Kofi Annan passes away: Top facts about former UN chief and Nobel Peace Laureate
As head of U.N. peacekeeping operations, Annan was criticised for the world body's failure to halt the genocide in Rwanda in the 1990s.
Former United Nations Secretary-General and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Kofi Annan has died at the age of 80, his foundation said on Saturday.Annan, a Ghanaian national, died in hospital in Bern, Switzerland, in the early hours of Saturday, two of his close associates said.
In Geneva, the Kofi Annan Foundation announced his peaceful death with "immense sadness" after a short illness, saying he was surrounded in his last days by his second wife Nane and children Ama, Kojo and Nina.Annan served two terms as U.N. Secretary-General in New York from 1997-2006 and retired in Geneva and later lived in a Swiss village in the nearby countryside.
"In many ways, Kofi Annan was the United Nations. He rose through the ranks to lead the organization into the new millennium with matchless dignity and determination," U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, whom Annan had chosen to head the U.N. refugee agency, said in a statement.
As head of U.N. peacekeeping operations, Annan was criticised for the world body's failure to halt the genocide in Rwanda in the 1990s.
"The U.N. can be improved, it is not perfect but if it didn't exist you would have to create it," he told the BBC's Hard Talk during an interview for his 80th birthday last April, recorded at the Geneva Graduate Institute where he had studied"I am a stubborn optimist, I was born an optimist and will remain an optimist," Annan added.
He studied economics in Macalester College, international relations from the Graduate Institute Geneva and management at MIT.
Pic Source: Reuters
He joined the UN in 1962, working for the WHO's Geneva office.
Pic Source: Kofi Annan with former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice
Annan served two terms as U.N. Secretary-General in New York from 1997-2006 and retired in Geneva and later lived in a Swiss village in the nearby countryside.
Pic Source: Reuters
In 2001, the Nobel Committee divided the peace prize between the UN and Annan. They recognised his work in revitalising the UN, containing the spread of HIV in Africa and opposition to international terrorism.
Pic Source: Reuters
Anann had used his final speech as secretary general in December 2006 to deliver a stinging rebuke to George W Bush, accusing the US of committing of human rights abuses.
Pic Source: Reuters
Annan is fluent in English, French, Akan, some Kru languages and other African languages.
Pic Source: Reuters
"The U.N. can be improved, it is not perfect but if it didn't exist you would have to create it," he told the BBC's Hard Talk during an interview for his 80th birthday last April, recorded at the Geneva Graduate Institute where he had studied "I am a stubborn optimist, I was born an optimist and will remain an optimist," Annan added.
Pic Source: AFP
It’s hard to be anonymous when you’re a legendary UN diplomat but it’s even harder when you look like ‘God’s’ doppelganger.
In 2012, six years after retiring as UN chief, while laying low at a friend’s place in Italy, Annan was misidentified as the legendary thespian Morgan Freeman.
He was in a shop with his wife when a group of men approached. Annan thought they’d recognised him when one of the men gave him a pen and asked: “Morgan Freeman, may I have an autograph?"
Annan flashed a smile, scribbled Morgan Freeman and ran away as quickly as feasible.