United Nations, Secretary-General Kofi Annan Win Nobel Peace Prize

The United Nations and its Secretary-General Kofi Annan won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for "their work for a better organized and more peaceful world." The Nobel committee said the United Nations and Annan would share the $943,000 award in equal parts. It cited the United Nations for being at the forefront of efforts to achieve peace and security in the world. Annan, who has devoted almost his entire working life to the world body, was lauded for "bringing new life to the organization." U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard woke Annan and told him the news shortly after 5 a.m. Friday morning. Speaking on CNN, Eckhard called the award "a vote of confidence in our common future." Annan, born in 1938 in Ghana, became U.N. secretary-general in 1997. He has been praised for his character, moral leadership, his focus on civil wars in Africa and elsewhere and his efforts to combat AIDS. He was the first leader to be elected from the ranks of United Nations staff. He was the head of U.N. peacekeeping operations when he was tapped for the top job after the United States lobbied to prevent his predecessor, Boutros Boutros-Ghali of Egypt, from taking a second term. In an unprecedented vote of confidence, Annan was unanimously reappointed to a second five-year term by the 189 U.N. member states in June, six months before his first term expires on Dec. 31.