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The right to development is the measure of the respect of all other human rights.That should be our aim: a situation in which all individuals are enabled to maximize their potential, and to contribute to the evolution of society as a whole.

Kofi Annan

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Kofi Annan
Age: 80 †
Born: 1938
Born: April 8
Died: 2018
Died: August 18
Diplomat
Economist
Politician
Coomassie
Kofi Atta Annan
Annan
Kofi A. Annan
Individual
Individuals
Human
Potential
Humans
Evolution
Whole
Development
Maximize
Right
Respect
Enabled
Situation
Contribute
Rights
Aim
Society
Measure

More quotes by Kofi Annan

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I am not afraid to dream. You first have to start with a dream. Build your castles in the air and give it foundation. Without a dream, you are not going to get anywhere.
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In countries where democracy is either non-existent or in development, on the other hand, citizens crave those freedoms. Maybe that is one lesson Western citizens can learn from those countries: treasure what you have. Use your rights and freedoms to effect the change you want.
Kofi Annan
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We have to choose between a global market driven only by calculations of short-term profit, and one which has a human face.
Kofi Annan
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You are never too young to lead.
Kofi Annan
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The reality is that no group of countries has any grounds for complacency about its own human rights performance and no group of countries does itself justice by automatically slipping into the victim mode . . . .
Kofi Annan
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Most people forget that even in Iraq, by the time the air and no-fly zone was established, the air defence system had been removed through the first Gulf war. All of them had been neutralised.
Kofi Annan
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I don't see a situation where one side will win militarily, take over Syria, and there will be peace and quiet, a clean victory.
Kofi Annan
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The World is not ours to keep. We hold it in trust for future generations.
Kofi Annan
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The global HIV/AIDS epidemic is an unprecedented crisis that requires an unprecedented response. In particular it requires solidarity - between the healthy and the sick, between rich and poor, and above all, between richer and poorer nations. We have 30 million orphans already. How many more do we have to get, to wake up?
Kofi Annan
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Violence against women is perhaps the most shameful human rights violation, and it is perhaps the most pervasive. It knows no boundaries of geography, culture or wealth. As long as it continues, we cannot claim to be making real progress towards equality, development and peace
Kofi Annan
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For everyone, everywhere, literacy is, along with education in general, a basic human right.
Kofi Annan
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In the 21st Century I believe the mission of the United Nations will be defined by a new, more profound, awareness of the sanctity and dignity of every human life, regardless of race or religion.
Kofi Annan
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When the US withdrew their troops from Somalia, I recall making a comment that [in] the way the peacekeepers had been withdrawn from Somalia, the impression had been given that the easiest way to unravel a peacekeeping operation is to kill a few soldiers.
Kofi Annan
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I've been around enough to realise that there are two things that once people have them, they don't want to give up, and it's extremely difficult to convince them to give up: one is privileges, and the other is subsidies.
Kofi Annan
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The international community... allows nearly 3 billion people - almost half of all humanity - to subsist on $2 or less a day in a world of unprecedented wealth.
Kofi Annan
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To go to war without the Security Council will not be in conformity with the Council.
Kofi Annan
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The question is the morning after. What sort of Iraq do we wake up to after the bombing? What happens in the region? What impact could it have? These are questions leaders I have spoken to have posed.
Kofi Annan
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... the long-lasting humanitarian impact of these inhuman weapons continues to deny communities the opportunity to rebuild long after the end of the conflicts.
Kofi Annan
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We must restore the sacredness of the family as a bedrock of humane values everywhere, in peace as well as in war.
Kofi Annan
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In fact UN is more of a galaxy of organisations and agencies than one machine.
Kofi Annan