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Monday, July 14, 2025

Colin Powell has died of COVID-19 complications, family says

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1365 days ago
20211018
FILE - In this Feb. 15, 2001 file photo, Secretary of State Colin Powell looks on as President Bush addresses State Department employees at the State Department in Washington. Powell, former Joint Chiefs chairman and secretary of state, has died from COVID-19 complications, his family said Monday, Oct. 18, 2021. (AP Photo/Kenneth Lambert)

FILE - In this Feb. 15, 2001 file photo, Secretary of State Colin Powell looks on as President Bush addresses State Department employees at the State Department in Washington. Powell, former Joint Chiefs chairman and secretary of state, has died from COVID-19 complications, his family said Monday, Oct. 18, 2021. (AP Photo/Kenneth Lambert)

WASHI­ING­TON (AP) — Col­in Pow­ell, for­mer Joint Chiefs chair­man and Sec­re­tary of State, has died from COVID-19 com­pli­ca­tions, his fam­i­ly said Mon­day. He was 84.

In an an­nounce­ment on so­cial me­dia, the fam­i­ly said Pow­ell had been ful­ly vac­ci­nat­ed.

News of Mr Pow­ell’s death was con­firmed in a re­port from the As­so­ci­at­ed Press.

“We have lost a re­mark­able and lov­ing hus­band, fa­ther and grand­fa­ther and a great Amer­i­can,” the fam­i­ly said in its so­cial me­dia post.

In 1989 Pow­ell be­came the first Black chair­man of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In that role he over­saw the U.S. in­va­sion of Pana­ma and lat­er the U.S. in­va­sion of Kuwait to oust the Iraqi army in 1991.

Col­in Pow­ell, who al­so was a US Sec­re­tary of State be­tween 2001 and 2005, served De­mo­c­ra­t­ic and Re­pub­li­can pres­i­dents in both war and peace times.

He left be­hind an in­deli­ble rep­u­ta­tion as a straight-shoot­er who con­sid­ered — then re­ject­ed — a run for the pres­i­den­cy.

But his rep­u­ta­tion al­so suf­fered a painful set­back when, in 2003, Pow­ell went be­fore the U.N. Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil and made the case for U.S. war against Iraq. He cit­ed faulty in­for­ma­tion claim­ing Sad­dam Hus­sein had se­cret­ly stashed away weapons of mass de­struc­tion, dis­put­ing Iraq’s claims that it had not rep­re­sent­ed “a web of lies”.

For­mer Pres­i­dent George W. Bush said he and for­mer first la­dy Lau­ra Bush were “deeply sad­dened” by Pow­ell’s death.

“He was a great pub­lic ser­vant” and “wide­ly re­spect­ed at home and abroad,” Bush said. “And most im­por­tant, Col­in was a fam­i­ly man and a friend. Lau­ra and I send Al­ma and their chil­dren our sin­cere con­do­lences as they re­mem­ber the life of a great man.”


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