Nobel Peace Prize awarded to anti-nuclear campaign group - by Mark Lewis

The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded Friday to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, an organization seeking to eliminate atomic weapons through an international treaty-based prohibition.

The Geneva-based ICAN won the $1.1 million prize because it "has been a driving force in prevailing upon the world's nations to pledge to cooperate ... in efforts to stigmatize, prohibit and eliminate nuclear weapons," Norwegian Nobel Committee chairwoman Berit Reiss-Andersen said in the announcement.

The prize "sends a message to all nuclear-armed states and all states that continue to rely on nuclear weapons for security that it is unacceptable behavior. We will not support it, we will not make excuses for it, we can't threaten to indiscriminately slaughter hundreds of thousands of civilians in the name of security. That's not how you build security," ICAN executive director Beatrice Fihn told reporters in Geneva.

Read More: Nobel Peace Prize awarded to anti-nuclear campaign group | WJLA