Its fate now rests also in the hands of the states that created it,” it said in a statement.

It added: “This is not just about defending a single institution, but about safeguarding the international order grounded upon the rule of law.

“History will judge this moment.”

The Trump administration has long opposed the ICC, which was founded in 2002 to prosecute war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, and has previously targeted its prosecutors and judges with sanctions.

This latest step goes further, potentially penalising companies that provide services to the court itself — an unprecedented escalation against an institution established under an international treaty.

The United States initially signed the Rome Statute that created the ICC but never ratified it.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the US ‘will ban transactions with this rogue court’

“President Trump will never allow the International Criminal Court to prosecute Americans,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement first published by Reuters.

He said: “That is ‌why, today, the United States is sanctioning the International Criminal Court.

“We ⁠will ban transactions with this rogue court, cutting off their resources and crippling its ability to operate.”

The US Treasury said the sanctions would begin with a six-month grace period, alongside exemptions allowing some transactions involving telecoms, software, payment of pensions and dealings related to detainees.

Mr Rubio said the measures were designed to give the court and its member states time to address US concerns, and that they would be adjusted if those demands were not met.

Washington has criticised the ICC over arrest warrants issued for Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and over an investigation into actions of US soldiers in Afghanistan, which the ICC says is “deprioritised”.

In his statement, Mr Rubio pointed to calls from outside experts ‌for the ICC to pursue cases against American service members, border patrol agents and elected leaders.

ICC officials have not taken steps toward such prosecutions.