Pic of Day: Pictured is Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union, who has died aged 91. This Photocall file photo was taken as Gorbachev received an honorary Doctor in Laws degree from Trinity College Dublin in 2002. In a tribute, President Michael D. Higgins said in part: “Among the expressions of sadness at the passing of Mikhail Gorbachev, most painful perhaps will be those who, living in conditions of Cold War, saw his ‘perestroika’ and ‘glasnost’ as instruments of hope. For them, he seemed to recognize the power of diplomacy, with its capacity to show even powerful governments the capacity to approach, even resolve, ideological differences, and to bring these to the center of the places of discourse with discussions based on mutual respect. His own deep distress, as given in rare interviews late in life, was that he had underestimated the power and influence of institutional forces raised against this, including military-industrial complexes without borders. He spoke of how he had trusted where he should have recognized that there was no basis of trust. There were internal and external forces who would never allow the radical reforms to come to be. He was a man of good instinct who offered hope and who will be rightly remembered by so many for that most human of instincts.”
