BELFAST (NORTHERN IRELAND) – John Hume, a Roman Catholic architect of Northern Ireland’s Good Friday peace agreement who won the Nobel Peace Prize for his immense contribution in putting an end to 30 years of sectarian violence, passed away on Monday at the age of 83, his SDLP party said.
Hume, who is credited for initiating peace negotiations in the British region. He also shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 1998 with Northern Ireland’s then first minister, David Trimble of the Protestant Ulster Unionist Party.
His family said in a statement that Hume passed away in a care home in his native Londonderry in the early hours of Monday morning.
“The death of John Hume represents the loss of 20th century Ireland’s most significant and consequential political figure,” SDLP leader Colum Eastwood said in a statement.
“This is an historic moment on this island but most of all it is a moment of deep, deep sadness.”
Hume, a moderate nationalist and civil rights campaigner, held revolutionary talks with Gerry Adams, who was at the time leading the Sinn Fein party. The party was then the political wing of the Irish Republican Army (IRA).
Paving way for a joint initiative by the British and Irish governments in 1993, it led to a peace process and an IRA truce in 1994 and talks that produced the watershed Good Friday accord.
Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney said in a statement, “All of us, should bow our heads in respect & thanks. What an extraordinary man, peacemaker, politician, leader, civil rights campaigner, family man, Derryman, inspiration.”
(Photos syndicated via Reuters)
This story has been edited by BH staff and is published from a syndicated field.