Martin McGuinness, an Irishman whose tactics of armed resistance and then political conciliation made him a hero to nationalists in Northern Ireland, where he fought to end British rule, negotiated a sweeping peace treaty and climbed to the top of the province’s political system, died March 21 in Derry, Northern Ireland. He was 66.
An announcement of Mr. McGuinness’s death by his political party, Sinn Fein, did not cite a specific cause.
Mr. McGuinness had been hospitalized in late February for amyloidosis, British and Irish newspapers reported. The disease causes an abnormal protein to build up in the heart and other organs, and was one reason Mr. McGuinness resigned Jan. 9 from his post as deputy first minister, one of Northern Ireland’s two top political positions.
Mr. McGuinness was an equally stabilizing and polarizing ***** in Northern Ireland politics, where he served as deputy first minister since 2007. The position is part of a power-sharing agreement that splits the British province’s executive branch between two long-warring factions: Catholic nationalists who seek to unite the north with its sovereign counterpart to the south, the Republic of Ireland, and Protestant loyalists who believe Northern Ireland ought to remain a part of Britain.
A former butcher’s apprentice, Mr. McGuinness was known for many years as a leading figure in the outlawed militant Irish Republican Army, which waged a nearly three-decade bombing campaign and guerrilla war against British authorities that it viewed as ******* occupiers. More than 3,600 people were ****** and thousands more were injured during the conflict.
