Former US Secretary of State Colin Powell has died of Covid-19 complications.

Powell, aged 84, was a former top military officer who rose to become the first African-American secretary of state in 2001 under Republican George W Bush.

“We have lost a remarkable and loving husband, father, grandfather and a great American,” a statement from the family said.

“We want to thank the medical staff… for their caring treatment,” it added.

The statement said that he had been fully vaccinated against Covid.

Mr Powell became a trusted military adviser to a number of leading US politicians.

Born in Harlem of Jamaican parents, Mr. Powell grew up in the South Bronx and graduated from City College of New York, joining the Army through R.O.T.C. From a young second lieutenant commissioned in the dawn of a newly desegregated Army, Mr. Powell served two decorated combat tours in Vietnam.

He later was national security adviser to President Ronald Reagan at the end of the Cold War, helping negotiate arms treaties and an era of cooperation with the Soviet president, Mikhail Gorbachev.