Which of the following statements about the Nobel Peace Prize for 2023 is/are correct? 1. The 2023 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Narges Mohammadi 2. Narges Mohammadi was awarded the prize for her struggle to bring peace in Afghanistan and Iran Select the answer using the code given below:

Correct — A, 1 only. Statement 1 is right: the Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded the 2023 Peace Prize to Narges Mohammadi. Statement 2 misstates the citation. The award was made for her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and for her fight to promote human rights and freedom for all — a citation about rights inside Iran, with no reference to peace-making in Afghanistan. Mohammadi was in Evin prison in Tehran when the prize was announced and could not travel to Oslo; her children accepted it on her behalf and read a message she had smuggled out.

• (b)2 only — It rejects the laureate's name, which is the one part of the item that is straightforwardly correct, and accepts a citation the committee did not use.
• (c)Both 1 and 2 — The name is right but the reason is not. The citation is about women's rights and human rights in Iran, not about bringing peace to Afghanistan and Iran.
• (d)Neither 1 nor 2 — Statement 1 names the 2023 laureate correctly, so both statements cannot be rejected.

The Peace Prize is the only one of the Nobel awards decided in Norway, by a five-member committee appointed by the Norwegian parliament, while the others are decided in Sweden. Its citation is short and precise, and questions of this kind are usually built by altering it rather than by changing the name. Mohammadi is the second Iranian woman to receive the prize, after Shirin Ebadi in 2003, and one of several laureates who were imprisoned at the time of the award.

The useful habit here is to test the reason separately from the name. Indian coverage of a Nobel announcement carries the laureate's name everywhere and the citation in a single line, so an examiner who wants to separate careful readers from headline readers will alter the citation. Reading statement 2 closely shows that it moves the subject from women's rights to conflict resolution and adds a second country, both of which are departures from the committee's wording.

• The 2023 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Narges Mohammadi of Iran.
• The citation was for her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and her fight to promote human rights and freedom for all.
• She was imprisoned in Evin prison in Tehran when the prize was announced and did not attend the ceremony.
• The Peace Prize is awarded by a committee appointed by the Norwegian parliament, unlike the other Nobel prizes.
• Shirin Ebadi, the 2003 laureate, was the first Iranian woman to receive the Peace Prize.

• Accepting a plausible-sounding citation without checking it against the committee's wording.
• Assuming a Peace Prize must be for ending a conflict; many are for human rights work.
• Confusing the Norwegian Nobel Committee with the Swedish Academy.

A two-statement current-affairs item that pairs a correct name with an altered citation, testing whether the reason was read as carefully as the name.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded by a committee appointed by the parliament of

  • (a)Sweden
  • (b)Norway
  • (c)Denmark
  • (d)Switzerland

  Answer(b) Norway — the other Nobel prizes are decided in Sweden.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Narges Mohammadi, the 2023 Nobel Peace laureate, is a citizen of

  • (a)Iraq
  • (b)Iran
  • (c)Afghanistan
  • (d)Turkey

  Answer(b) Iran — she was imprisoned there when the award was announced.