Fmr EU commission Jacques Delors dead

Former President of the European Commission and a founding father of the European Union’s historic single currency initiative, Jacques Delors, has died.

He was aged 98 years

Delors, a staunch supporter of postwar European integration, presided over the European Commission, the EU executive, for three terms, the longest tenure of any office holder from January 1985 to the end of 1994.

In his decade as Commission President, the EU completed its integrated single market, agreed to a single currency, and established a shared foreign and security policy.

After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the then-12-nation bloc also outlined the requirements for gradually admitting the ex-communist governments of Central and Eastern Europe.

His daughter, Martine Aubry, the socialist mayor of Lille, told newsmen that her father died in his sleep at his Parisian home on Wednesday.

French President, Emmanuel Macron paid tribute to his compatriot as an “inexhaustible architect of our Europe” and a fighter for human justice.

Michel Barnier, the European Union’s chief negotiator during Britain’s divorce from the EU, said Delors had been an inspiration and a reason to “believe in a certain idea of politics, of France, and of Europe.”

Delors, was a passionate defender of an “ever closer union” who at the helm of the EU executive frequently clashed with Britain’s then-prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, who vigorously pushed back against any shift of power to Brussels.

Delors’ plans for monetary union also led The Sun tabloid in Britain to famously run a front page headline in 1990 reading “Up Yours Delors.”

The announcement of Delors’ death came hours after news broke of the passing of Wolfgang Schaeuble, whose career in the German parliament spanned more than half a century, during which he helped secure his country’s place at the heart of Europe.

Jacques Delors was a visionary who made Europe stronger,” European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen said.