German Chancellor Angela Merkel was among 15 honoured Tuesday by President Barack Obama with the highest civilian award of the United States, DPA reported.
Former President George Bush (1989-93), billionaire investor and philanthropist Warren Buffet, American artist Jasper Johns, world- famous cellist Yo-Yo Ma and poet Maya Angelou were among other prominent recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Obama called the 15 medal recipients "some of the most extraordinary people in America and around the world."
Merkel was not in attendance but would receive the medal on a future White House visit, Obama said, calling her "a trusted global partner and a friend."
Merkel became the first former East German and first woman to become chancellor in 2005.
"Growing up in communist East Germany, Angela Merkel dreamed of freedom. And when the Wall finally crumbled and Germany was reunited, she broke barriers of her own," Obama said.
The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to individuals who have made exceptional contributions to the security or national interests of the United States, to world peace, or to cultural or other significant public or private endeavors.
Bush was the 41st president and father of 43rd president George W Bush. He was a decorated Navy pilot in World War II, later elected to Congress from Texas and served as ambassador to China, CIA director and vice president under Ronald Reagan before being elected president.
His administration saw the 1989 opening of the Berlin Wall and 1990 reunification of Germany and the overthrow of other East Bloc regimes and collapse of the Soviet Union. Bush's government built and led the military coalition that drove Saddam Hussein's forces out of Kuwait in 1991.
"When democratic revolutions swept across Eastern Europe, it was the steady diplomatic hand of President Bush that made possible an achievement once thought impossible - ending the Cold War without firing a shot," Obama said.
Since leaving office, Bush has been active in global humanitarian causes, joining with Bill Clinton, the man who defeated him for re- election in 1992, to lead efforts to raise money for victims of the Indian Ocean tsunami. Bush has led "an extraordinary life of service and of sacrifice," Obama said.
Other medal recipients:
Congressman John Lewis, a leader of the civil rights movement, Natural Resources Defense Council co-founder John H Adams, Polish- born Holocaust survivor and author Gerda Weissmann Klein, Latino civil rights activist Sylvia Mendez, baseball legend Stan "The Man" Musial, 11-time NBA champion and civil rights activist Bill Russell, labour union leader John Sweeney, and Jean Kennedy Smith, who founded a group that promotes arts for handicapped people.
The award was given posthumously to Dr Tom Little, an optometrist and longtime aid worker who was one of 10 members of a humanitarian team slain by Taliban militants in August in Badakhshan, Afghanistan.
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