UN Secretary-General Kofi Atta Annan was unanimously approved by the 15-member Security Council yesterday for a second five-year term as the world's top diplomat.
The 189-member UN General Assembly is expected to approve the nomination in a vote scheduled tomorrow.
The re-election of Annan, a 63-year-old Ghanaian, has been a forgone conclusion since he announced in March he would run again and no candidate opposed him.
His current term expires on December 31.
A career UN official, Annan became the seventh UN secretary-general on January 1, 1997. He is a member of a merchant family from the Fante ethnic group and is married to a Swedish artist and lawyer. He received undergraduate and graduate degrees in the United States.
"I think he has been a good secretary-general," said Jeane Kirkpatrick, US ambassador to the United Nations under former President Ronald Reagan.
Annan used his first term to focus global attention on Africa's conflicts, poverty and the AIDS epidemic - now the focus of an unprecedented three-day AIDS conference which concluded yesterday. He has also trimmed UN bureaucracy and spearheaded an overhaul of peacekeeping operations.
(Chinadaily.com.cn 06/28/2001)
