The Norwegian Nobel Committee has just declare the Nobel Peace Prize winner of 2008. And the winner is Former Finnish president and peace mediator Martti Ahtisaari. Mr. Martti Ahtisaari won for his important efforts, on several continents and over more than three decades, to resolve international conflicts.

A Nobel Peace Prize winner of 2008 is Martti Ahtisaari

Ahtisaari was listed as a potential winner of the Nobel Peace Prize candidate since 2005, after he has negotiated an end the conflict, which began over 130 years ago, when together with the Indonesian government and the leaders of the separatist guerrillas in Aceh.

71-year-old Finn, who is a quiet, stocky man, whose gait affected by rheumatism, is credited to the control of the 2005 reconciliation, the Indonesian government and Free Aceh Movement (GAM) rebels to cease its three-decade conflict that killed about 15000 people.

The holder of five members of the committee have said that Ahtisaari's work around the globe - Africa, Europe, Asia and the Middle East - showed that such work can have a major impact on the peace process.

He has also contributed to lead to Kosovo's down the path towards independence, although his intense mediation efforts did not clinch a joint agreement with Serbia and Kosovo before the Pristina earlier this year, unilaterally declared independence. Read more at wiki page.

Ahtisaari's plan also provides guidelines for the deployment of EU police in Kosovo and other important aspects of how today's Kosovo is performed daily.

The winners of the rest of the 2008 Nobel Prizes are:

• Yoichiro Nambo, physics.
• Makoto Kobayashi and Toshihide Maskawa, physics.
• Osamu Shimomura, Martin Chalfie and Roger Y. Tsien, chemistry.
• Harald zur Hausen, medicine.
• Françoise Barré -Sinoussi and Luc Montagnier, medicine.
• Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clezio, literature.

Other popular contenders included:

• Zimbabwe's former opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
• Ingrid Betancourt, the French-Colombian politician and anti-corruption activist rescued this year after being held for six years by Marxist FARC rebels.
• The Cluster Munitions Coalition.
• The African Union, for restoring peace in Kenya after election-sparked riots.