Prominent deaths of 2007

Paris - Leading personalities who died in 2007:

POLITICS
-- Bo Yibo, veteran of China's communist revolution, at 98 in Beijing (Jan 15).
- Hrant Dink, Turkish journalist of Armenian origin, murdered aged 53 in Istanbul (Jan 19).
-- Maurice Papon, former top French civil servant who collaborated with the Nazis in World War II, aged 96 (Feb 17).
-- Boris Yeltsin, Russia's first post-Soviet president, aged 76 from a heart attack in a Moscow hospital. (April 23).
-- Malietoa Tanumafili II, monarch of the Pacific island state of Samoa and the world's oldest ruling head of state, aged 94 in the capital Apia. (May 11).
-- Jerry Falwell, the US evangelical firebrand, aged 73 in hospital of heart problems. (May 15).
-- Kurt Waldheim, former UN Secretary General and Austrian president who hid his Nazi past, aged 88. (June 14).
-- Afghanistan's last king, Mohammed Zahir Shah, aged 92 (July 23).
-- Former Angolan independence leader Holden Roberto, aged 84 in Luanda. (Aug 2).
-- Iraqi Sunni Muslim leader Abdul Sattar Abu Reesha, killed in an Al-Qaeda attack in Anbar province, days after he shook the hand of US President George W. Bush. Age unknown (Sept 11).
-- Khun Sa, former Burmese drugs lord who was once on the US "most wanted" list, at around 74 in Yangon (Oct 28).
-- Paul Warfield Tibbets Jr., the US pilot who dropped the first atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima in 1945. At age 92 in Columbus, Ohio. (Nov 1).
-- S. P. Thamilselvan, the political head of Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels, killed in an air strike aged 40. (Nov 2)
-- Ian Smith, the rebel white minority leader of Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe. At age 88 in Cape Town, South Africa. (Nov 20).

CULTURE
-- Carlo Ponti, Italian film producer who married actress Sophia Loren, aged 94 in Geneva hospital (Jan 10).
-- Art Buchwald, US newspaper columnist, at home in Washington aged 81 (Jan 17).
-- Omkar Prasad Nayyar, Bollywood music maker, aged 80, of a heart attack (Jan 28).
-- Anna Nicole Smith, US pop-culture icon, aged 39 in a Florida hotel room (Feb 8).
-- Luigi Comencini, Italian filmmaker, aged 90 (April 6).
-- Kurt Vonnegut, science-fiction writer, aged 84 in New York (April 11).
-- Jack Valenti, former Hollywood lobbyist and US presidential aide, aged 85 in Washington (April 26).
-- Mstislav Rostropovich, Russian cellist and conductor, aged 80 in Moscow (April 27).
-- Ingmar Bergman, Swedish film director, at his home on the island of Faaroe at 89 (July 30).
-- Max Roach, US jazz drummer and composer, at age 83 in New York (Aug 16).
-- Italian opera singer Luciano Pavarotti, aged 71 in his native town of Modena (Sept 6).
-- Jane Wyman, US actress and first wife of US president Ronald Reagan, aged 93 (Sept 10).
-- Marcel Marceau, French mime artist, aged 84 (Sept 22).
-- Deborah Kerr, Scottish actress who starred in "From Here to Eternity" aged 86 (Oct 16).
-- South African reggae star Lucky Dube, one of Africa's biggest-selling artists, shot dead in Johannesburg aged 43 (Oct 19).
-- US novelist Norman Mailer, aged 84 in New York (Nov 10).
-- Maurice Bejart, French choreographer, aged 80 in Lausanne. (Nov 22).
- US motorcycle stunt artist Evel Knievel, aged 69 in Florida. (Nov 30)

BUSINESS
-- Momofuku Ando, the Japanese inventor of instant noodles, aged 96 in Tokyo (Jan 5).
-- Anita Roddick, founder of the Body Shop cosmetics chain, aged 64 in Chichester, England of a brain haemorrhage. (Sept 10).
-- Tony Ryan, Irish co-founder of low-cost airline Ryanair, aged 71 at home in Ireland following a long illness (Oct 3).
-- Tota Miah, the Bangladeshi "snake king", who started the country's first commercial snake farm, of snake bite aged 38. (Nov 4)
-- Former General Motors chief executive Roger Smith, who notably featured in Michael Moore's film "Roger and Me", aged 82 (Nov 30).

SPORTS
-- Pakistan cricket coach Bob Woolmer of unknown causes during the World Cup in Jamaica, aged 58. (March 18).
-- Alan Ball, England football great, aged 61 of a heart attack at home near Southampton, Hampshire (April 25).
-- Colin McRae, British motoring rally champion, aged 39, in a helicopter crash. (Sept 15).
-- Norifumi Abe, Japanese three-time motorcycle Grand Prix winner, killed in a street crash in a Tokyo suburb, aged 32 (Oct 7).