Political prophet, but not in his own country (Part 3)

VB: What does Javier Solana do?

CP: His job is to rally the council, to ensure that the council's view on the world is reflected to the rest of the world and he also helps the council as I do, to reach those opinions, reach those views. It's a complicated set-up but there's plenty for both of us to do, I can assure you.

VB: Anyway, is there any such thing as a European common foreign and security policy? Don't they all go their way when it suits them? Can you identify anything and say that is EU common foreign and security policy?

CP: Yes, I think it's pretty easy to identify something but let me say straight away, we're not talking about a single foreign policy. Foreign policy, a security policy, goes right to the heart of what it means to be a nation state. There will be for the indefinite future as many foreign policies as there are countries in the European Union. But, what has happened in the last few years, partly as a result of the end of the Cold War, partly as a result of the growing awareness of the gulf between our economic weight in the world and our political weight, partly because we're such players in areas like development assistance, much the biggest provider of it to the world, partly because of the humiliations that Europe suffered in the Balkans, for all those reasons, Europe has decided to look for areas whereby co-operating we can have more of an impact together than we could manage on our own.

A very good example of where that has been working, and working very successfully, is the Balkans. We're not through the wood in the Balkans yet. There is still considerable problems that we face in Kosovo itself, in southern Serbia, in Montenegro. But by and large, the strategy that we've been pursuing in the Balkans has been successful and by and large Balkan countries are moving back towards the European family.

VB: What is EU policy, for instance, on sanctions on Iraq?

CP: There isn't a common policy except that we are all supporting the UN policy on sanctions with some thinking that there should be modifications but by and large everybody is signed up in a Security Council resolution.

VB: Is there an EU policy on the US missile defence system (the US is proposing to build a missile defence shield, which some people say is in breach of the anti-ballistic treaty it signed with the Russians in the early 1970s)?

CP: The point on which I think everybody is agreed is that in arguing our case with the United States, we have to stress the importance of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, even though, of course, nobody can argue, I guess, that a treaty almost 30 years old can never be changed. I think we have to make the point very clearly to the United States that the impact on Russia, the impact on China, has to be something that has to be carefully discussed, carefully negotiated with Russia and China.

My own concern is less about the strictly military aspects of missile defence, much more about whether or not the decision taken on missile defence reflects an American view which is sometimes expressed on Capitol Hill and sometimes expressed in the right-wing think-tanks in the States that America can somehow cope with an unstable and different world by shutting itself off, by finding some technological fix that America doesn't have to engage in multilateral institutions, that it can simply be a global leader without taking any account of multilateralism.

I think that that attitude, that approach, is worrying. I hope that the new US administration will reject it and reject it clearly because I think that a superpower, such as the United States, has to demonstrate through its commitment to multilateralism, that it's not simply selfishly pursuing its own interest. I think that's part of the way in which it acquires legitimacy.

VB: Who will you vote for in the next British election?

CP: I'll vote Conservative.

VB: In spite of the fact that you disagree with them on all of the big issues?

CP: I disagree with the present stand on Europe but I've always been a Conservative, I always will be a Conservative and I think there's quite a lot of tribal specimens like me around.

VB: In an interview with The Irish Times in February of last year you said that your involvement in the Commission on Northern Ireland Policing was the most difficult and painful and emotionally draining job you had ever done. Why was that?

CP: We did 40 public meetings during the course of drawing up that report and they were an important part of the whole process of preparing the report. I think that what was borne in on us at those meetings was that there are two stories in Northern Ireland, two legitimate credible stories, that there are two cries of anguish, and I think not to recognise that is to miss the point but listening to those two stories was a very, very difficult business indeed. I've never found any job that I've done as harrowing, as emotionally wrenching, as that one was but I think we did pretty good work.

VB: Did you get a sense from those meetings that the groundwork had been laid for the compromises that were needed on both sides, not just on policing?.

CP: I think we were part of the laying of the foundations for compromise. It's interesting to recall why we were set up in the first place. The parties, the politicians in Northern Ireland, the politicians in Ireland and Britain had been able to find a lot that they could jointly accept in the Good Friday agreement. The one thing that they couldn't agree on was policing. Why? Because it goes right to the heart of the dispute. So, we were having to tread where others had not been able to journey.

But, secondly, I think in resolving any fierce argument, you find yourself at a certain point obliged to address history and obliged to face up to how other people see the truth and I think we were part of that process as well.

I can remember an evening at Omagh with a packed public library, a meeting divided I should think pretty well 50/50, passions on both sides. I think an occasion like that, a rather cathartic occasion like that, was part of the laying of foundations for a future in which people can reach accommodations and can recognise the legitimacy of the other side's point of view.

VB: You've been dismissive of nationalist concerns to do with the British government's failure to implement the detail of your report. Issues to do with the oath, to do with emblems, to do with the name, to do with the integrity of monitoring systems. These are utterly crucial but you've been dismissive of nationalist concerns about the failure of the British government to implement the recommendations of your report on these issues.

CP: I haven't been dismissive of anybody's concerns because I realise how substantial the issues are but what I feel very strongly about is our report hasn't been amended in radical or substantial ways. I don't believe that at all. I think, as I've argued, by and large what is now proposed meets all the criteria which we applied and which others wanted. First of all, it provides Northern Ireland with a policing service which reflects the ambitions, the traditions of the whole of society of both the communities in Northern Ireland.

Secondly, it does offer a system of accountability to the community which you could hardly find matched anywhere else in the world.

Thirdly, and extremely important, it provides a comprehensive oversight. So, my judgment is that we do have on offer in Northern Ireland that fresh start, that new beginning for policing which people have looked for. While I'm not impatient, I do think that it's time now to get on with making a success of the new policing service.

VB: A final question. Has being a Catholic been an impediment to you politically in British politics?

CP: No, I don't think it has. It certainly affected me in my public life, but you would expect that to be the case, but I don't think it has in any sense been an impediment. I don't think it was an impediment to the very first job I had when I went as a young minister into Northern Ireland. I don't think it has been an impediment at any other stage in my political life.

I think some of my views on political issues might just have been an impediment from time to time and the way I've expressed those views with perhaps excessive robustness from time to time might have been a problem but not the fact that I was born, brought up, remain and will die a Catholic.