President Peter Mutharika uses his United Nations General Assembly speaking spot to pay tribute and respect to one of Africa's most famous diplomats, Kofi Annan, who was UN's former secretary general and another UN diplomat, Malawian Professor David Rubadiri.
Annan, who was UN secretary-general from 1997 to 2006, the first black African to hold the world's top diplomatic post, died on 18 August in Switzerland at the age of 80.
Rubadiri, Malawi's first ambassador to the United States and the United Nations. In 1964 after independence, died at Mzuzu Central Hospital on September 15 2018 at the age of 88.
President Mutharika told the UN General Assembly that Rubadiri was "a conscience of the African continent, and a pan-African poet who was adopted by East Africa as their son."
On the ex-UN chief Annan, Mutharika said he was an "African inspiring spirit of the world."
He said: "Kofi Annan was a voice of peace, a voice of the voiceless, the conscience and moral arbiter of the world. He decisively carried forward the flag of peace amidst turmoil when some of us were busy declaring war on peace. "
He said in honour of Kofi Annan, the UN General Assembly should rise and march forward in the spirit of defending peace.
"We cannot sit here as a proud Assembly while out there-- human communities are being driven out of their homes, forced to abandon their countries and condemned to unknown destinies of homeless survival. Every human needs a home," the Malawi leader said.
"We cannot be a proud humanity when out there-- innocent children, voiceless men and vulnerable women are suffering and being killed. Every life is precious."
Mutharika said history will measure the global leadership and the legacy of UN on the scales of how it defends the defenceless, feed the hungry, and empower the weak.
"History will judge our generation on how we defend human life and protect this endangered planet. Therefore, it is our shared responsibility to seek peace in all its forms; to defend peace; and to reach out to reason with those who declare war on peace."
