Let me tell you my Oscar Arias story: in 1986, he drew up a peace plan for Central America at a time when the US was heavily engaged there militarily, including through proxy armies like the Nicaraguan Contras. I don’t recall the details of the plan now but it legitimized & called for more US military involvement. He had already been nominated for the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize for his nefarious plan when Harvard invited him to speak. He was readying himself for his Nobel acceptance speech.
At the time I lived in Boston, was of course active in the antiwar movement, & a delegation of us attended his public Harvard speech. He went on at length about the defeat of the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, promoting it as the restoration of democracy. The audience of mostly Harvard students & faculty frequently interrupted his speech with vigorous applause for democracy in Nicaragua. In the Q & A session, I stood up & respectfully but directly challenged him on the inclusion of US intervention in his plan asking him to explain it. During the entirety of my question the audience went wild with booing. They considered this a moment of sycophancy, not challenge. For those who have not experienced being booed, it’s like being fish getting shot in a barrel. I said to the audience “You can stop the booing because I intend to finish my question.” And I did. But after my adrenaline calmed down & to this day, I regret not saying “Is the same crowd that applauded the so-called restoration of democracy in war-torn Nicaragua not allowing me to ask a serious & important question at Harvard University?”
After his Nobel, Arias became known—like Suu Kyi after him—as a human rights icon. They belong to a false pantheon. It is fitting that Arias, the war criminal who did so much harm to the people of Central America, live his final years exposed as a pervert & sexual predator.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/05/world/americas/oscar-arias-sanchez-sexual-assault.html?