Peruvian foreign service officer and world statesman, Javier Pérez de Cuéllar (born 1920), reached the pinnacle of a long diplomatic career with his installation in January 1982 as secretary general of the United Nations. The fifth man to hold that post, he was the first Latin American and the second non-European to lead the world body. Pérez de Cuéllar served two terms as secretary general until 1992.

A man of aristocratic lineage, Javier Pérez de Cuéllar was born in Lima, Peru, on January 19, 1920. His businessman father died when Pérez de Cuéllar was four years old. He received his primary and secondary education in private schools and enrolled in the law program at Lima's Catholic University. To support his studies the young man became a clerk in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In 1944, after obtaining his...