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Amanpour

Exclusive interview: Tony Blair, Bill Clinton, Bertie Ahern

Amanpour

CNN

News

4.11K Ratings

🗓️ 17 April 2023

⏱️ 56 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

25 years ago, the Good Friday agreement ended decades of violence and brought peace to Northern Ireland. The architects of that ground-breaking pact were former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, former US President Bill Clinton and former Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern. In a historic reunion, Blair, Clinton & Ahern sat down with Christiane for an exclusive interview reflecting on the hard choices they made all those years ago and preserving peace and stability today.  Also on today's show: Author Clint Smith discusses his new book of poetry, Above Ground, which deals with the emotional ups and downs of raising a family in today's modern world.  To learn more about how CNN protects listener privacy, visit cnn.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

Hello everyone and welcome to Amunfor here's what's coming up.

0:08.0

Well I think we were all privileged to be where we were when we were, and privileged to do our part to

0:17.1

get this done.

0:18.1

A historic reunion to celebrate a historic peace agreement, my exclusive interview with the 1998 Northern

0:25.9

Ireland peacemakers, US President Bill Clinton, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, and the Irish

0:32.3

T-Shock Bertie Ahern.

0:34.0

Then, my children have never grown up in a normal society.

0:38.0

Why the people chose peace by a historic margin.

0:41.0

From the archive, my report on the families who decided a quarter

0:45.6

century ago also ahead.

0:47.8

Parent but is this thing that shows you the parts of yourself that you are proud of

0:52.1

and also the thing that shows you the parts of

0:53.9

yourself that you're not so proud. The poetry of parenthood writer Clint Smith

0:58.6

talks to Michelle Martin about his new collection of works inspired by his children. Welcome to the program everyone. I'm Christina Wancour at Queens University in Belfast with the principal peacemakers who ended the war

1:25.2

here in Northern Ireland 25 years ago. During the so-called Troubles, more than

1:30.4

3,500 people were killed, most of them civilians.

1:34.3

50,000 were injured as acts of terror traumatized generations.

1:38.9

Ultimately, it was a clutch of leaders, local and global, who took a chance and risked it all on peace.

1:45.8

Catholic nationalist leader John Hume and the Protestant unions, David Trimble, crossed that

1:51.0

bridge together and in time they shared a Nobel Peace Prize.

1:54.7

Now despite serious flaws the enduring success has made the agreement a bit of a model

1:59.8

for peace

...

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