Trimble, David

Trimble, David

 orig. William David Trimble

(born Oct. 15, 1944, Belfast, N.Ire.) Former first minister of Northern Ireland and corecipient with John Hume of the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1998. Trimble was elected to the British Parliament in 1990 and became leader of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) in 1995. He represented the UUP in multiparty peace talks beginning in September 1997. These talks, which included members of Sinn Féin, the political wing of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), culminated in the Good Friday Agreement of April 1998, which aimed to restore self-government in Northern Ireland. Defying opposition from hard-line unionists, he signed the agreement and successfully campaigned for its acceptance in referenda in Northern Ireland and in Ireland. In subsequent elections to the new Northern Ireland Assembly, he was elected first minister. He resigned as first minister in 2001, following a conflict with the IRA over decommissioning (disarmament), though he returned to government later that year after decommissioning commenced; the post of first minister was suspended the following year. In 2005 he lost his seat in the British Parliament and subsequently resigned as leader of the UUP.