The 7th General Secretary of the United Nations, Kofi Annan has died in Switzerland, a source close to his family has confirmed.
Annan passed away after a short illness on Saturday morning.
Kofi Annan served as the General Secretary from January 1997 to December 2006.
Kofi Atta Annan was born in Kumasi, in central Ghana, Africa, on April 8, 1938. After receiving his early education at a leading boarding school in Ghana, Annan attended the College of Science and Technology in the capital of Kumasi. At the age of twenty, he won a Ford Foundation scholarship for undergraduate studies at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, where he studied economics.
In 1974 he moved to Cairo, Egypt, as a chief civilian personnel officer in the UN Emergency Force. Annan briefly changed careers in 1974 when he left the United Nations to serve as managing director of the Ghana Tourist Development Company.
In recognition of his abilities, Annan was appointed secretary-general, the top post of the UN, by the UN General Assembly in December 1996. He began serving his four-year term of office on January 1, 1997.
He was succeeded by wife, Nane Lagergren of Sweden and a son.
