CHAIRING the multi party talks in Northern Ireland has become "a labour of love", former Senator George Mitchell has told a US newspaper.
While there is speculation in Washington that Mr Mitchell may not want to remain involved - if talks are suspended, as expected, for the British election, he expresses enthusiasm for his role in an interview with USA Today.
Asked if the British government should have accepted his report's proposal for decommissioning of paramilitary arms during the negotiations, perhaps, thus preventing the breaking of, the IRA ceasefire, Mr Mitchell answered: "They certainly accept it now. It forms the basis ... on how best to move forward."
Asked if progress was likely before the election, Mr Mitchell said: "It depends on your definition of progress. Many people have said that the existence of talks has helped to prevent the eruption of widespread violence."
He said nothing in his experience had prepared him for his role. "There are elements that simply don't exist in the American political process.
When he first went to Belfast, "a few of the participants expressed opposition to me on religious grounds - I'm Roman Catholic. I said, `I've been in American politics for 30 years and no one has asked me what - my religious was or where my parents came from'."
Mr Mitchell said that in Northern Ireland "there is a very deep sense of history there with reliance on the past as justification for current grievances. In this country (US), it's much more like, here's the problem, and how do we solve it?"
He said he had "come to know, admire and really like the people" in Northern Ireland. "This is not an undeveloped country. They have a higher rate of literacy than we do in the United States. With outsiders they are uniformly friendly, generous, warm. It is only among themselves that they become hostile, antagonistic, mistrusting and fearful. What I hope is that they will soon begin to treat each other as they treat us."
Mr Mitchell is working on his book Not For America Alone, a reflection on the success of democracy and failure of communism, to be published in May.
A biography of him In Search of Peace, has recently been published. It tell how Mr Mitchell's father had been one of five children born to Irish immigrants who had been placed in an orphanage and later adopted.
His real name was Joseph Kilroy.
While serving with the US army in Germany in the 1950s, Mr Mitchell considered joining the Central Intelligence Agency but then decided to study law even though he was offered a post with the CIA. He joined the staff of the later Senator Edmund Muskie in 1962 and became Senate majority leader in 1988.