There has been fierce fighting in recent months despite Russian claims that most of the rebels have been killed.. Former American President Jimmy Carter won the Nobel Peace Prize today for his peace mediation efforts and promotion of human rights in, what the awards committee said was, a criticism of US policy and “a kick in the leg” to those following the same line. The list remains secret for 50 years, but those who nominate sometimes announce their choice.Many known nominees reflected the 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States and their aftermath, including former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.The first Nobel Peace Prize, in 1901, honoured Jean Henry Dunant, the Swiss founder of the Red Cross. The prizes were created by Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel in his will and always are presented on10 December, the anniversary of his 1896 death.This year’s Nobels started on Monday with the naming of medicine prize winners American H Robert Horvitz and Britons Sydney Brenner and John E. Sulston for groundbreaking research into organ growth and cell death – work that has opened new avenues for treating cancer, stroke and other diseases.The physics award went on Tuesday to Masatoshi Koshiba, of Japan, and Americans Riccardo Giacconi and Raymond Davis Jr. for using some of the most obscure particles and waves in nature to increase understanding of the universe.On Wednesday, the economics prize went to Americans Daniel Kahneman and Vernon L. Smith for pioneering the use of psychological and experimental economics in decision–making On the same day, American John B.

Fenn, Koichi Tanaka of Japan and Kurt Wuethrich of Switzerland were given the chemistry prize for making two existing lab techniques work for big molecules like proteins.Imre Kertesz, a Hungarian who survived Auschwitz as a teenager, won the literature prize Thursday for writing that “upholds the fragile experience of the individual against the barbaric arbitrariness of history,” the Swedish Academy said.. The Washington area sniper cast a shadow of fear still wider yesterday when police confirmed that the murder of a motorist at a petrol station in Virginia was the seventh fatal attack on random victims in eight days. Like the other victims, Mr Meyers was struck by a single bullet in the upper part of his body. A witness has said he saw a white van leaving the crime scene shortly after 8pm ­ a description similar to the white box van seen at one of last week’s attacks. “It’s a minivan but instead of windows around the side, it’s solid. We don’t know about windows in the back,” Sergeant Kim Chinn, of Prince William County police, said of the vehicle at Manassas It resembled a Dodge Caravan, she said. How many people were in the van was unclear.Two of the earlier victims were shot when they were on garage forecourts, open spaces offering the sort of long sightlines favoured by the killer.

With the confirmation that Wednesday’s attack is the latest in the series of random shootings, the sniper is now known to have in a sense encircled the capital, adding to the fears of residents.The first five murders were in the space of 16 hours on 2 and 3 October, in Montgomery County, Maryland, immediately north of Washington. On the evening of 3 October, only hours after the fifth murder, a man was killed in northern Washington DC.In the next attack, a woman was shot and wounded in a shopping mall near Fredericksburg, 50 miles to the south. Then on Monday, a 13-year-boy was shot and badly wounded as he was arriving at school with his aunt at Bowie, Maryland, to the east of the capital ­ an attack that led schools in the area to impose heavy security measures. Yesterday he was said to be in a stable but critical condition after surgery. The gunman (or a “copycat” goaded to emulate him) has now struck in the west.Despite thousands of leads, the drafting in of hundreds of agents from the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, and a reward standing well over $300,000 (£200,000), the police are struggling to crack the case.The best lead was a tarot card found where the sniper laid in wait for the schoolboy on Monday.