Former UN secretary general Kofi Annan has lent his support to the EU referendum’s Remain campaign
Former United Nations secretary general Kofi Annan and world-wide web inventor Tim Berners Lee have come out in favour of a Remain vote in this month's EU referendum.
The pair have made their interventions in a special edition of The New Statesmen, guest-edited by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
Annan, who led the UN from 1997 to 2006, and was succeeded by current secretary general Ban Ki-Moon, praised the EU as “a triumph”.
“No nation can afford to be too isolated. Despite some shortcomings, the European union project has been a triumph and all the member states should strive to strengthen rather than weaken it,” he said.
Read More: The definitive list of everyone who's ever expressed a view on Brexit
While Berners Lee added: “The logical reason is that we need structures of all scales to manage this planet, and there a good many things that are best done at the scale of Europe.
“The EU level, though, is essential for us…My heart and wallet are at one: Britain should remain in Europe."
Annan and Berners Lee are the latest high profile figures to lend their support to the Remain campaign, following in the footsteps of US president Barrack Obama, and German chancellor Angela Merkel.
However, Leave voters have sought to use the endorsements against the Remain campaign – when Merkel intervened last week, Boris Johnson complained of “European elites”, who he said were panicking over a potential Brexit.