Lebanese politician Hussein El Husseini, the former speaker of parliament and key broker of the Taif Agreement which brought an end to Lebanon’s Civil War, has died aged 85.
The death of one of the founders of the Amal Movement, a prominent Shiite political party and former militia, was mourned by people across Lebanon’s political spectrum.
As speaker of parliament in 1989, he is regarded as the godfather of the Taif Agreement, which paved the way towards the end of the 1975-1990 war that killed 120,000 people and led many more to leave Lebanon.
He served as secretary general of Amal from 1978 to 1980, taking over from fellow founder Musa Al Sadr, who disappeared in mysterious circumstances in Libya in 1978.
When he resigned as secretary general, he was replaced by Nabih Berri, who remains as leader of the party to this day.
Mr El Husseini was appointed as parliament speaker from 1984-1992, with Mr Berri again taking his place, reportedly because he was preferred by the Syrian forces who were occupying Lebanon at the time.
Regarded as a moderate politician, Mr El Husseini first became an MP representing Baalbek-Hermel in 1972 and remained in place until 2008, when he quit over a political deal agreed by Lebanese politicians in Doha to defuse a crisis that had led to renewed conflict.
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Smoke rises in a Beirut street during clashes between Palestinians and members of Christian militia the Lebanese Forces, backed by Lebanon's Christian Kataeb Phalangist party, on April 15, 1975. AFP -
Guerrilla fighters on a tank in a street in Beirut during Lebanon's civil war, in December 1975. Getty Images -
A Katyusha rocket is fired from the back of an army lorry into an apartment complex during the first year of the Lebanese civil war, in 1975. Getty Images -
A mass of burnt vehicles in the harbour area of Beirut after the outbreak of civil war in 1975. Getty Images -
A Red Cross nurse from Sweden takes care of a boy shot in the heel by a sniper, on September 9, 1976, at a hospital in the Coral Beach Hotel, on the road between Beirut and Saida. AFP -
Israeli shelling on west Beirut on August 2, 1982. AFP -
A man sits on rubble in a desolated area of west Beirut on August 20, 1982. AFP -
The US embassy in Beirut on April 18, 1983, after a bomb destroyed part of the building. AFP -
French soldiers watch the skyline in Beirut on September 26, 1983. The troops were part of the Beirut security multinational force sent to keep security after the Israeli invasion of 1982. AFP -
General Francois Cann, commander of the French troops of the multinational forces, on October 23, 1983, as rescuers search for survivors in Beirut through the rubble of a building that was destroyed by a suicide lorry bomber overnight. Fifty-eight French soldiers and five Lebanese were killed in the attack. AFP -
Rescuers continue to search on October 31, 1983, for corpses and identify the victims of the attack on October 23 on the headquarters of US troops from the multinational force in Beirut. AFP -
Rescuers search for victims on March 8, 1985, 15 minutes after a car, packed with an estimated 250kg of TNT, exploded in a crowded street of the southern Bir Al Aabed district in mainly Shiite southern suburb of Beirut. At least 75 people were killed and 256 injured in the explosion. AFP -
Israeli Defence Force soldiers on March 19, 1985, confront a civilian at Kasmyah bridge after troops the month before evacuated about 500 sq km around Saida. AFP -
Tripoli, in northern Lebanon, on October 4, 1985, after a ceasefire between pro-Palestine and pro-Syrian militias was agreed to in Damascus. AFP -
A woman cries in shock, minutes after a car bomb exploded in a crowded neighbourhood of mainly-Muslim west Beirut on August 8, 1986, killing 13 people, including three children, and wounding at least 92. AFP -
A nun inspects a damaged room in the Hotel Dieu Hospital in east Beirut on February 25, 1990, after a break in the battle between rival Christian factions. AFP
Lebanon has declared three days of mourning and Mr Berri has cancelled Thursday’s parliamentary session, where MPs were to meet to elect the country’s next president.
Caretaker prime minister Najib Mikati said Mr El Husseini had played a “pioneering role” in bringing about the Taif Agreement, adding that Lebanon had lost an important “national and constitutional figure”.
