Robert Fisk was known as being one of the finest commentators on the Middle East after he started covering the area in the 1970s.
The veteran reporter interviewed Osama Bin Laden three times in the 1990s – one of the few Western journalists to do so.
He died at the age of 74, shortly after being admitted to St Vincent’s Hospital in Dublin on Friday, the Irish Times reported.
Born an only child in 1946, in Maidstone, Kent, Mr Fisk moved to Belfast in 1972 to cover the Troubles as Northern Ireland correspondent for the Times.
He later became Middle East correspondent for the paper in 1976, reporting on the civil war in Lebanon while based in Beirut.
After a disagreement with the Times owner Rupert Murdoch, Mr Fisk resigned from the paper in 1989 and moved to the Independent, where he worked for the rest of his career.
Mr Fisk won numerous domestic and international awards for his reporting work.
He took Irish citizenship and had a home in Dalkey outside Dublin.
Irish president Michael D Higgins paid tribute to the man he had the “privilege” of knowing.
He said: “I have learned with great sadness of the death of Robert Fisk.
“With his passing the world of journalism and informed commentary on the Middle East has lost one of its finest commentators.
“Generations, not only of Irish people but all over the world, relied on him for a critical and informed view of what was taking place in the conflict zones of the world and, even more important, the influences that were perhaps the source of the conflict.
“To his family and many friends Sabina and I send our deepest condolences.”
Many also took to social media to pay tribute to the writer.
John Pilger wrote: “Robert Fisk has died. I pay warmest tribute to one of the last great reporters.
“The weasel word ‘controversial’ appears in even his own paper, The Independent, whose pages he honoured. He went against the grain and told the truth, spectacularly. Journalism has lost the bravest.”
Jon Snow added: ” Sad to learn my old friend Robert Fisk of the Independent has died: Great reporter – he sat on the banks of the Shat-al-Arsb waterway twixt Iran & Iraq in 1983 and recorded our mad swim under fire to rescue 57 British seamen from the Al Tanin 40,00 ton bulk ore carrier.”
