BELFAST, (Reuters) – David Trimble, the Northern Irish leader who steered the region’s Protestant majority into an historic peace deal with their Catholic rivals that earned him a Nobel Peace Prize, has died aged 77, his family said on Monday.
Trimble, who became Northern Irish first minister in the power-sharing government that emerged from the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, played a key role in the accord that mostly ended three decades of bloodshed in the region.
“It is with great sadness that the family of Lord Trimble announce that he passed away peacefully earlier today following a short illness,” Trimble’s family said in a statement published by his Ulster Unionist Party (UUP).
Trimble and John Hume, former leader of the Catholic Social Democratic and Labour Party, jointly received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1998 for their roles in helping end the sectarian violence that claimed some 3,600 lives.
Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin said Trimble’s reference to the “politics of the possible” in his Nobel acceptance speech summed up his achievements over many decades, often in challenging circumstances.
