Peace envoy, ex-Sen. George Mitchell diagnosed with leukemia

 Former U.S. Sen. George Mitchell of Maine, a famed peace envoy in rrn Ireland in 1990s, is starting treatment for leukemia at a Boston hospital on Friday, a day after his 87th birthday.

Portland Press Herald obtained an email outlining diagsis and treatment from president and CEO of Senator George J. Mitchell Scholarship Research Institute.

Meg Baxter wrote in email to staff and board that goal of treatment at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute is to achieve remission, newspaper reported. She didn't immediately return a mess Friday from Associated Press.

Mitchell, also a peace envoy in Middle East focused on Palestinian-Israeli conflict during President Barack Obama's ministration, is a consultant and former chairman of global law firm DLA Piper. He brokered historic 1998 Good Friday Agreement in rrn Ireland and was awarded Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1999. He also was tapped by Major League Baseball to investigate steroid use by players, leing to eponymous Mitchell Report.

Mitchell, a Democrat, won election twice as a U.S. senator and served as majority leer after first being appointed to fill a position left vacant when late Edmund Muskie was tapped to serve as secretary of state under President Jimmy Carter.

Before that, Waterville native and Bowdoin College gruate served as a U.S. attorney and federal judge.

Mitchell was previously diagsed with what was termed “small, low-gre and localized” prostate cancer in 2007.