Peace Talks

by Tim Finch

  That I am distracted, that I have had difficulty focusing on proceedings, has had no bearing on the talks, I might add. They are going well. Around and about me, as it were. With me not fully or at all engaged. (I have raised my gavel once or twice, thought better of it and put it down again.) I should add too that the talks progressed – notably so – during the few days I was away, visiting capitals, my deputy in the chair. This idea that I am orchestrating the talks, that without me they would stall or fall apart, is more than ever an empty boast. Am I even a calming presence, a still centre around which progress swirls? Am I not just sitting here, in the middle of it, neither here nor there?

  This question again of what do I actually do? Such is the progress towards a settlement that it increasingly looks like the main thing this time will be to take credit where it isn’t due – the one comfort being that, when I report up, to governments, ministers, prime ministers and presidents, the credit will spiral up and away from me too. A Sherpa, even the most senior of them, does not get to plant the flag at the summit. That is one of our little sayings and I have always taken comfort in it.

  I played a familiar card. I called an adjournment – not on the first day back, but on the second morning. (There was no sign of Noor, I need hardly add. I was not thinking of Noor any more. Will I ever?) There was surprise, one might almost say consternation, in the room. I didn’t need to explain my decision to anyone else and I didn’t. The explanation I offered to myself was that I felt we were in need of a pause – a timeout, as the Americans call it. Others might ask: why risk losing momentum? Why not power on? Had I said anything, I would have said that I thought we were perhaps running away with ourselves, hurtling too fast towards the finish.

  I know some will speculate that I don’t want this to end. That this is all I have in my life now. But I repudiate that. These talks are not some sort of emotional crutch without which I would crumple. I want a deal as much as the next man – and like him (this is still a man’s world, get over it) I want it as quickly as possible. Indeed, I want it more, I’m sure. There are others who would spin things out for fear of what will come after. Not me. I will move on to the next round of talks. It isn’t as if there isn’t a waiting list of conflicts and crises in need of mediation. My mediation. My special skills. Whatever they are, whatever it is that I am good at, which must be something, as I have enjoyed a long and distinguished career pursuing it.

  No, the fact was – let me repeat – that I felt things were getting a bit overexcited; there was – that strange potency in the room which happens sometimes – too much give and take, too much understanding and conciliation. It happens sometimes when a group of people, even mortal enemies, are locked up away from the world, particularly up here, where the air is so thin and hysterical, a sort of laughing gas. Everyone gets just a bit carried away.

  For the first time ever, I have come out on the walk – the group walk – by myself, in the middle of the day. The snowfield, the icy bridge, the stand of trees, the steep and rocky climb – the peaks, the peaks, the peaks …

  I am going to miss this, I will admit. To be up here and to be working – far from it all, but at the centre too.

  It is positively hot. The snow has melted away completely in some places. Green patches. Water dripping from the trees.

  I will go down – I must. My team, the two delegations, are waiting. They are locked away. There is danger inside these locked rooms. Positions can harden again. In the absence of the other, suspicion of the other inculcates and festers. I need to get down from this high place, my dizzying elevation, to race back. Who am I that I would threaten all this?

  I feel very small. I will make myself even smaller. A minuscule man. A homunculus with a gavel. Laughable, puffed up. But we must bear with him. What he offers is humility and service. Let’s get this done.

  I AM IN GOLDEN SUNSET

  There was no ceremony as such. That will take place some weeks from now with the political leaders taking centre stage. The stage will be set with flags and flowers. The flags of the parties to the settlement; the flowers in the colours of the flags and otherwise white to symbolise peace. A small audience, consisting of the staff of the political leaders, members of the negotiating teams and various other dignitaries and diplomats, will be ushered into the hall. There will be a media pen for the larger number of cameramen, photographers and journalists. The whole event will be taken live on CNN, BBC World, Al Jazeera, RT and the rest.

  The leaders will walk to a desk at the front of the stage and sit down at their designated places. They will each have a water glass and a choice of bottles of mineral water. A plump leather folder will be laid on the desk before the leaders and they will sign on the line indicated to them, using plump fountain pens. (What happens to these pens afterwards? I wonder. Montblancs, every one. Who pockets them? And where does the leather folder with the signed treaty inside end up? I ought to know, perhaps. The flowers, I gather, go to local hospitals.) There will be handshakes, smiles and applause. Cue a lightning storm, with hail thrown in, of shutter and flash. I will be on the far right of the picture as you look at it, though you won’t be able to see me because I will have been cropped out before publication. Take it from me, then, that I will be smiling and applauding too. Until someone shouts, ‘Cut’ – not literally – and we disperse.

  I have explained before that a peace deal is a victory of sorts. But one is reminded also of the scorn directed – rightly, I generally feel – at educationalists and child psychologists who disapprove of competitive school sports. Where there are no winners, or everyone is a winner, all you are left with is a bunch of losers, right? Away from the cameras and the journalists, there will be no sense of elation or even relief. We have come down from the mountain on to the plain. The prospect is a bleak one.

  Consider the nature of the deal we have just concluded. A country divided in a highly artificial and unstable way. Lines drawn, zones designated, corridors created. All of this work with pencils, rubbers, rulers and set squares (again, not literally: it is just how I imagine it – shades of colonial-era mapmaking and border drawing). And all of this overseen on the ground by a UN ‘observer force’ – which is to say, a military force denied the power to act militarily. Factions within both sides to the deal oppose it bitterly – as they did the process which brought it about. They will be looking for every opportunity to destabilise and destroy. They will have every opportunity.

  Peace may have been declared, but tens of thousands of people are dead, as many again have been injured, and many hundreds of thousands are internally displaced or living in neighbouring countries as refugees. Whatever the outcome of the war, the majority of these people would have sacrificed lives, limbs, family, friends and homes in vain. Whatever the outcome of the war, most people would not have gained in any personal way from the years of fighting. Under the terms of the peace deal, the number for which this is true rises to precisely zero. The two sides have fought hard, and negotiated hard, to get back to the status quo ante (yes, that again) – except worse. Their ethnic and religious differences have not been resolved, nor have any of their political and economic grievances. Indeed, these divisions and enmities have deepened and indurated. On top of which, whole districts of their main cities have been razed, important industries like tourism and agriculture have been devastated, infrastructure and the utilities destroyed.

  Aid will flood in, of course, and reconstruction projects will start up, but primarily – or so it will prove – so that corruption and fraud can once again flourish. Electricity and the water supply will be unreliable and intermittent at best. Unemployment and poverty will remain endemic. An interim power-sharing government will be set up to pave the way to ‘free elections’ and ‘democratic rule’, but politics will be characterised by suspicion and recrimination. The old tyrants will still dominate; the old ways of doing things will persist. Assassinations and bombings will occur daily.

  And remember, the imperative that brought
the parties to the negotiating table was exhaustion from years of fighting – years of fighting with no prospect of victory or indeed defeat. It was not the prospect of peace. Not even the peace-makers within the parties – more precisely, the warring parties: they were forged for war – wanted peace for its own sake. What they wanted – or rather, needed – was a pause, a breather. A chance to recuperate and regroup.

  (What, I find myself wondering, is the translation or equivalent in Arabic for ‘a breather’? Is it the sort of word that Noor would use? I doubt it somehow. Which is a pity. Nice expression ‘a breather’: a good-man turn of phrase. Yes, Noor sometimes comes to mind. Not frequently. No more frequently than the rest of them – and I include my team. We have all gone our separate ways, never – in many cases – to meet again. Just think how many people pass through one’s life – not literal passers-by, not people opposite one on a train or next to one on a plane, but people one has worked with for a time or attended a conference alongside or interacted with in some reasonably significant way – who one will never meet again; the many, many thousands – who are, in effect, dead to one. Alive still, most of them; actually dead, some of them. But what is the difference? It is the promiscuity of acquaintance in the modern age that leads to this casual annihilation of lives beyond one’s own. It ought to prepare one, inure one. It doesn’t, of course.)

  But I have got ahead of myself. This was the moment of triumph. The peace-makers had made a peace. And yes, as I have been known to joke, ‘You are never going to be out of work if your business is making peace.’ Or to put it another way – another of my jokes, ‘Nirvana is not around the corner.’ But this was not the moment for sardonic wit, for black humour. It was – we must try to bask in it – a moment of light.

  Though of light comedy most of all. Think of it this way: such an occasion gives rise to certain social niceties that, with all that has gone before, are not easy to pull off but are the more endearing for it. So, there was one final rap of my gavel to ragged cheers and then we were all on our feet suddenly. And there was mingling of sorts across various lines. Uneasy mingling – but mingling all the same. Certainly, some shaking of hands; less certainly, some slapping of backs. But at the same time, we didn’t quite know where to put ourselves or quite what to say.

  As I say, no ceremony and no standing on ceremony. Rather, a ramshackle democracy broke out. Girls – and boys – from the simultaneous translation booths spilling down on to the floor of the conference hall to join us. The delegations breaking ranks, if briefly, if tentatively. I was among the mill and throng, feeling none too comfortable. Unmoored from my established position. Deprived of my elevated status. I was reminded of the odd occasion on which I have attended a church service and the minister has invited the congregation to share the peace. ‘The peace be with you.’ ‘And also with you.’

  ‘Congratulations, Ambassador Sabbagh.’

  ‘Congratulations to you too, Mr Behrends.’

  A team photo, someone said. We were all one team suddenly. How about that! Not for the official record, it was stressed, but for showing to family, for a keepsake. Where to stand for this picture was a matter of great – greatly forced – amusement and awkwardness. Short ones at the front, tall ones at the back. Hands were put on shoulders to manoeuvre people into position. There was gentle jostling. Some fixed grins. ‘Come on, Dr Faroud, no one can see you lurking there!’ The delegations would not be split up or mixed together, however. One on one side of the line-up; the other on the other. An incorrigible stiffness reasserted itself, for all that the young people in the negotiating team and in SimulTrans were determined to maintain high spirits.

  ‘What is cheese in Arabic?’

  ‘Cheese?’

  ‘Yes, we say “cheese” for photographs.’

  ‘Cheese in Arabic, my friend, is jaban.’

  ‘Altogether now: JABAN.’

  There was no question of alcohol, of course, but a few bottles of something sparkling were produced – the girl with the metal trolley appearing and then disappearing, head down, terrified. The extended exertion of easing the corks from the bottles elicited more forced laughter. At last! Sugary fizz was frothed into plastic cups. There was no clinking, but rather a squashy pressing together. The delegations started to gather up their folders and files. To snap shut laptops and power down screens. Just think of all the ghosts in those machines. There was now a distinct feeling of unease that there had been this outburst of informality – almost of levity.

  I was sent a stern note, first by one side and then the other, that under no circumstances were any of the photographs to be posted on websites or social media. All staff were informed. The idea of that team photograph with us all – or at least some of us – shouting ‘JABAN’ was both funny and terrifying. Imagine that doing the rounds? Talk about a diplomatic incident.

  The work on the official communiqué had begun. I had started a ring-round of capitals. The delegations had withdrawn to their floors. To pray. To implore harsh judgements on enemies and infidels. And to seek blessing on their own peace-making. Allah being pulled both ways yet again.

  Still, we had a deal. As is the way of it, we didn’t – and there was seemingly no prospect of one – and then there was – and we did. What happened so suddenly to resolve the intractable business of prisoner-of-war swaps? Or the question of war graves? Or the flying of flags on public buildings? Or parity of access to the one deep-water port? Sheer exhaustion played a part. Sheer grinding tedium too.

  One after another and headlong, the Working Groups reported back that they had reached provisional agreements on the various points of contention. Schedules and Texts found itself scrambling. I called in the chefs de mission who sat next to each other in easy chairs for the first time. I had tea brought in and baklava. A nice touch, that. ‘Are we concluded?’ We were and within the hour we were in a final plenary to slot the pieces together – and slot they did. Like blocks of finely sanded and well-oiled wood. Parquet, I remember saying to myself in an almost ooh-la-la accent. Call it high spirits. I was giddy with it for a second or two.

  Closing statements could have undone all the good work, sliced open and reinfected the sutured wounds. But they were got through. Like that last half-mile of a marathon. Do you remember my one and only? A bandy-legged Mr Bean treading water up the Mall, was how you described it. I think it was you. Then they draped a big golden Crunchie wrapper around my shoulders. My time: just over four hours and thirteen minutes. We went for tea in the Ritz, I remember.

  As the closing statements wound on, I began to ponder whether it was actually possible to prop eyelids open with matchsticks. I tried to imagine the coarse surface of the match heads scratching my corneas; the wooden ends of the matches wedged in the bone shelves of my eye sockets. Holding it all together, unblinking, until … ping! What was everyone else thinking? What nonsense was not diverting them? Molten exasperation churned inside me suddenly. Intolerable fidgetiness took hold and generated heat. Intolerable heat.

  Either side of me the doodles of deputies spiralled in on themselves, becoming blacker and blacker, more manically self-absorbed, until they broke the skin of the paper of notebooks, or started injecting black blooms of dye into the spongy veins of the ornamental blotters. These blotters had black leather frames with the crest of the hotel group inscribed in gold. The most extraordinary detailed work to produce something I hadn’t until now – or only tangentially – noticed. Like the work that medieval stonemasons lavished on gargoyles high up in the great cathedrals. Chartres, Bourges, Reims …

  And yet, these closing statements served their purposes. Monumental sanctimony and self-righteousness were strutted. A breathtaking carve-up of credit and blame. One last round of grievance and recrimination. But that was fine; these were exercises in going through the motions. The poison had been drained. There was open yawning and the drumming of fingers as the other side awaited their turn. All that remained for me et cetera, et cetera.

  Aft
er the first sip, the fizzy drink was largely left untouched. It had a nasty, diesel taste, it turned out. Once the delegations had left us – and after a respectful pause – I suggested we might retire to the bar. I didn’t say it, but it was clearly implied, ‘for a proper drink’. Some of the team came, some didn’t. The party, to the extent it could be so described, broke up after a round or two. People were already looking forward to getting home, to seeing loved ones. I didn’t feel sorry for myself. I had another couple of drinks. Ordered a burger and fries. It would have been nice to phone you, as I did in the past, but there you are.

  I should say at this point that I am not on my balcony, or in my suite, or in one of the bars or cafés of the resort, or in the Gaststube. I am not in the mountains at all. I have left them for good. Packed up and gone. A month has passed. The official signing of the peace deal will take place in a fortnight. No difficulties have arisen, but negotiations over scheduling, the precise choreography and stage management of the ceremony, take time. These I have left to able deputies, who are working with junior representatives of both parties to the deal. The caravan has moved to Vienna, the agreed site for the signing ceremony.

  Where am I, then? As far from any of the above as it is possible to be. The West Indies. On a short break. On my own, of course. No change there. Perhaps there will be more evenings out with other Josephines? In due course? Quite so. But these will be very occasional variations on the main theme. The success of the evening out with Josephine has convinced me of that. My first-order relationship from now on will be with myself alone. I contemplate this fate with almost complete equanimity. I am getting used to this solitude of mine; dare I say it, even getting to like it.

  Here I am, then, in this Caribbean resort complex, in my apartment, on its dark wood deck, which sits on tree-trunk struts, projecting out over a rocky, tropical garden that tumbles down a mountainside towards the sea. The apartments have been placed – doubtless with great care; this is, of course, an ‘eco’ resort – in a forest of tamarind and coconut and cinnamon and turpentine and calabash and palm – such names to conjure with; a forest of exotics which covers not just this mountainside, but the mountain range behind the resort and the headlands that half encircle the bay.