Kofi Annan has died at the age of 80. For 10 years, he was at the forefront of world politics. He continued to work as an ambassador for peace even after leaving his post as secretary-general of the United Nations.
Image: Reuters/D. Balibouse
Advertisement
Kofi Annan — a small man with a grey goatee, smiling from behind his desk in New York — once recalled that his first day as United Nation's secretary-general was like his first day at school.
He was born into a prominent family in 1938 in Kumasi, the second biggest city in Ghana. His father was governor of Ashanti province under British colonial rule. Annan attended top schools in Ghana, Switzerland and later in the US.
The battles of Kofi Annan
The Ghanaian-born Kofi Annan climbed the ranks of the UN to become its first African leader and one of the most recognizable figures in global diplomacy. He was a fighter for peace, and the fight often got ugly.
Image: Getty Images/AFP/H. Zaourar
Rising star of the United Nations
Anan was born into a noted Ghanaian family in 1938 and studied in Switzerland and the US. He joined the United Nations when he was 24 years old. By 1993, he was appointed the chief of its peacekeeping operations. One of his first challenges was the crisis in Somalia, in which clashes between US forces backed by the UN and Somali militiamen claimed lives of 18 American soldiers.
Image: Getty Images/AFP/H. Zaourar
Defeats in Bosnia and Rwanda
The UN's peacekeeping forces failed to stop the mid-1990s genocides in Rwanda and Bosnia. The botched missions molded Annan, "creating a new understanding of the legitimacy, and necessity, of intervention in the face of gross violations of human rights," he wrote in his 2012 autobiography.
Image: Getty Images/AFP/A. Joe
Backed by the US
By 1996 the US was set on removing then-UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, who had repeatedly bumped heads with Washington. Annan, on the other hand, while momentarily standing in for an unreachable Boutros-Ghali, allowed a US-led intervention in Bosnia to begin. The US eventually vetoed Boutros-Ghali's bid for a second term, opening the way for Annan to claim the post in 1997.
Image: Reuters/R. Wilking
Nobel Peace Prize winner
In 2001, the Nobel Peace Prize Committee awarded the honor to the UN and its leader Kofi Annan, praising Annan for revitalizing UN and fighting for human rights. "I do not stand here alone," Annan said in his acceptance speech. He thanked the committee on behalf of his UN colleagues "who have devoted their lives — and in many instances risked or given their lives in the cause of peace."
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/H. Junge
A row with Washington
The US invaded Iraq in 2003, bypassing the UN Security Council and angering many of its closes allies. Annan openly opposed the invasion and slammed it as "illegal." The remarks sparked anger among his former backers in Washington.
Image: picture-alliance/ dpa/Y. Logghe
Under investigation
Annan found himself mired in a corruption scandal over the Iraq Oil-for-Food program in 2004, with his son Kojo receiving fees from a company involved in the deal. The UN secretary-general was eventually cleared of wrongdoing. Still, questions remained about Annan's role in securing the deal for his son. Some observers believed the scandal was orchestrated by US diplomats.
Image: Getty Images/A.Burton
Staying in the fight after leaving the UN
Annan completed his two five-year terms by 2006 and was succeeded by Ban Ki-moon. Still, the Ghanaian-born diplomat continued to be active on the world stage. Alongside Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, and other notable diplomats and activists, he founded The Elders, an NGO fighting for peace and human rights.
Image: Getty Images
A lost bid for peace in Syria
Annan once again took center stage as the UN's first envoy to Syria in 2012, during the initial fighting of what was to become a long-running and bloody civil war. However, he resigned some five months later, frustrated with the big powers' failure to honor their commitments. "I lost my troops on the way to Damascus," he said.
Image: Reuters/Sana
Last mission in Myanmar
In 2016, Annan traveled to Myanmar to lead an advisory commission on the conflict with the Rohingya, sparking hectic protests among the nation's Buddhist majority. Eventually, the commission issued a report urging the government to fight poverty among the Rohingya and ensure their rights. In October 2017, Annan called on the UN to pressure Myanmar into taking back the exiled Rohingya.
Image: DW/V. Hölzl
9 images1 | 9
Picture-perfect UN career
Annan joined the UN at the age of 24, first working as an administrator at the World Health Organization and then becoming head of personnel for the UN mission in Cairo, deputy director of the UNHCR in Geneva and eventually deputy UN secretary-general. In 1993, UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali nominated him under-secretary-general for peacekeeping, putting him in charge of 75,000 peacekeepers around the world.
As the head of UN peacekeeping troops, Annan experienced the first real dent in his career in 1994 when radical Hutu militias killed over 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus in what later became known as the Rwandan genocide. Annan was accused of failing to provide adequate support in the east African country despite the prior warnings of a violent escalation by Romeo Dallaire, the head of the UN peacekeepers in Rwanda. His reluctance was partly due to the fact that the US and Europe seemed to have little interest in getting more involved in Rwanda.
Annan expressed regret on behalf of the UN 10 years later: "The international community failed Rwanda, and that must leave us always with a sense of bitter regret and abiding sorrow."
Untiring peace negotiator
The Rwandan genocide didn't put an end to Kofi Annan's upward movement in the UN. He was elected secretary-general in December 1997, after some pressure from the US, and thus became the first person from sub-Saharan Africa to occupy the post.
Rwanda's genocide began on April 7, 1994. It was a mass slaughter that shocked the world. At the time the international community — above all France and the UN — failed to come to the aid of victims.
Image: Timothy Kisambira
A signal to extremists
On April 6, 1994, unidentified attackers shot down a plane carrying Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana as it was about to land at Kigali airport. President Habyarimana, his Burundian counterpart and eight other passengers died in the crash. The next day organized killings began. Massacres continued over the course of three months, and nearly 1 million Rwandans lost their lives.
Image: AP
Targeted killings
After the assassination of the president, Hutu extremists attacked the Tutsi minority and Hutus who stood in their way. The murderers were well-prepared, and targeted human rights activists, journalists and politicians. One of the first victims on April 7 was Prime Minister Agathe Uwiringiymana.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
Foreign nationals rescued
While thousands of Rwandans were being killed every day, Belgian and French special forces evacuated about 3,500 foreigners. On April 13, Belgian paratroopers rescued seven German employees and their families from Deutsche Welle's relay transmitting station in Kigali. Only 80 of 120 local staff members survived the genocide.
Image: P.Guyot/AFP/GettyImages
Appeals for help
As early as January 1994, UNAMIR commander Romeo Dallaire wanted to act on information he had received about an "anti-Tutsi extermination" plot. The warning he sent to the UN on January 11, later known as the "genocide fax," went unheard. And his desperate appeals after the genocide began were rejected by Kofi Annan, who was Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations at the time.
Image: A.Joe/AFP/GettyImages
Hate media
The Mille Collines radio station (RTLM) and Kangura, a weekly magazine, stoked ethnic hatred. In 1990, Kangura published the racist "Hutu Ten Commandments." Mille Collines radio, which was known for its pop music and sports programs, fueled the genocide by urging Hutu civilians to hunt down and kill Tutsis. Director Milo Rau devoted his film "Hate Radio" to these appalling broadcasts (photo).
Image: IIPM/Daniel Seiffert
Refuge in a hotel
In Kigali, Paul Rusesabagina hid more than 1,000 people in the Hotel Des Mille Collines. Rusesabagina had taken over the position of the hotel's Belgian manager, who left the country. With a great deal of alcohol and money, he managed to prevent Hutu militias from killing the refugees. In many other places where people sought refuge, they were not able to escape the slaughter.
Image: Gianluigi Guercia/AFP/GettyImages
Massacres in churches
Churches were no longer sanctuaries. About 4,000 men, women and children were murdered with axes, knives and machetes in the church of Ntarama near Kigali. Today, the church is one of the country's many genocide memorials. Rows of skulls, human bones as well as bullet marks in the walls are a reminder of what happened there.
Image: epd
France's role
The French government maintained close ties to the Hutu regime. When the French army intervened in June, it enabled soldiers and militiamen responsible for the genocide to flee to Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of Congo, and even take their weapons with them. They still pose a threat to Rwanda today.
Image: P.Guyot/AFP/GettyImages
Streams of refugees
During the genocide, millions of Rwandan Tutsis and Hutus fled to Tanzania, Zaire and Uganda. Some 2 million of them went to Zaire alone. These included former members of the army and perpetrators of the genocide, who soon founded the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a militia that is still terrorizing the population in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo today.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
Capture of the capital
On July 4, 1994, rebels from the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) patrolled the area around the Church of the Holy Family in Kigali. By that time, they had liberated most of the country and routed the perpetrators of the genocide. However, human rights activists also accused the rebels of committing crimes, for which no one has been held accountable to this day.
Image: Alexander Joe/AFP/GettyImages
End of the genocide
On July 18, 1994, the RPF's leader, Major General Paul Kagame, declared that the war against the government troops was over. The rebels were in control of the capital and other important towns. Initially, they installed a provisional government. Paul Kagame became Rwanda's president in the year 2000.
Image: Alexander Joe/AFP/GettyImages
Lasting scars
The genocide went on for almost three months. The victims were often slaughtered with machetes. Neighbors killed neighbors. Not even babies and elderly people were spared, and the streets were strewn with corpses and body parts. It's not only the physical scars on the bodies of the survivors that remind Rwandans of the genocide. A deep trauma also remains.
Image: Timothy Kisambira
12 images1 | 12
In his opening speech, he made it clear that he not only wanted to carry out administrative tasks at the head of the UN but also wanted to shape global politics. His agenda included the fight against global poverty, global warming, and AIDS, and the resolution of political crises. Later, he described the signing of the Millennium Development Goals in 2000 as a highlight of his period in office. He also acted as a negotiator in the Cyprus conflict and with Iran over its nuclear program. Annan was also an outspoken critic of the attacks by the Sudanese Janjaweed militia in the Darfur region.
In 2001, the Norwegian Nobel Committee recognized Annan's contributions, awarding both him and the UN with the Nobel Peace Prize. The chairman of the Oslo-based panel, Gunnar Berge, told DW in an interview that Kofi Annan was "an excellent representative of the United Nations and probably the most effective secretary-general in its history."
Once again, the modesty for which Annan was so respected shone through in his acceptance speech: "This award belongs not just to me. I do not stand here alone. On behalf of my colleagues in every part of the United Nations, in every corner of the globe, who have devoted their lives — and in many instances risked or given their lives in the cause of peace — I thank the Members of the Nobel Prize Committee for this high honor."
Failed reformer
Despite this public appreciation, Kofi Annan began to lose support from the members of the United Nations. Over his tenure as secretary-general, he tried in vain to reform the body, telling the General Assembly, "We must also adapt international institutions, through which states govern together, to the realities of the new era. We must form coalitions for change, often with partners well beyond the precincts of officialdom." In the end, a plan to give other countries, especially those in Africa, Asia and South America, seats on the Security Council failed largely because of resistance from the US and the body's other permanent members.
Annan has been a controversial leader. His leadership of a 2017 commission examining Rohingya violence raised criticism.Image: Reuters/W. Lone
Annan also came under pressure for his stance against the US invasion of Iraq under President George W. Bush in 2003, which he said violated the UN's Charter. He tried to prevent military intervention with a round of negotiations.
In 2004, the UN secretary-general faced calls to resign over an embezzlement scandal concerning the UN's Oil-for-Food program. There were revelations that Kofi Annan's son Kojo had accepted payments from a Swiss company that the UN had commissioned to monitor goods supplies as part of the program. An investigative committee absolved Kofi Annan in 2005, stating that he was neither in control of his family nor of the UN.
Special representative in Syrian war
Annan stepped down as UN secretary-general in 2006 at the end of his second period in office. He did not retire entirely from the public eye, however, and went on to publish his memoirs and work for various NGOs, including his own Kofi Annan Foundation for the promotion of global governance.
Annan visited the World Economic Forum in Davos in 2011Image: REUTERS
He also acted as a negotiator between the government and the opposition in Kenya after post-election violence broke out at the end of 2007. In February 2012, he was named special representative in the Syrian civil war. He stepped down six months later after several failed attempts to negotiate a ceasefire.
Later, as violence against the Rohingya minority in Myanmar's Rakhine state grew in 2017, Annan headed an expert commission that looked into how the conflict could be resolved.
Kofi Annan is survived by his second wife, Nane Lagergren, with whom he lived in Geneva, and a son and daughter from his first marriage.
DW correspondent Dagmar Wittek on the death of Kofi Annan
