Peaceful Class of ’98 meet for final hurrah

IF recent events showed a week can be a long time in politics, then a decade can be an eternity.

The signatories and negotiators of the Good Friday agreement, who made history 10 years ago by opening the pathway to peace, gathered in Belfast yesterday to discuss how things have changed since, and look back at some of their personal memories of the intense negotiations.

Chief among them was the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, on his last official visit to the north before he steps down next month; also present was Liz O’Donnell, a one-time Progressive Democrats junior minister who sat on the negotiation table on behalf of the government but has since lost her Dáil seat; there was John Hume, the former SDLP leader who has since resigned from politics.