Mandela at 95, celebrated in hospital

 Nelson Mandela is spending his 95th birthday in hospital in Pretoria, as events take place around the world and in South Africa in his honour, BBC reports.

South Africans are being urged to mark the former president and anti-apartheid leader’s 67 years of public service with 67 minutes of charitable acts.

Mr. Mandela, who is in critical but stable condition with a recurring lung infection, entered hospital on June 8.

President Jacob Zuma said his health was “steadily improving.” “We are proud to call this international icon our own as South Africans and wish him good health,” Mr Zuma said in a statement.

“We thank all our people for supporting Madiba throughout the hospitalisation with undying love and compassion,” he said, referring to Mandela’s clan name.

Mr. Mandela’s daughter, Zindzi, said on Wednesday he had made “dramatic progress”, and that she had found him watching television with headphones on and communicating with his eyes and hands when she visited him this week.

“I should think he will be going home anytime soon,” she told the UK’s Sky News television.

Mr. Mandela’s birthday is also Nelson Mandela International Day, a day declared by the United Nations as a way to recognise the Nobel Prize winner’s contribution to reconciliation.

The former statesman is revered across the world for his role in ending apartheid in South Africa. He went on to become the first black president in the country’s first all-race elections in 1994.