Carter - Compassionate, humble and committed to Mideast peace

Jimmy Carter, the earnest Georgia peanut farmer who as US president struggled with a bad economy and the Iran hostage crisis but brokered peace between Israel and Egypt and later received the Nobel Peace Prize for his humanitarian work, died at his home in Plains, Georgia, on Sunday. He was 100.

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• Beat Ford in 1976, lost by landslide to Reagan in 1980

• Egypt-Israel peace was top diplomatic accomplishment

• Iran hostage crisis consumed last 444 days of presidency

• In 1979, he bemoaned America’s ‘crisis of confidence’

• Won 2002 Nobel Peace Prize for peacemaker work

US President Joe Biden directed that January 9 will be a national day of mourning throughout the United States for Carter, the White House said in a statement.

"I call on the American people to assemble on that day in their respective places of worship, there to pay homage to the memory of President James Earl Carter," Biden said.

Carter, a Democrat, became president in January 1977 after defeating incumbent Republican President Gerald Ford in the 1976 election. His one-term presidency was marked by the highs of the 1978 Camp David accords between Israel and Egypt, bringing some stability to the Middle East.

But it was also dogged by an economic recession, persistent unpopularity and the Iran hostage crisis that consumed his final 444 days in office. Carter ran for re-election in 1980 but was swept from office in a landslide as voters embraced Republican challenger Ronald Reagan, the former actor and California governor.

Carter lived longer than any US president and, after leaving the White House, earned a reputation as a committed humanitarian. He was widely seen as a better former president than he was a president - a status he readily acknowledged.

World leaders and former US presidents paid tribute to a man they praised as compassionate, humble and committed to peace in the Middle East.