Obama has failed to live up to Nobel, says laureate chief

The former secretary also revealed in his book that the White House asked if US President Barack Obama really had to travel to Oslo to pick up his surprise Nobel Peace Prize in 2009.

Geir Lundestad, who acted as the committee’s non-voting but influential secretary from 1990 to 2015 wrote in his memoirs that the prize, expected to boost Obama, was instead met with harsh criticism, with many arguing that he has not done anything to show that he was worthy of the award.

Speaking to AP on Wednesday, Lundestad said he didn’t disagree with the decision to award the president but the committee “thought it would strengthen Obama and it didn’t have this effect”. “Many of Obama’s supporters believed it was a mistake”, he writes.

Apparently, Obama was so embarrassed by the committee’s choice he had aides contact the organization to enquire whether it would be a faux pas if the president skipped the award ceremony in Olso, Norway. The Nobel Peace Prize was developed at the bequest of the Swedish chemist, engineer, and the inventor of dynamite, Alfred Nobel, who left much of his fortune for the establishment of the Nobel prizes.

Lundestad’s book gave a rare inside look into the inner workings of the Nobel committee, whose decision-making process has always been shrouded in secrecy.

The move stunned the world and the recipient alike, as Obama had been in office less than nine months and the United States was still waging simultaneous wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

‘In the White House they quickly realized that they needed to travel to Oslo, ‘ Lundestad wrote.

“In broad strokes, the answer was no”. Six years later, however, Obama’s cascading foreign policy failures surely has much to do with Mr. Lundestad’s nostalgia – even if he won’t admit it publicly.

Lundestad’s memoir contained several other noteworthy passages.

“It was made very clear that they meant to watch until the end”, he said. He said that as a former Norwegian prime minister, Jagland should never have been appointed to the committee, which frequently stresses its independence.

Jagland declined to comment, said Daniel Holtgen, his spokesman at the Council of Europe.

The Times of Israel reports that the tell-all book breaks with the tradition of confidentiality surrounding the Nobel Peace Prize.