Swedish journo returns Nobel prize, protesting Handke

By Atila Altuntas

STOCKHOLM (AA) - Swedish journalist Christina Doctare returned her 1988 Nobel Peace Prize to the Royal Swedish Academy on Tuesday in protest against the awarding of the 2019 literature prize to Austrian writer Peter Handke.

Handke is accused of denying the 1995 Bosnian genocide by Doctare, who received the prize as a member of the UN peacekeeping forces.

The 77-year-old Handke was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature despite his open support of Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic, who died of a heart attack in his prison cell in 2006 while being tried for war crimes and genocide at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague.

Handke also claimed that Muslim Bosniaks in Sarajevo had killed themselves and said he never believed that the Serbs had committed genocide in Srebrenica.

Doctare also spoke during protests in the capital Stockholm against Handke's award.

"I was proud of the Swedish Academy, but all I feel now is shame and guilt," she said.

Doctare said she had witnessed the Bosnian massacre 27 years ago and was returning her prize due the Nobel Committee’s decision to award Handke.

*Writing by Dilara Hamit in Ankara