Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ and its Secretary-General Kofi Annan have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize ¡°for their work for a better organized and more peaceful world¡±.
The Nobel Peace Prize for 2001
Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ and its Secretary-General Kofi Annan were chosen to receive the prize ¡°for their work for a better organized and more peaceful world¡±. The Norwegian Nobel Committee further said: ¡°Today the organization is at the forefront of efforts to achieve peace and security in the world and of the international mobilization aimed at meeting the world¡¯s economic, social and environmental challenges¡±.
The Committee "wishes to both honour the work that the Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ and its Secretary-General Kofi Annan have already done, and to encourage them to go ahead along the road to a still more forceful and dynamic United Nations." Han Seung-soo, President of the Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ General Assembly, expressed his hope "that the international community will view this award (...) as a beacon illuminating the way forward for the United Nations as it rises to confront new challenges".
Kofi Annan: "Peace must be sought, above all, because it is the condition for every member of the human family to live a life of dignity and security."
The Norwegian Nobel Committee praised Kofi Annan: "No one has done more than Kofi Annan to revitalise the Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ. After taking office as the Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ's seventh Secretary-General in January, 1997, he managed in a very short time to give the Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ an external prestige and an internal morale the likes of which the organization had hardly seen in its over fifty-year history, with the possible exception of its very first optimistic years."
In his acceptance speech Secretary General Kofi Annan stated: "Peace must be sought, above all, because it is the condition for every member of the human family to live a life of dignity and security". Annan told Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ staff he hoped that winning the prize "will urge us forward and encourage all of us to tackle our tasks with even greater determination".
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