WASHINGTON – Former US secretary of state Warren Christopher, who helped bring peace to Bosnia and negotiated the release of American hostages in Iran, has died in California at 85.
Mr Christopher died “peacefully, surrounded by family at his home in Los Angeles” late on Friday of complications from kidney and bladder cancer, his family said in a statement.
As the top United States’ statesman under former president Bill Clinton from 1993 to 1997, Mr Christopher was a behind-the-scenes negotiator. Often called the “stealth” secretary of state, he was known for his understated, self-effacing manner.
“As President Clinton’s secretary of state, he was a resolute pursuer of peace,” President Barack Obama said on Saturday. “Warren Christopher was a skilful diplomat, a steadfast public servant, and a faithful American.”
Mr Christopher said that as a diplomat, careful listening was his secret weapon. “I observed some time ago that I was better at listening than at talking,” the New York Times quoted him as saying in a 1981 speech.
In 1995, he intervened during the final days of the US-brokered Bosnian peace talks at Dayton, Ohio. He had an important role in closing the deal, according to his deputy, Richard Holbrooke.
Mr Christopher not only spoke the language of diplomacy, he dressed the part. Favouring elegant, tailored suits, he was once named one of the best dressed men in the US by People magazine for his “diplomatically dapper” style.
He devoted much of his time to the Middle East, making at least 18 trips to the region in pursuit of peace and a ceasefire in southern Lebanon between Israel and Hizbullah. In 1994, he witnessed the signing of a peace treaty between Jordan and Israel.
As then president Jimmy Carter’s deputy secretary of state, he negotiated the release of 52 Americans taken hostage at the US embassy in Tehran in 1979.
US secretary of state Hillary Clinton said in a statement: “As well as anyone in his generation, he understood the subtle interplay of national interests, fundamental values and personal dynamics that drive diplomacy.”
“Most talking is not glamorous,” Mr Christopher said in an address at Stanford University months after the Iranian hostage crisis ended. “Often it is tedious. It can be excruciating and exhausting. But talking can also tame conflict, lift the human condition and move us close to the ideal of peace.” – (Reuters)