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Switzerland mourns ‘visionary and friend’ Kofi Annan

Kofi Annan
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As tributes flooded in from around the world on Sunday for former UN chief Kofi Annan, Switzerland mourned a “visionary” who helped bolster his adopted home’s position as an international diplomatic hub.

The Ghanaian national and Nobel peace laureate, who died Saturday at the age of 80, has been widely credited with raising the profile of the United Nations during his two terms as secretary-general from 1997 to 2006.

In Switzerland, where he settled after completing his second term, Annan is meanwhile widely remembered for his many deep friendships and for his contributions to securing the status of the country and especially of Geneva as a centre for world diplomacy.

“Kofi Annan was a visionary and a great friend of Switzerland,” Swiss President Alain Berset tweeted out shortly after the announcement Saturday.”Today, International Geneva has lost one of its most ardent advocates,” he added.

The head of the UN’s European headquarters in Geneva, Michael Moller, meanwhile lamented that “humanity has lost its strong moral voice, and I lost my mentor, my role model and great friend.”

Annan’s long-running relationship with Switzerland began in the early 1960s, when he obtained a degree at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva.

Early in his four decade-long UN career, he also lived intermittently in the city, when he worked for the World Health Organization (WHO) in the 1960s and later for the UN refugee agency in 1980.

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