Gore, U.N. climate panel win Nobel Peace Prize

By John Acher and Wojciech Moskwa

OSLO (Reuters) - Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore and the U.N. climate panel won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for helping galvanize international action against global warming before it "moves beyond man's control."

Political opponents saw the award as a snub to President George W. Bush who has doubted the science of global warming and rejected caps on emissions of gases believed to cause it but the White House said it was happy for the winners and praised their work.

Gore, who lost narrowly to Bush in the 2000 presidential election and who some hope will run again in 2008, shared the $1.5 million prize with the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

The former Democratic senator, speaking in California, called global warming "the most dangerous challenge we've ever faced" but declined to address whether he might enter the presidential race. He has said he has no plans to do so.

The committee awarded the prize from a near record field of 181 candidates for their efforts to draw attention to mankind's impact on the climate and measures needed to address it.

"Action is necessary now, before climate change moves beyond man's control," the committee said.

It warned that climate change -- linked to droughts, floods and rising seas -- could threaten living conditions across the world, prompt mass migrations and increase the risk of wars.

"We wish to put world climate on the agenda in connection with peace," committee chairman Ole Danbolt Mjoes said.

Since leaving office in 2001, Gore has lectured extensively on the threat of global warming and last year starred in his own Oscar-winning documentary film "An Inconvenient Truth" to warn of the dangers and urge action against it.

"He is probably the single individual who has done most to create greater worldwide understanding of the measures that need to be adopted," the Nobel committee said. "The IPCC has created an ever-broader informed consensus about the connection between human activities and global warming."

The committee said the case for action to stop global warming has been made convincingly by science.

"Whereas in the 1980s global warming seemed to be merely an interesting hypothesis, the 1990s produced firmer evidence in its support. "In the last few years, the connections have become even clearer and the consequences still more apparent."

The debate on global warming has focused partly on the certainty of the science, and some skeptics say that observed climate changes are within the range of natural variations.

PRESSURE FOR BALI DEAL

The award was seen raising pressure on the world to agree a new deal to combat global warming at a U.N. climate conference in Bali, Indonesia in December. Gore and the IPCC will collect their prize in Oslo on December 10, while it is under way.