Norwegian Football Federation president calls for FIFA Peace Prize abolishment: ‘These prizes will typically be…’

Lise Klaveness, the president of the Norwegian Football Federation (NFF), has reportedly called for the FIFA Peace Prize to be scrapped to avoid political interference.

In December 2025, United States President Donald Trump was controversially awarded the FIFA Peace Prize during the group stage draw of the 2026 World Cup.

FIFA had announced the prize in November 2025, but without prior approval of the FIFA Council, in a bid “to reward individuals who have taken exceptional and extraordinary actions for peace and by doing so have united people across the world”.

FIFA president Gianni Infantino has enjoyed a good relationship with Donald Trump, and because of this, many believe that the award was created as a mere consolation prize for the latter.

“We don’t think it’s part of FIFA’s mandate to give such a prize. We think we have a Nobel institute that does that job independently already.

“We think it’s important for football federations, confederations and FIFA to try and avoid situations where this arm’s length distance to state leaders are challenged. These prizes will typically be very political if you don’t have really good instruments and experience to make this independent.

“To have a jury and criteria is full-time work. It’s so sensitive. From a resource angle and from a mandate angle but, most importantly, from a governance angle, I think it should be avoided also in the future," she added.

FIFA had not announced the nominees for the peace prize, and the spokespersons also failed to inform as to on what basis or by whom the winner would be announced. Gianni Infantino has also been accused of breaching FIFA's neutrality rules amid his relationship with Donald Trump.

FairSquare, a human rights campaign group, have even written a letter to FIFA stating that Infantino did breach the neutrality rules. Klaveness welcomed FairSquare's move, saying: “We have been outspokenly critical of the process because it wasn’t anchored in the FIFA Council and it’s also, in our opinion, outside of the FIFA mandate to make such a prize.

“It should also be assessed if it’s a breach of the political neutrality. That will be up to the ethical committee to assess.

“We think it’s important not to just say things in (the) media but we have checks and balances within the organisation. First and foremost we support that FairSquare has made the complaint and that it should be addressed, it should be assessed and it should be a transparent process," she added.

Klaveness has been a regular critic of FIFA. In 2022, she had condemned the treatment of migrant workers in Qatar and even questioned the host selection process of the 2022 FIFA World Cup.

However, the report adds that she is not planning anything similar during the 76th FIFA Congress that will take place in Vancouver on Thursday.

The USA, Canada and Mexico will jointly host the 2026 FIFA World Cup that will be held from 11 June to 19 July. For the first time ever, 48 teams will compete in the tournament.