Former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan turns 76 years today. He was born on April 8, 1938. The Ghanaian diplomat served as the seventh Secretary General of the United Nations from 1997 to 2006.

Mr Annan and the United Nations were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize "for their work for a better organised and more peaceful world".

He is currently the Chairman of The Elders, a group founded by late Nelson Mandela.

The Elders is an international non-governmental organisation of public figures noted as elder statesmen, peace activists, and human rights advocates, who were brought together by Mr Mandela.

They describe themselves as "independent global leaders working together for peace and human rights". The goal Mandela set for the Elders was to use their "almost 1,000 years of collective experience" to work on solutions for seemingly insurmountable problems such as climate change, HIV/AIDS, poverty, as well as to "use their political independence to help resolve some of the world's most intractable conflicts.