FACTBOX-Facts about N.Ireland's Ian Paisley

(Reuters) - Northern Ireland's main Protestant and Catholic parties agreed on Monday to start sharing power on May 8, setting aside decades of hostility to hold a historic first meeting.

Hard-line Protestant cleric Ian Paisley, leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), and Gerry Adams, head of the mainly Catholic Sinn Fein, sat side-by-side to announce the deal.

Paisley is expected to become first minister in the Northern Ireland administration while Sinn Fein's Martin McGuinness would be deputy first minister.

Here are some facts about Paisley:

* Born in 1926 in Armagh, the son of a dissident Baptist minister, he delivered his first sermon aged 16 and founded his own breakaway Free Presbyterian Church in 1951. Fiercely critical of the Catholic Church, Paisley once famously branded the Pope "the Anti-Christ"

* Emerged as a political force in the 1960s, leading protests over issues such as the flying of Irish flags in Belfast, and in 1971 set up the Democratic Unionist Party which became the province's biggest political party in 2005

* His defense of Northern Ireland's position within the UK -- encapsulated in the war-cry "No Surrender" -- and his opposition to the Catholic Church have made him a hero to many Protestants but a rabble-rousing bigot to many Catholics

* First elected to the British parliament in 1970 and to the European parliament in 1979, he was viewed as a spent force after opposing a 1998 peace deal but his uncompromising stance would later win him support from disillusioned Protestants.

* In 2005 the IRA met Paisley's central demand when it pledged to disarm and pursue its aim of a united Ireland peacefully.

* Paisley resisted previous attempts to broker a political settlement and has up till now refused to talk to arch-enemy Sinn Fein, which he viewed as indistinguishable from the Irish Republican Army guerrilla group which waged a bloody 30-year campaign against British rule and which was responsible for nearly half of the 3,600 killings during the sectarian conflict.

* Paisley finally agreed a power sharing deal with Sinn Fein's leader on Monday. There was no public handshake.