Former United States President Jimmy Carter has turned 100, with praise pouring in for the peanut farmer whose post-presidential career resonated far beyond his short time in office.
Carter marked his birthday on Tuesday from his birthplace of Plains, Georgia, where he entered hospice care in his modest home last year.
He is both the oldest living president and the longest living president in US history, with an outsized legacy defined by his human rights and humanitarian work after a presidency during which he was heavily criticised.
“I think he has a complicated legacy but it really boils down, to me and I think, for him, that he lived out his faith and the commandment to love your neighbour as yourself in a way that made him respect people,” Carter’s grandson, Jason Carter, told the local 11Alive news station ahead of the ex-president’s birthday.
“And he used that respect to tell the truth. He used that respect to promote human rights,” he said.
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“He used that respect to work with the least of these, all over the world in a way that gave him partners in the poorest places in the world to do remarkable things,” he added.
While Carter did not attend any events for his birthday, it was marked in September by a concert in Atlanta, Georgia, where several former US presidents sent video messages praising Carter’s life’s work. A recording of the concert is set to air in the US on Tuesday night.
A year after leaving the presidency, Carter launched the Carter Center charity, which has led an array of global programmes. Those include overseeing election integrity around the world, promoting human rights and strengthening public health.
The charity’s efforts helped to lead to the near-total eradication of Guinea worm across the globe. Carter also remained active with Habitat for Humanity, a global home-building organisation, well into his 90s.
He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for “undertaking peace negotiations, campaigning for human rights and working for social welfare”.
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