# U Thant Peace Award

The U Thant Peace Award was created by Sri Chinmoy's peace meditations at the United Nations, after U Thant's death. First offered in 1982, the award is given to individuals and organizations who have exemplified the lofty spiritual ideals of the late United Nations Secretary-General U Thant and implemented those ideals in the tireless pursuit of world peace.

## Recipients

It had been bestowed by The Peace Meditation at the United Nations upon Mahathir Mohamad, Nelson Mandela, Mikhail Gorbachev, Pope John Paul II, Mother Teresa, Javier Pérez de Cuéllar, Kurt Waldheim the Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, Dada Vaswani, Swami Satchidananda and U Thant's daughter, Daw Aye Aye Thant.
The U Thant Distinguished Lecture Series is a forum through which eminent thinkers and world leaders speak on the role of the United Nations in addressing the challenges facing the world's peoples and nations in the 21st century. The lecture series is co-organized by the United Nations University and the Science Council of Japan.
The UNU has a tradition of inviting world leaders and renowned individuals to Tokyo to explore the role of the United Nations in a rapidly changing world. The U Thant Distinguished Lecture Series builds upon this tradition by providing an opportunity for Nobel laureates and heads of state, current and former, to share their insights and experiences with scholars, policymakers, business leaders and the public.
On April 8, 2006, the Award was offered to Kofi Annan, who refused it. Similarly in 2007, Ban Ki-moon declined the Award.

## Recipients of the U Thant Peace award

| Year | Recipient | Country |
| 1982 | Zenon Rossides | Cyprus |
| 1983 | Jorge Illueca | Panama |
| 1986 | Javier Pérez de Cuéllar | Peru |
| 1986 | Russell Barber | United States |
| 1991 | Vilayat Khan | India |
| 1991 | Guido de Marco | Malta |
| 1993 | Ganesh Man Singh | Nepal |
| 1993 | Siddhartha Shankar Ray | India |
| 1993 | Chidambaram Subramaniam | India |
| 1994 | James P. Grant | United States |
| 1994 | Mother Teresa | India |
| 1994 | Mikhail Gorbachev | Russia |
| 1995 | Laxmi Mall Singhvi | India |
| 1995 | Rafael Hernández Colón | Puerto Rico |
| 1995 | Desmond Tutu | South Africa |
| 1996 | Nelson Mandela | South Africa |
| 1996 | Robert Mugabe | Zimbabwe |
| 1996 | Maurice Strong | Canada |
| 1996 | Chakravarthi V. Narasimhan | India |
| 1997 | Ananda Guruge | Sri Lanka |
| 1997 | Vladimir Petrovsky | Russia |
| 1997 | Carl Lewis | United States |
| 1997 | 14th Dalai Lama | China |
| 1997 | Inder Kumar Gujral | India |
| 1998 | Dada Vaswani | India |
| 1998 | Pope John Paul II | Poland |
| 1998 | Claiborne Pell | United States |
| 1998 | Ja'afar of Negeri Sembilan | Malaysia |
| 1999 | Mahathir Mohamad | Malaysia |
| 1999 | Girija Prasad Koirala | Nepal |
| 1999 | Krishna Prasad Bhattarai | Nepal |
| 1999 | Ted Turner | United States |
| 1999 | Anwarul Karim Chowdhury | Bangladesh |
| 2000 | Svenn Kristiansen | Norway |
| 2000 | Humayun Rashid Choudhury | Bangladesh |
| 2000 | Gary Ackerman | United States |
| 2000 | Sivaya Subramuniyaswami | United States |
| 2001 | Atal Bihari Vajpayee | India |
| 2001 | James Parks Morton | United States |
| 2002 | Satchidananda Saraswati | India |
| 2002 | Daw Aye Aye Thant | Myanmar |
| 2002 | Ravi Shankar | India |
| 2004 | Kurt Waldheim | Austria |
| 2007 | Ibrahim Gambari | Nigeria |
| 2007 | Bill Pearl | United States |
| 2007 | Pascal Alan Nazareth | India |