Saying "humanity is indivisible," UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan called for global cooperation in fighting poverty, ignorance and disease as he and the United Nations accepted the centennial Nobel Peace Prize on Monday.
The chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee presented the $950,000 prize, which includes diplomas and gold medals, to Annan and the president of the UN General Assembly, South Korean Foreign Minister Han Seung-soo, representing the world body.
Annan has given "the UN an external prestige and an internal morale" hardly before seen since the world body's founding in 1945, chairman Gunnar Berge said.
In honor of the 100th anniversary of the first prize, more than 20 peace laureates from previous years, including East Timorese freedom fighter Jose Ramos-Horta and South Africa's Desmond Tutu, joined them on the stage for the 90-minute ceremony at Oslo City Hall, amid tight security.
Norway's royal family and other dignitaries also attended, and a torchlight parade and a banquet were planned in the evening.
Annan, a 63-year-old Ghanaian, and the United Nations will share the prize equally for their efforts to achieve peace and security in the world, the Norwegian Nobel Committee said in announcing the award on Oct. 12.
Annan became secretary-general of the 189-member United Nations in 1997 and has won high marks for focusing the global spotlight on poverty, human rights abuses, conflicts in Africa, the Balkans and the Middle East, and the AIDS epidemic.
Annan joined the United Nations in 1962 as an administrator with the World Health Organization in Geneva. He was the first leader to be elected from the ranks of UN staff and was unanimously reappointed to a second-five year term in June, six months before his first term expires on Dec. 31.
At least 13 UN agencies and people connected to the world body have won the prize before, but it had never gone to the organization itself. In 1961, UN Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold was awarded the prize posthumously after his death in a plane crash on a peace mission to Congo.
The Nobel Prizes are always presented on Dec. 10, marking the date their benefactor, Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, died in 1896.
( December 11, 2001)
