A man who disrupted the Nobel prize ceremony in Oslo by waving a Mexican flag streaked with red in front of the peace prize laureates has been fined, Norwegian police said Thursday. The protest at the presumed massacre of 43 Mexican students came as Malala Yousafzai and India's Kailash Satyarthi displayed their prizes to rapturous applause on Wednesday, with the man shouting, "Don't forget the students in Mexico."
The security breach is especially serious since child rights activist Malala remains a target for Islamist extremists. Police quickly escorted the man out of the building. "It shouldn't have happened," Oslo police chief John Fredriksen told reporters. The asylum seeker has been since handed over to immigration police. "The 21-year-old man who got into City Hall and disturbed the Nobel award ceremony has been fined for disturbing the peace and for entering illegally," a police statement said. The man agreed to pay a fine of 15,000 krone ($2,000, 1,700 euros).
He did not have an invitation to the ceremony but probably slipped in with a group of journalists. Mexican media said he was a left-wing militant who wanted to draw the world's attention to the disappearance of 43 students in southern Mexico caught up in the country's bloody drug war. The two Nobel laureates appeared unperturbed by the incident. "There was nothing to be scared of," Malala said in a press conference Thursday. "There are problems in Mexico, there are problems even in America, even in Norway. So the problems are always there in every country and it's really important that children raise their voice, children come forward," she added.
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