Martti Ahtisaari, former Finnish president and United Nation's special envoy at the Kosovo status process negotiations has been awarded the 2008 Nobel Peace prize, Associate France Press (AFP) said on October 10 2008.

“The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided to award the Nobel Peace Prize for 2008 to Martti Ahtisaari for his important efforts, on several continents and over more than three decades, to resolve international conflicts," the head of the Norwegian Nobel Committee Ole Danbolt Mjoes was quoted by the AFP.

Ahtisaari will receive the Nobel diploma, medal and cheque for 1.02 million euro at an official ceremony in Oslo on December 10, AFP said.

Ahtisaari has a history of working as mediator in a number of conflict zones around the world. He took part in the 2005 reconciliation process of the Indonesian government and Free Aceh Movement (GAM) rebels, bringing an end to a three-decade conflict that killed about 15 000 people.

Based on his work in 2005 he was asked to mediate the Kosovo status negotiations between Serbia and its former province. Despite his plan that envisaged Kosovo's independence, Ahtisaari failed to each an agreement between the two sides and called off talks in March 2007. A year later Kosovo unilaterally declared independence from Serbia.

AFP noted that Ahtisaari was originally a teacher who entered the diplomatic service in the late 1960s and was appointed ambassador to Tanzania in 1973 at the age of 36.

As the UN secretary general's special envoy to Namibia, Ahtisaari worked on leading the country down the path towards independence in 1990, although his efforts were much criticised by local media.

In 1994 Finland's Social Democratic Party nominated him to run for the presidency and Ahtisaari became the first directly elected Finnish president.