Former US Senator Gary Hart: Named Peace Envoy to Northern Ireland.Former US Senator Gary Hart, 77, has been appointed by the Secretary of State John Kerry to serve as Peace Envoy to Northern Ireland. Hart will be tasked with helping major UK and Irish parties restore the endangered 1998 US-brokered Peace Agreement in Northern Ireland that ended more than 25 years of warfare.

The news of the appointment was first reported by Irish Central. Secretary of State John Kerry confirmed the appointment on Wednesday.

“I’ve asked Senator Hart to support the parties in Northern Ireland as they enter a new round of talks to achieve a lasting peace,” said Secretary Kerry said in a statement. “We welcome these new talks, supported by the United Kingdom and Ireland. Senator Hart has my confidence and trust.

“Whether it's through his 12 years in the Senate, or his work on the [pre-9/11] US Commission on National Security in the 21st Century, Gary is known as a problem-solver, a brilliant analyst, and someone capable of thinking at once tactically, strategically, and practically. He has listened and spoken to the people of Northern Ireland, and he knows many of the leaders.Now we're fortunate that he's agreed to devote some additional time to engage in the tough and patient work of diplomacy as my personal representative, including on issues related to Northern Ireland.”

Secretary Kerry added that the US consul general in Belfast Greg Burton will serve as Hart’s deputy for his work in Northern Ireland. According to the Irish Times, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade Charlie Flanagan called Hart’s appointment “an important step forward as we seek to resolve the current political impasse and build an enduring and a reconciled society.

“Senator Hart’s political experience, analytical skills and his knowledge of Ireland will be immensely valuable as he undertakes his new role,” Flanagan told the Times.

The1998 US-brokered Peace Agreement between the UK and Ireland, with the invaluable help of President Clinton, is now in serious jeopardy as recent US Peace Envoy Richard Haas noted earlier this year in his address to the US Congressional subcommittee of foreign relations.

"If you walk down parts of Belfast, you are still confronted by concrete barriers separating communities,” Haas told the subcommittee. “Upwards of 90 percent of the young people still go to divided, single tradition schools. Neighborhoods are still divided. I don't see the society sowing the seeds of its own normalization, of its own unity, if neighborhoods and schools are still divided.”

Hart played a significant, though unheralded role in setting the peace process in motion 30 years ago. “Gary Hart was the first major presidential candidate to endorse the idea of a U.S. peace envoy and all-party talks – those were the two core elements – which were new [in 1984],” Governor Martin O’Malley [D] Maryland, told the magazine Irish America in a 2007 interview.

Hart’s profile has been elevated in recent months, in part thanks to a book by former New York Times chief political reporter, Matt Bai entitled, All the Truth is Out. The book provides insights into Hart’s special love for Ireland. Bai cites a three-page memo Hart wrote to President Clinton in mid-1994 on the negotiations over Britain’s control of Northern Ireland: “After consultations with all parties, your should appoint a ‘personal representative’ to observe, monitor and report to you on the progress of further peace negotiations, with an emphasis on seeking new formulas to facilitate progress,” Hart wrote, according to Bai.

About a year later, Clinton appointed former US Senator George Mitchell.

Hart – who traces his maternal heritage to Co. Sligo – has been a regular visitor to Ireland, most often with his son Jack over the past 30 years, especially enjoying the peaceful quiet of Oughterard, Co. Galway. During his 1984 campaign for president, Hart was asked by a reporter what he would be doing if he wasn’t running for president.

He responded, “I’d be writing books in Ireland.”