Irish and Northern Irish leaders hail Queen’s contribution to peace

Loyalists and unionists grieve as politicians remember late monarch's historic 2011 visit to Ireland

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Political leaders across Ireland and Northern Ireland have hailed the Queen's role in applying balm to centuries of conflict between nationalism and unionism as one of the most consequential uses of her symbolic power.

Grief was most viscerally expressed in loyalist and unionist areas of Northern Ireland, where murals of the late monarch turned into shrines and gathering points for people to share memories.