LONDON — Margaret Thatcher, a dominant, divisive and yet revered figure in British politics whose impact on British life and society was enduring and contentious, died on Monday of a stroke, her family said.
Politicians called her influence on her country’s destiny among the greatest since Winston Churchill, and the authorities said she would be buried with military honors.
President Obama said in a tribute released by the White House that Mrs. Thatcher’s achievement as the first woman to serve as Britain’s prime minister taught “our daughters that there is no glass ceiling that can’t be shattered.” He added that the “world has lost one of the great champions of freedom and liberty, and America has lost a true friend.”
Mrs. Thatcher, 87, served as prime minister for 11 years beginning in 1979. She was known as the Iron Lady, a stern Conservative who transformed Britain’s way of thinking about its economic and political life, broke union power and opened the way to far greater private ownership.