A BELFAST-born human rights worker has described how growing up during the Troubles helped inspire her work in negotiating an end to conflicts around the world.
Professor Christine Bell heads PeaceRep, a research group founded by the University of Edinburgh Law School and backed by the UK government, which supports international peace efforts in countries including Myanmar, Afghanistan and Syria.
She is currently assisting mediators in Ukraine, and Prof Bell leads a team of more than 50 researchers and mediation experts, who together have created a database of over 2,000 peace agreements signed around the world since 1990, which has been used in efforts to bring an end to more recent conflicts.
Prof Bell said her upbringing in Belfast during the height of the Troubles "absolutely motivated me to get involved with this work".
The 56-year-old, who is a professor of Constitutional Law at the University of Edinburgh and a fellow of the British Academy and the Royal Society of Edinburgh, said although she did not lose any immediate family during the conflict, she "was present at very violent events that deeply affected me".
“So many people were affected. My two best friends, one of them, her father had been shot dead and the other one, her brother was shot, severely wounded and left with life-changing injuries," she said.
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“My story is far from unique for anyone who lived in Northern Ireland during the Troubles. That insight into how communities suffer in conflict has most definitely given me the drive to work towards healing division wherever it exists around the world.”
PeaceRep received a £19million seven-year funding grant from the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) in 2021 to conduct its work.
Prof Bell, who read law at both Cambridge University and Harvard University in the US, is the organisation's executive director and principal investigator.
In the late 1990s, she was director of the Centre for International and Comparative Human Rights Law at Queen's University in Belfast, where earlier this year she met former US President Bill Clinton and his wife and ex-presidential candidate Hillary at events to mark the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement.
“Globally, I think the Belfast Good Friday Agreement is viewed successfully and considered a blueprint for peace," Prof Bell said.
“Of course, things are complicated because of disappointment over the current breakdown of power-sharing, but the 25th anniversary was a reminder of how far Northern Ireland has come."
The mother-of-six said: “Northern Ireland is a totally different place to 25 years ago when every day was marred by tit-for-tat violence. My eldest child is 28 and is part of a new generation whose lives have not been blighted by daily conflict and the misery that brings.
“I met with Bill Clinton and you got a sense he was really enjoying himself and Northern Ireland is one of the things he’s most proud of. I also chatted with Hillary and found it really inspirational that Northern Ireland is still of such global interest.”
She added: “We can build on all of the lessons learned from the Belfast Good Friday Agreement to help end violence elsewhere.”
Professor Bell said she works with conflicts "that are even more difficult and deadly than Northern Ireland, so I don’t want to exaggerate how my background helps with my work".
“But I do find that people engaged in trying to find solutions to conflict, clock my accent and recognise that I have insight of the Troubles and the peace deal to bring to the conversation," she said.
“I have found that sometimes when a meeting has been very fraught, I have jettisoned the academic talk and used my personal experience to stop a whole meeting from falling apart. It does make a human connection with people if they see that you understand something of their experience.”
FCDO minister Lord Ahmad praised the work of PeaceRep, and said: “The UK Government is proud to be supporting the team based at the University of Edinburgh and I was fascinated to learn how they are using big data analytics to help peacemakers learn lessons from previously negotiated peace deals, not least the Belfast Good Friday Agreement.
“PeaceRep’s database is now the go-to site for mediators embarking on the difficult process of opening dialogue to stop violence and plot a path to peace."
