By awarding the 1999 Nobel Peace Prize to the French doctors' group Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) yesterday, the Norwegian committee acknowledged the revolution in humanitarian relief, from the careful, painstakingly neutral stance of traditional organisations such as the Red Cross and UN agencies to the vocally critical and politically committed approach of the French doctors' group founded 28 years ago.

In archive film shown on French television after the announcement, Dr Bernard Kouchner, one of the co-founders of the group, explained how he and fellow doctors working with the Red Cross in Biafra in 1971 revolted against the ICRC's passive acceptance of Nigerian government dictates.

"I realised that merely bandaging wounds was a form of complicity," he said. The young doctors, left-wingers who had participated in the May 1968 student revolt, broke off to establish MSF. In July, Dr Kouchner became the UN's civil administrator in Kosovo. Speaking live on French television from Pristina, he said that "from the very beginning [MSF] was political. . . We had to convince people that ignominy and suffering could not be hidden behind borders". The group's combative, stop-at-nothing style and its "without borders" suffix inspired others. Today there are dozens of groups with similar names - Pharmacists Without Borders, Dentists Without Borders, Reporters Without Borders.

Taking part in several French cabinets since the 1980s, Dr Kouchner swayed French government and public thinking towards his belief in a moral imperative to intervene on behalf of threatened or persecuted peoples. In 1988, at French initiative, the UN General Assembly established the principle of free access to victims of catastrophes. This would later be enforced in Bosnia, where aid groups demanded "humanitarian corridors".

Mr Jean-Pierre Langellier, an editorialist at Le Monde, said Dr Kouchner's high profile in Kosovo reminded the Nobel jury of MSF's influence. "There has been an evolution towards an almost sacred right of intervention," Mr Langellier said. "We saw it this year in Kosovo. MSF played a very important role in this process. I think that is why - for purely political and diplomatic reasons - it was unthinkable [for MSF to win the prize] 10 years ago."

The Nobel committee praised MSF's "pioneering humanitarian work on several continents", its refusal to allow "national boundaries and political circumstances or sympathies" to influence whom it cared for, and its independence. Since its early days, when MSF stayed in Vietnam after the fall of Saigon and in the mountains of Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation, the French doctors worked closely with journalists, another revolutionary concept that transformed the behaviour of relief organisations.

The MSF charter says it must "help populations in distress and victims of catastrophes, whether natural or man-made: earthquakes, famines, wars". The record of its missions over the past 28 years reads like the history of the world's civil wars and disasters: Nicaragua, Honduras, Vietnam, Lebanon, Western Sahara, Sudan, Cambodia, Ethiopia, Rwanda.

The group was expelled from Ethiopia in 1985 because it denounced the theft of humanitarian aid and the forced displacement of civilians. An internal debate about the degree of co-operation with host governments and military forces continues to this day.

MSF staged its biggest refugee programme in 1991, to help hundreds of thousands of Kurds who fled Saddam Hussein's forces after the Gulf War. For this it was given the European Human Rights Award.

SINCE 1996, MSF has been one of the few aid agencies to work in Chechnya and North Korea. It convinced the Taliban to reverse a ban on emergency medical aid for women in Afghanistan. In France, it has drawn attention to the medical needs of those outside the social "safety net", and it has provided healthcare in the devastated societies of the former east bloc.

This year MSF was expelled from Kosovo before NATO bombing of Serbia started in March. It ran several refugee camps in Albania and Macedonia, and returned to the Serb province with NATO troops in June. In East Timor, MSF was one of the last relief organisations to flee during the rampage by Indonesian troops in September, and one of the first to return.

Although MSF is now an international organisation with permanent offices in 20 countries and 2,000 volunteers in crisis zones around the world, President Jacques Chirac said the Nobel Peace Prize was "an honour for France" as well as "a homage to the exceptional men and women who. . . bring aid and support. . . to those who suffer from humanitarian catastrophes or conflicts." These men and women, he added, "embody the progress of universal conscience".