Maathai, the 12th woman and the first African woman to win the Peace Prize, told reporters at the Nobel Institute that "one reason why women are not as active in peacemaking as they should be is because they are not in the decision-making."

"It is very difficult if you are on the outside shouting to people who are inside the house ... We must put ourselves in the position where our voices can be heard inside the house."

Maathai, dressed in an embroidered emerald green bubu dress with a matching hair band, said she hoped the prize she was accepting "on behalf of many whose faces are not known" would help empower women around the world and especially in Africa.

"I believe that a great honor such as this bestowed on an African woman can only encourage and empower women, especially the African women. And it can only make men stand up and wonder what has hit them," she said with a broad grin.

Women should "understand that the sky is indeed the limit ... if you persist and believe in yourself," she said.

The first environmentalist to have taken the coveted prize, Maathai, 64, was selected by the Nobel committee for her campaign to save Africa's forests.

Kenya's assistant minister for the environment since 2003, she is the founder of the Green Belt Movement -- a campaign to save Africa's forests that began with nine trees in her yard nearly three decades ago, and which has grown into the largest tree planting project in Africa with more than 30 million trees planted across the continent.

Deforestation has been a major problem in Kenya, exposing millions of people to drought and poverty, and by planting trees, the Green Belt Movement has aimed to promote biodiversity, democracy, peace, human rights and giving women a stronger identity in society, Maathai said.

"Most wars that are fought in the world are fought over what? Over natural resources ... If you don't manage your natural resources sustainably, thinking not only of the present but also of the future ... you can not have peace," she said.

The Nobel Committee's decision reflects environmentalism's extraordinary rise from the wings to the centre stage of politics and has been hailed by ecologists the world over.

The choice of Maathai for the prize has also been seen as uncontroversial compared to the past three laureates, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, former US president Jimmy Carter and Iranian human rights lawyer Shirin Ebadi, who were all critical of US President George W. Bush.

She created however a stir just a day after she was announced the winner with reported claims that the AIDS virus was a deliberately created biological agent.

"AIDS (is) not a curse from God to Africans or the black people ... It is a tool to control them designed by some evil-minded scientists," she reportedly said.

On Thursday however, Maathai insisted that she never made any such comment.

"I did not say what I'm reported to have said, nor do I believe it," she stressed.

She also tried to diffuse outrage over a statement she made in a radio interview in October that there were no indigenous people in Africa.

"I'm very sorry if I hurt" anyone, she said, adding that her comment had stemmed from ignorance.

"Some of the problems with being in this position is that you get asked everything, even what you are ignorant about," she confessed.

Although some of the media coverage has been negative, most of the attention Maathai has received has been extremely positive, she said.

The "attention has made it possible for us to pass the message that we've been trying to pass for 30 years ... Now the whole world is listening," she said.

Maathai will receive the Nobel prize, and 10 million Swedish kronormillion euros), at a ceremony on Friday in Oslo's city hall.

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