Alfonso García Robles

Facts

Alfonso García Robles

Photo from the Nobel Foundation archive.

Alfonso García Robles
The Nobel Peace Prize 1982

Born: 20 March 1911, Zamora, Mexico

Died: 2 September 1991, Mexico City, Mexico

Residence at the time of the award: Geneva, Switzerland

Role: Diplomat; delegate to the United Nations General Assembly on Disarmament; former Secretary for Foreign Affairs

Prize motivation: “for their work for disarmament and nuclear and weapon-free zones”

Prize share: 1/2

“Mr. Disarmament”

Alfonso García qualified as a lawyer and held a diploma from the Academy of International Law in the Hague. He embarked on a long career as a diplomat, including various posts at the UN headquarters in New York.

After the Cuban missile crisis in 1962, Garcia Robles played a key part in the laborious efforts to make Latin America a nuclear-free zone, which led to an agreement signed by 14 states in Mexico City in 1967.

When the agreement had been concluded, García Robles continued his work for peace. He participated in the formulation of the non-proliferation agreement for nuclear arms of 1968, and figured prominently in the UN's special sessions on disarmament. He was also Mexico's Foreign Minister for a little over a year.

But it was as a diplomat that García Robles achieved his greatest triumphs. The last time he visited the UN Headquarters, he was lauded as “Mr. Disarmament”.

To cite this section
MLA style: Alfonso García Robles – Facts. NobelPrize.org. Nobel Prize Outreach AB 2023. Mon. 4 Dec 2023. <https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1982/robles/facts/>

Back to top Back To Top Takes users back to the top of the page

Streams during Nobel Week

Watch the 2023 Nobel Prize lectures, the Nobel Prize Concert, Nobel Week Dialogue, the prize award ceremonies in Oslo and Stockholm and Nobel Peace Prize Forum here at nobelprize.org.
Watch lectures and award ceremonies

Explore prizes and laureates

Look for popular awards and laureates in different fields, and discover the history of the Nobel Prize.