Year After Obama Won Nobel, World Looks for Signs of Peace

Oct. 8, 2010— -- One year after the Nobel prize jury made its controversial decision to award President Obama the prize for world peace, a larger jury is still waiting for the president to live up to those lofty expectations.

Even some of Obama's allies -- like former Nobel laureates Al Gore and Jimmy Carter -- declined to assess his performance in fulfilling what the peace prize citation said was his "vision" of world harmony.

The one year anniversary of Obama's prize comes as fighting is escalating in Afghanistan, the war in Iraq continues to smolder and Obama struggles to keep fledgling Middle East peace talks from collapsing. Drones are firing missiles in unprecedened numbers and confrontations with Iran and North Korea are hotter than ever.

In addition, wars rage in Somalia, Africa, Asia and South America, fueled by religion, tribal hatreds, poverty and piracy.

The anniversary of Obama's prize also comes as the Nobel committee selected its 2010 winner, imprisoned Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo.

Despite repeated calls by ABCNews.com., the White House declined to comment on how it believed the president advanced the cause of peace this year. The president did, however, issue a statement on this year's prize going to Liu.

"I welcome the Nobel Committee's decision to award the Nobel Peace Prize to Mr. Liu Xiaobo. Last year, I noted that so many others who have received the award had sacrificed so much more than I," Obama said.

During his tenure, Obama has withdrawn tens of thousands of troops from Iraq. He rushed to the relief of Haiti after its devastating earthquake and redirected U.S. helicopters and aid to help the millions of Pakistanis whose homes were washed away by catastrophic floods.

But for anti-war activists, the award was premature. Obama's continued war footing is proof enough that he has not sufficiently advanced the cause of peace and has not lived up to the mantle of being a Nobel peace laureate.

"Of course we're disappointed with the president," said Dana Balicki, National Campaign Coordinator of the anti-war group Code Pink. "He simply hasn't live up to it. There was a great deal of skepticism that he deserved the prize in the first place."

An untested and untried Obama accepted the Nobel Prize for Peace last year, just months into his presidency. He was selected, prize committee chairman Thorbjorn Jagland said, not for what he had accomplished but for the promise of what he would accomplish.