'Dr No' who said yes to peace: Ex-Northern Ireland leader Ian Paisley dies

Ian Paisley, the firebrand preacher-politician who for decades brayed “No Surrender!” across Northern Ireland’s sectarian divide, died on Friday aged 88, in the province to which he, belatedly, helped bring peace. Founder of his own church at 25, Paisley’s Biblical fulminations against popes and Irish nationalists echoed among the bullets, bricks and bombs to form the soundtrack to 30 years of blood-letting. Yet in old age he astonished the people of Britain and Ireland, who had grown used to the Reverend “Doctor No” and his litany of rejection.

There will be plenty of time for political analysis but at this point I wish to extend my deepest sympathies to Ian’s wife Eileen and to the Paisley family at this very sad time.

Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams

He agreed to lead the province alongside former IRA guerrillas, swallowing his dislike of a U.S.-brokered peace deal that gave Dublin a say in Northern Irish affairs. It was a mark of his personal journey, on which he brought with him a loyal Protestant following, that even Catholic republicans prayed for his recovery when he fell gravely ill, and mourned his passing as a man who made peace in his lifetime. “I have lost a friend,” former IRA commander Martin McGuinness said.

The journey he travelled, in many ways, encapsulates the triumph of the peace process and constitutional politics, and the futility of so much of what came before.

Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin

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