Jeremy Craig: Diplomat played key role for Ireland in EEC, UN and Middle East

Jeremy Craig was a respected Irish diplomat who served in several important posts at home and abroad during the course of a 25- year career in the Department of Foreign Affairs.

He was born in Dublin in 1942 of a family with members on both sides who were prominent in public life in the early years of the State. His paternal grandfather, Sir James Craig TD, Professor of Medicine in Trinity College Dublin was elected to the Dáil to represent Dublin University in 1922 and re-elected at five subsequent general elections. His great-uncle on his mother’s side was Patrick McGilligan TD, who was minister for industry and commerce and minister for external affairs in the Cumann na nGaedheal government in the 1920s and minister for finance and later attorney general in Inter-Party governments in the 1940s and 1950s.

Jeremy went to Sandford Park School and later to Trinity College where he took a history degree. He was an active and enthusiastic member of the 250- year-old College Historical Society, “the Hist”, and he took a prominent part in its debates. In later life he maintained his interest in reasoned debate and retained friendships which he had made there as a student.

After a short period in the home civil service he joined the department of external affairs as it then was, as a Third Secretary in 1966, and served in the economic division and then in the Irish Embassy in Washington. He was promoted to First Secretary in the Embassy in Ottawa in the early 1970s. When he returned to Dublin he was promoted again and became a Counsellor in the political division in the department in 1974. By then Ireland had joined the EEC and, as a small and relatively inexperienced new member state, it faced a particular challenge in assuming the EEC presidency for the first time during the first six months of 1975.

A new system for foreign policy co-ordination between member states, which was then getting under way placed a heavy burden on the foreign ministry of the country holding the presidency which had to organise and run the system and provide chairpersons for a series of working groups during its term of office. As head of the section dealing with the United Nations, with responsibilities also in relation to Africa, Jeremy played a prominent part in what proved to be a highly successful first Irish presidency.

After the second Irish presidency in 1979, he took up another testing assignment in New York as deputy head of the Irish Mission to the United Nations, where Ireland, after an active campaign, was elected to a non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council for the two-year term, 1981-1982. This put it at the heart of the UN body charged with dealing with a series of international crises during those two years. These included the Israeli incursion into Lebanon and shelling of Beirut in August 1982, the Falklands war, Namibia’s effort to achieve independence and the election of a new secretary general. Jeremy co-ordinated the work of the small team of diplomats at the Irish Mission, had a role on a council working group and took the Irish seat on the council himself during the month of August 1981.

In 1983, Jeremy was promoted again and posted to Beirut as Irish Ambassador to Lebanon where he was also non-resident ambassador to Syria and to Iraq. This was a post of significance for Ireland’s relations with the Middle East and because Irish peacekeepers had been serving with the UN in Lebanon since 1978. It was also a difficult and dangerous assignment as Lebanon was convulsed by a complex civil war which in one form or another lasted from 1975 until 1989.

Three years later, in 1986, he took up another important posting in the embassy in London as deputy to the ambassador. Sadly, for health reasons, he did not have the opportunity to make the contribution he might have made there to Anglo-Irish relations. After a short time in London he returned to a post in the department in Dublin and he took early retirement on health grounds in 1991.

In retirement Jeremy maintained contact with his former colleagues. He loved walking and music and regularly attended concerts in the Concert Hall.

All through his career, Jeremy was a conscientious and committed diplomat. He was intellectually gifted, had good judgment and a capacity for clear analysis of international policy issues. He was personally courteous and helpful to those who worked with him and was highly regarded by his former colleagues in the Department of Foreign Affairs, many of whom were present at his funeral service to express their sympathy to his three brothers, Alan, David and Peter, and his extended family.