Nobel Peace laureate Martti Ahtisaari, who served as Finland's 10th president between 1994 and 2000, died on Monday at the age of 86, the Finnish president's office said in a statement.
Ahtisaari was celebrated around the world for brokering peace in conflict zones in Kosovo, Indonesia and Northern Ireland. He refused to accept that wars and conflicts were inevitable.
At home, Ahtisaari was always a political outsider. But it was that very lack of political ties helped him to win Finland's first direct presidential election, in 1994, at the helm of the opposition Social Democrats. In later years he strayed from his party's line by encouraging Finland to become a fully fledged NATO member. That took place years before Finland's eventually joined the alliance in 2023, in response to neighbouring Russia's invasion of Ukraine.Ahtisaari was born in 1937 in Viipuri, now part of Russia, and his family was forced to flee when Soviet forces attacked when he was two.
He joined Finland's Ministry for Foreign Affairs in 1965 and was appointed Finnish ambassador to Tanzania in 1973. Acting as point man for the EU, he persuaded Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic in 1999 to accept NATO's terms for ending the Kosovo air campaign.
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