Seamus Mallon

The Sunningdale Agreement, which was signed 50 years ago at the weekend, could conceivably have saved thousands of innocent lives if it had been allowed to remain in place, and deserves to be remembered as one of the most tragic lost opportunities of modern Irish history.

Lest there’s doubt – Irish unity will happen.

TONY Blair concedes it was "maybe naive" to think the Good Friday Agreement would deliver political stability in the short-term. The former British prime minister regards the accord's greatest failure as its inability to deliver strong and sustainable devolved government, yet he argues that when compared to the violence of the preceding decades, Good Friday 1998 ushered in "huge and positive change".

When loyalist gunmen set out to kill customers in a Catholic-owned pub in Poyntpass, Co Armagh, 25 years ago last Friday, they plainly hoped their appalling actions would drive the two sides of our divided society further apart than ever at a crucial stage.

FORMER PSNI chief constable Hugh Orde has described how the setting up of the Historical Enquiries Team (HET) in Northern Ireland was "the only original idea I have ever had in policing".

FORMER PSNI Chief Constable Sir Hugh Orde is to deliver the second annual lecture in memory of the late SDLP deputy first minister Seamus Mallon.

ENOCH Powell claimed all political careers end in failure, but it is the entire story not the final chapter that is the true measure.

While the ratification of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998 required the committed involvement of a range of individuals, it is clear that the historic breakthrough could not have happened without the central contribution of David Trimble.

THE post-St Andrews partnership between the DUP and Sinn Féin is regarded as the most effective in delivering for society and nurturing reconciliation, new data suggests.

I recall Seamus Mallon say when we would know that a policing career enjoyed the wholehearted approval of the nationalist community in this part of Ireland.