John Hume, the former SDLP leader, Nobel peace prize winner and leading player in the Northern Ireland peace process, has died aged 83. He became SDLP leader in 1979 and is attributed with helping create the atmosphere that enabled the IRA and loyalist ceasefires of 1994. Referring to the Good Friday Agreement, the SDLP leader said Hume “was not simply the agreement’s main architect or its builder, he was very much both. We were to have separate parties to toast the Nobel peace prize win that year. He said: “His contribution to peace in Northern Ireland was epic and he will rightly be remembered for it.

Source: The Guardian August 03, 2020 08:59 UTC