Norwegian Security Service: Russia tried to influence Nobel Committee using fake letters from Ukraine
The Norwegian Police Security Service stated that the Russian special services attempted to influence the Nobel Committee in order to avoid awarding the Peace Prize to the President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, as reported by the Norwegian public broadcasting company NRK.
To discredit Poroshenko, in the summer of 2015, the Russian TV channel Sputnik disclosed a letter signed by the then Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada, Volodymyr Groysman, addressed to the U.S. Ambassador to Norway.
According to the letter, American diplomats had allegedly received the support of two out of the five members of the Nobel Committee. However, the President Poroshenko stressed that "it is essential to obtain guarantees," of receiving the award.
Both the U.S. Embassy and the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine denied the authenticity of the letter.
Two weeks after the publication of the letter, two representatives of the Russian Embassy came in the office of Secretary of the Committee, and Director of the Norwegian Nobel Institute, Olav Njølstad.
Njølstad said that it was an "absurd" meeting, and when he asked the Russians if they knew about the letter, "they said that they did not know, and then started smiling," he said.
After the meeting, Njølstad appealed to the Norwegian security services, which found out that one of the diplomats, who came to the office, was an officer of the Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation.
The Norwegian Police Security Service talked about the involvement of the employees of the Russian Embassy in the incident but did not disclose any names.
The Russian Embassy has sent a written comment to the NRK, where it expressed its disagreement with such conclusions and stated that "the collection and analysis of information on foreign and domestic policy and exchange of views is an important part of the daily work of diplomats of any country."
The Russian Embassy also said that "meetings with the representatives of the Nobel Committee, including the one mentioned, have precisely this purpose."
Since the lists of the nominees for the Nobel Peace Prize are published 50 years after the prize is awarded, it is not known whether Poroshenko was among the candidates to receive it.