Grand Duke honoured for humanitarian work

(CS) Luxembourg's Grand Duke Henri was honoured with the Path to Peace Award 2013 at a special ceremony in New York on Tuesday for his commitment to the development of peace.

The award is handed out by the Path to Peace Foundation, which was founded in 1991 by the Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the United Nations.

The current president is Archbishop Francis A. Chullikatt.

The Path to Peace award was given to the Grand Duke at a special ceremony attended by some 300 invited guests.

Previous laureates include Grand Duchess Maria Teresa, who received the award for her humanitarian work in 2006, as well as Kofi Annan, King Baudouin I of Belgium, Lech Walesa and Boutros Boutros-Ghali.

Find out more about the awars and the foundation on thepathtopeacefoundation.org

On Wednesday, Henri will speak to the UN General Assembly about sport and its contribution to peace and development, followed by a visit to the Security Council and a meeting with UN Vice Secretary General Jan Eliasson.

Not only the Grand Duke received an award on Tuesday though, with Maria Teresa honoured with the International Solidarity Award 2013 by the Greek ELPIDA association, which supports children with cancer.

The official awards ceremony took place on October 16. However, since the Grand Duchess was unable to travel to Athens at the time she thanked the audience via video message. On Tuesday then Christian Biever, Luxembourg ambassador to Greece, brought the award to Luxembourg.