Lee Kuan Yew
In October 2009, Lee was conferred the first Lifetime Achievement award by the U.S.-Asean Business Council at its 25th anniversary gala dinner in Washington, D.C.. In his tribute, former United States Secretary of State and 1973 Nobel Peace Prize winner, Dr Henry Kissinger said: "He has become a seminal figure for all of us. I've not learned as much from anybody as I have from Mr Lee Kuan Yew. He made himself an indispensable friend of the United States, not primarily by the power he represented but by the quality of his thinking.