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Supreme Court Rules That Abortion Medication Mifepristone Can Remain Available While Appeals Process For Lower Court Ruling That Reversed FDA Approval Plays Out; Clash Between Sudanese Generals Plunges Country Into Civil War; Opposing Sudanese Armies Agree To Allow Foreigners To Leave Country; Hundreds Of Thousands Of Gallons Of Sewage Spill Into Los Angeles River In Southern California; Former U.S. President Bill Clinton, Former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair, And Former Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern Interviewed On Their Work To Finalize Good Friday Agreement Ending Decades Of Violence In Northern Ireland. Aired 2-3p ET.

Aired April 22, 2023 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[14:00:00]

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: And we're excited to welcome our new colleagues, Gayle King and Charles Barkley, to CNN. That's "King Charles" Wednesday nights, got to get used to saying that way, launching this fall right here on CNN.

All right, hello again, everyone. Thank you so much for joining me this Saturday. I'm Fredricka Whitfield.

All right, a new legal battle is taking shape after the U.S. Supreme Court issues a last-minute order to protect a common abortion drug. The high court deciding last night to freeze a lower court's ruling that placed restrictions on the drug mifepristone.

The pill is the predominant method for ending pregnancies in the U.S. But now that decision sets up the most consequential abortion related dispute since the overturning of Roe v. Wade. Another appeals court is scheduled to take up the case, meaning it could take weeks or maybe even months before a final decision is made.

CNN's Jessica Schneider has more.

JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The Supreme Court stepping in to protect full access to the abortion pill mifepristone while this appeals process plays out. That means it will be status quo for the administration of this drug. Women can continue to take it up to 10 weeks pregnant. They can continue to receive it by mail and via telehealth visits with their health care providers, and the generic version will remain widely available.

This is exactly what the Biden administration and the FDA, what they were asking for. They warned that if there were restrictions imposed on this drug at any point, there would be confusion and chaos. So now this chaos has really been averted.

So where does this go from here? Well, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, they'll be hearing arguments on the underlying issue in this case, and the underlying issue is whether the FDA properly approved mifepristone in 2000. Those first briefings in the appeal, they actually must be filed at the Fifth Circuit next week, and the case as a whole is being fast tracked because arguments are set for less than a month from now on May 17th.

But regardless of what the Fifth Circuit decides, any possible changes to the drug are being put on hold indefinitely by the Supreme Court order, so women can continue to fully access mifepristone until the Supreme Court acts again at some point, which wouldn't be for months, if at all.

WHITFIELD: All right, Jessica Schneider, thank you so much.

The order offers a temporary victory for the Biden administration, which has sought to protect abortion access -- access, rather -- in the wake of the Supreme Court decision to reverse Roe v. Wade precedent. CNN's Kevin Liptak is at the White House for us. Kevin, what is the president saying about all of this?

KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Well, certainly, the president, his advisers breathing a sigh of relief after that decision came out yesterday, but certainly no one in the White House really believes this is the end of the road. And what you hear from President Biden's advisers is that they are prepared for quite a lengthy legal fight going ahead.

And the president did get at that in his statement. He released it really within minutes of this decision last night. He said, "As a result of the Supreme Court stay, mifepristone remains available and approved for safe and effective use while we continue this fight in the courts.

I continue to stand by FDA's evidence-based approval of mifepristone, and my administration will continue to defend FDA's independent expert authority to review, approve, and regulate a wide range of prescription drugs."

So an acknowledgement there that while this is a victory for the Biden administration, certainly they have a long road to go. Really in the lead up to this decision, Fredricka, the administration had been working behind the scenes to develop some contingency plans at the counsel's office, at the Department of Justice, and within the president's senior team. Those options will remain on the table as this moves forward in the courts.

But I also think it's important to note something else that the president said in his statement, which is that if Americans want to see abortion rights preserved, they will need to use their vote as their voice. Essentially, they will need to elect lawmakers who support abortion rights if they want to see the protections of Roe versus Wade, which were stripped away by the Supreme Court last year, restored.

And that really does get at the politics of all of this. Certainly, as the president gears up for reelection, as Democrats hit the campaign trail, this will be a central issue for them over the next year.

Certainly, they believe this can galvanize supporters heading in to the 2024 elections. So even as president, the president's advisers focus on the public health issues at stake here, there are also very focused on the politics at play as this continues to play out in courts going ahead, Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right, Kevin Liptak, thanks so much.

All right, new today, Chief Justice John Roberts is declining to directly respond to alleged ethics lapses by Justice Clarence Thomas. The Senate Judiciary Chairman Dick Durbin had asked Roberts to testify to his committee following reports that Thomas had taken multiple luxury trips at the invitation of a Republican megadonor.

[14:05:03]

Well, those trips were not disclosed on Thomas's public financial filings. Thomas contends that current ethics guidelines do not require such disclosures. Instead, Chief Justice Roberts has referred the matter to the Judicial Conference, which serves as the policymaking body of the federal courts.

All right, still ahead in Sudan, a three-day ceasefire is in shambles as the death toll climbs. We'll hear what the U.S. is telling its citizens and staff still inside the country. We've got a live report straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: All right, fighting is raging today in Sudan despite the declaration of a three-day ceasefire. The U.N. says the death toll has risen to 427 in just a week of battles as two of Sudan's top generals fight for power. Meantime, the country's army says it will help facilitate the evacuation of diplomats from a number of countries.

[14:10:02]

Saudi Arabia says it has already begun returning its citizens home. The U.S. is warning, however, that private American citizens should not expect to be evacuated.

CNN's Larry Madowo is in Nairobi, Kenya, for us. So Larry, is there any hope of salvaging this ceasefire?

LARRY MADOWO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We're halfway through that ceasefire, Fred. So one more day, Sunday will be the last one, and it's not been a smooth ceasefire in the way that the international community expected of these two warring generals. There's been fighting still going on in the middle of the capital Khartoum, especially around the presidential palace and the general command headquarters. That is where the army is located.

But at the same time, because of the lull in fighting, people have been leaving Khartoum, trying to make it to safer parts of the country. And there's a convoy, several convoys, actually, making its way eastwards to the port of Sudan that is the main seaport in Sudan on the Red Sea.

And that is why Saudi Arabia has already reported four ships left the port of Sudan, went across the red sea to the port of Jeddah in Saudi Arabia, not just of Saudi citizens, but also of friendly, brotherly countries, according to the country, one of those countries, Kuwait.

But back at the capital, the army saying it is open and has agreed to a ceasefire with countries including France, the U.S., the U.K., and China to evacuate the citizens using the airport of Khartoum, and that matches what the other side of the conflict, the Rapid Support Forces, said they were open to reopening all airports to allow any countries that want to pull out their diplomats and the citizens to do so.

Here's a warning, though. The U.S. is planning to evacuate the diplomats out of the Khartoum embassy and to security that were necessary. It will not be evacuating private U.S. citizens in Sudan because, according to the State Department and the White House, that is not standard practice.

It's been done once in recent times in Afghanistan, but that's been described as a unique situation. The U.S. says it didn't evacuate citizens out of Libya or Yemen or Syria when those governments were collapsing.

This conflict drags on. We're on day eight now, 427 people already wounded, almost -- 427 dead, Fred, almost 4,000 wounded.

WHITFIELD: Yes, it's extraordinary, and it's just hard to see how this is going to end. All right, Larry Madowo, thank you so much.

All right, still to come, miles of public beach in southern California shut down after 250,000 gallons of sewage spilled into the Los Angeles River and then made its way to the ocean. We'll go live to Long Beach next.

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[14:16:41]

WHITFIELD: Right now, sanitation crews in southern California are cleaning up after hundreds of thousands of gallons of sewage spilled into the Los Angeles River, and then that massive spill prompted officials to close several miles of public beaches in the city of Long Beach. And that's where we find CNN's Camila Bernal. So Camila, would are you learning about how this happened and what's going on at the beach? I do see people behind you. Are they part of the cleanup?

CAMILA BERNAL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Oh yes, Fred, they are here. It is a beautiful day in southern California, so you'll see a lot of people are at the beach. But I do want you to take a look at the water, because there is not one single person in the water. So I think they got the message.

It's about 250,000 gallons of wastewater that essentially ended up back here in the ocean. This happened because there was a malfunction in one of the sewer systems. And so what happened was that all of that waste ended up going into the L.A. River and now here in Long Beach.

And so you're seeing these signs here where it says the beach is closed. So the idea here is to really tell people look, if you're going to go in the water, it is just not safe. There is bacteria in there. You really just don't want to be in the water. There's a lot of people who are out here, but again, it seems like they did get the message. Take a listen to some of these beachgoers.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's disgusting.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's nasty. You can't enjoy the water. You can't jump in. You can't swim in here.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I hope people respect the sign because it's really tempting.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERNAL: So yes, it is very tempting because we've had such a long, rainy, horrible winter here in California, and it is finally just a beautiful weekend out. So while it is tempting, officials are saying just wait until they continue to test the water. They're going to be testing it throughout the day and throughout the next couple of days to see when exactly it is going to be safe.

But in the meantime, there is this long stretch of beach here in Long Beach, California, where officials are saying do not go in the water. Fred?

WHITFIELD: Well, somebody better tell the two people over your right shoulder because at least they're getting their toes wet, and I don't know. I don't know that's a good idea.

BERNAL: I don't know.

(LAUGHTER)

BERNAL: I don't know, either. I would advise against it, for sure.

WHITFIELD: Maybe you should go advise them after this live shot. All right, Camila Bernal, we'll check back with you, and we'll see how they're doing later. Thank you.

All right, police in Utah, well, they're looking for the person responsible for this, vandalizing a state senator's home. Republican Mike Kennedy posted this photo of the damage on Facebook Friday morning, and police say he was targeted, and it was likely retaliation for a recent piece of legislation that he sponsored on banning gender transitioning surgical procedures for minors.

And this quick programming note, what started with the disappearance of 20 people from a small town in Oregon ended with the largest suicide on U.S. soil and changed the face of new age religion forever. "Heaven's Gate, The Cult Of Cults," continues tomorrow night 10:00 pm right here on CNN.

[14:20:00]

Coming up, a CNN exclusive. Christiane Amanpour sits down with the leading architects of the Good Friday Agreement, 25 years after they brokered an end to decades of violence in Northern Ireland. Her interview with Bill Clinton, Tony Blair, and Bertie Ahern next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: All right, now to a CNN exclusive interview. Christiane Amanpour reunites the leading architects of the Good Friday Agreement and explores America's critical role in helping end decades of violence in Northern Ireland.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Now, whether you're of Irish heritage or not, surely everyone in the United States knows Saint Patrick's Day, the parades, everything cloaked in green. Countless American presidents have visited Ireland over the years in search of connecting with their roots. And millions of Irish Americans were affected as they watched from afar the vicious civil war that raged in the north for three decades, the so-called Troubles.

[14:25:00]

But does everyone remember that 25 years ago it was an American president who was instrumental in ending that war where more than 3,500 people were killed and another 50,000 were injured? Well, this past week in Belfast, President Bill Clinton joined his counterparts at the time, prime ministers of Britain and Ireland, to remember and celebrate their landmark piece of lifesaving diplomacy.

And all three agreed to join me for an exclusive reunion to talk about the courage, the commitment, and the patience that it took to get that piece over the finish line with the Good Friday Agreement.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

Welcome President Clinton, Prime Minister Blair, Prime Minister Ahern. We're calling this the reunion of the peacemakers, and I just wonder, just to start, with reflections, first with you, Mr. President, of just what it means for you to be together, to be here 25 years later with all the principles?

BILL CLINTON, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: Well, I think we were all privileged to be where we were when we were, and privileged to do our part to get this done. They actually had to sign the agreement. I was just the cheerleader, sort of and gave them George Mitchell, which was the gift of a generation. So I think we're proud. I hope we are.

AMANPOUR: Prime Minister Blair, this was something that wrecked many British governments before yours.

TONY BLAIR, FORMER BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: But I was lucky in in having a group of people in Northern Ireland, leaders who were prepared to lead and do difficult things. I had an Irish prime minister that had a -- we were coming to the end of the 20th century and you needed people with a kind of 21st century mentality of the world. And Bertie had that. And then the president was saying that he was a cheerleader, but he was actually much more than that. He was also an intervener at crucial points in the negotiations.

So we were lucky. It was just one of one of these things, I think it was a was a combination of circumstances. But the individual leadership of people at that particular moment was crucial in delivering it.

AMANPOUR: And Prime Minister Ahern, was it that mostly the alignment of the stars, so to speak, in terms of leadership? Was it also about the people on the ground?

BERTIE AHERN, FORMER IRISH PRIME MINISTER: Yes, the parties and the people on the ground, but I think from our point of view, to have the president of the United States being genuinely interested and Bill to give time and to stay up at night. We are a small country, and the things you don't expect.

And I was just so lucky that Tony and I got on so well. He gave us an enormous amount of time. I know he had 100 other items on his list, and I realized every prime minister is busy. But when I looked at my agenda against his agenda, and he was prepared to come here, spend days here, weeks here, hours and time and time again.

And people talk about 1998. But we went down to 2007, and the same commitment you gave, Tony, and that that was an extraordinary commitment.

AMANPOUR: Can I ask the origin story? So President Clinton, even in your campaign before the 92 election, you talked about this to Irish Americans. You said you would put all your abilities behind trying to get peace. Why, why did it matter so much, even in 92?

CLINTON: First of all, I was a student at Oxford when the Troubles began. I remember what a big story it was when Bernadette Devlin was elected to parliament. And I remembered, and I went to Ireland a couple of times while I was a student. And I saw both the happiness and the sorrow.

And I always felt when I started talking to Irish Americans when I was running for president that we can make a positive difference if we were fair to both sides. And I knew that to do that we'd have to do something that the side that was then prevailing would think was unfair, which was to get involved, because our whole diplomacy was built around our special relationship with the U.K., which included staying away from Ireland. Even when President Kennedy came here, he didn't talk about Northern Ireland. And no president ever spent the night in Northern Ireland until I did, stayed in the Europa on purpose because it had been bombed so much.

And so I give a lot of credit to the Irish Americans that urged me to do it, and to the people in my National Security Council, especially Nancy Soderberg, who is here today, and who worked this issue for me, who said you might not have a lot of experience in foreign policy, but your instincts are right on this. Stay. And so we took the heat.

[14:30:00]

AMANPOUR: Prime Minister Blair, here you are. You have you have come in as a as a Labour prime minister for the first time in a generation, and you have an overwhelming mandate, and you start by doing this. You were elected in 97. The negotiations started in 97. Why? Why was it so important to you, to put that much political capital?

BLAIR: There was a personal reason, actually, to a degree, rather like the president. My family on my mother's side did come from Donegal. I'd grown up with a very clear understanding of the Troubles. And you would wait literally every morning and the 1970s, 1980, 1990s to news on the U.K. media of acts of terrorism or destruction, death, tragic stories of the families of the victims of the Troubles.

So it was all, it was part of my own personal history. But I also thought John Major, who had been my predecessor as prime minister had tried and got somewhere. There was some stirring, you could see, some possibility, even though the thing had broken down by the time we came to office.

And I thought -- I've often wondered whether it was just because you were straight into government, and maybe you had this feeling that everything was possible. And so you're prepared to give what most people thought was impossible a go.

So for all of those reasons, the first speech I made as prime minister was here in Northern Ireland. And then we -- once we decided to work on it, we put a lot of lot into it.

AMANPOUR: And Prime Minister Ahern, you also became prime minister the same year as Prime Minister Blair. And did you did you feel that there was a fatigue? Did you feel that -- it said that the IRA were either persuaded or figured out that they could no longer kill, maim, and terrorize their way to a united Ireland. But what do you think and made you put all your chips on the table as well?

AHERN: I think the conflict would have went on, and if we didn't put in the effort, the IRA, we're not going to be beaten, and we're not going to win. But that had been clear for a long way back. And I think the British army, like at one stage there was 80,000, Northern Ireland is a small place, but there were 80,000 security between army, police, reserves. So it was an enormous security operation. So everyone was just taken on.

But I think there did come an opportunity to new governments coming in, support of the president, the parties begin to listen. I think when Tony Blair as prime minister went to Balmoral Show and set out his position, that gives us an opportunity to get the IRA to go back into a ceasefire again.

And then the big risk I think we took was to start the talks with the paramilitaries, or those that represented them, because just quickly, the history of the Troubles start in the sixties. There was one effort in 74. The next effort wasn't until 85. The next effort wasn't until 98. And if we fail, it was another decade.

So I think there was that opportunity, and if we did not do what we did 98, the violence would have continued. So that that was, I think we realized we have to give it a go, and lucky enough that we had a British prime minister for the first time in decades was prepared to put huge political capital.

AMANPOUR: Mr. President, I'm really interested in what Prime Minister Ahern says about the paramilitaries in the IRA. The prime minister's chief negotiator, Jonathan Powell, and others have said that for a long time the Americans played a very destructive role. They gave visas to Irish fundraisers for the IRA.

They allowed weapons to be sent to the IRA. Your courts provided safe haven to IRA people who were fleeing the law over here. So comment on that. And I guess, did that then give you credibility with them? We've helped you for so long. Now we can ask you to come to the peace table?

CLINTON: Yes, but only because I also took on some very strong people in the Irish American community who were convinced that terror was basically the end of those who were engaging in it, and were also more tolerant of the unionist paramilitary groups. So the fact that there was all this turmoil I think gave us a chance.

And we started with the visa for Adams.

[14:35:02]

AMANPOUR: Gerry Adams, Sinn Fein.

CLINTON: But it was organized. There were seven Irish American groups that were very interested, and they were mostly pro Republican. They were mostly -- but they were antiviolence. So one of them we arranged asked Gerry to come give a speech. And the visa I gave him was for two days on the promise that not one penny would be raised even for Sinn Fein. No money. And it was seen as a balanced move to break the ice.

And I think, frankly, we all have to give a lot of credit to the people here, because they were sick of it. They were tired of dying. They were tired of the uncertainty. They were tired of the poverty that attended constant violence. They were tired of it all, and it created an opportunity for these two guys who were willing to take the risks to move us towards where we went.

And the fact that all the parties were included in the negotiations, which was quite taxing on both of them, I can tell you, from time to time in different ways, that made a difference. Then I think George Mitchell made a difference.

AMANPOUR: George Mitchell has said, I can't remember the figures, but it was hundreds and hundreds of hours and days of negotiations that finally led to yes. But it may have gone the other way. Can you recount and reflect on how difficult, actually -- it sounds like everybody was ready to do it, but it actually was very difficult to get the Good Friday Agreement. BLAIR: It was very difficult. But one vital thing that I think helped

was not just things we've been talking about the last few minutes, but also, if you're going to make a peace process where you've got to be prepared to talk to everyone, right. And I remember when we first, when I became the first British prime minister actually just sit down with the Sinn Fein people.

And this was horribly controversial at the time, and people thought you're going to -- Gerry Adams have been prevented -- there was a law in the U.K. that prevented him appearing on U.K. television.

AMANPOUR: Even his voice.

BLAIR: Even his voice, right. And I don't think we could have got this off the ground if we hadn't been prepared to talk to everyone.

And then there really is this thing about the people being prepared to act in a way that isn't politically conventional. So 30 years, the Irish Teachta, he could have stuck in a fairly traditional Irish position on everything, but he didn't. And that -- we each kind of liberated each other.

So, and then, when it comes back to what you and President Clinton were just talking about, it became easier for him to intervene constructively when it looked like everyone was being involved and there was a seat at the table for everyone. And then Mandelson who was at that time the secretary of state for Northern Ireland actually visited loyalist prisoners who were from the other side engaged in terrorist activity. And that, again, was something that a lot of people, they really recoiled from.

But the whole point about the peace process, you're never going to get anywhere unless everyone is prepared to take risks for peace. And you either spend your political capital or you hoard it. And for all sorts of various reasons, people decided to spend it. And I think that those politicians in Northern Ireland who, after all, were the ones that had to take the most difficult decisions.

Those were the people here. I think they were exhausted. But they also, there was something about the moment and the circumstances that made everyone think, OK come on. We're approaching a new millennium. We're really going to carry on with people killing and fighting each other in a European country in the 21st century? There was that as well, that that kind of feeling that that that that change had to come, and then with the people who were prepared to be agents of that change.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

AMANPOUR: And as Prime Minister Blair said, it was highly controversial at the time, sitting down with Gerry Adams and others believed to have been paramilitaries in the IRA. One of the protestant unionist negotiators remembers sitting at the table with those people for the very first time and thinking, we're prey to you. You want to kill us. That shows the true depth of the divisions and the hatred that they ultimately managed to overcome. When we come back, I asked the Northern Ireland peacemakers about the

continuing poison of identity politics and why it's infected so many democracies since the end of the cold war.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

AMANPOUR: Welcome back to our exclusive reunion of Northern Ireland's principal peacemakers. Twenty-five years ago, their tireless efforts helped end the pain of its long-suffering citizens who had endured decades of bloodshed. When the deal was signed April 10th, 1998, a key negotiator remembers looking around the room and seeing grown men with tears streaming down their faces.

[14:45:00]

And their relentless efforts often took great personal sacrifice. The Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern even had to leave his own mother's funeral two days before Good Friday to help get the deal over the line. A quarter century later, the Good Friday Agreement has stopped the killings but has yet to deliver the full peace dividend. Still though, it remains a model for how other long running global crises could be resolved. So here's part two of that side of our conversation.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

AMANPOUR: And I want to ask you also about another thing, because again, many have commented that the, quote, political vandalism of Brexit has brought the back, the poison of identity into politics here to the -- to the, not the exclusion, but to the diminishment of other issues. Are you worried, President Clinton, that identity will put its horrible roots back in amongst the parties in the system here?

CLINTON: Worried, I think, would be the wrong word. But I think we have to face the fact that even with the government going down, Northern Ireland looks pretty good compared to a lot of other formally, purely democratic countries in the world. This identity think swept the world at the end of the cold war. It took a few years to get going. We -- it's selfish, but I think Tony and Bertie and I and a lot of others, we did a pretty good job with the whole European continent, trying to keep people working together at the end of the cold war.

But it did strip the sort of veneer off of longstanding differences, racial, religious, ethnic, cultural differences, that other people could exploit. And so the Brexit phenomenon has been all too present all over the world, including in the United States, where you cannot run a successful democracy in an interdependent world if it is dominated by people that think the only thing that matters is our differences.

But when the Northern Ireland government has worked, and it worked -- Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness, the odd couple in politics, produced a few years of on time budgets, agreed upon help. When Martin McGuinness in the first government where Seamus Mallon represented the totally nonviolent Republican side. Martin McGuinness was the education minister and stunned them by first

recommending increased funding for the poor schools in the unionist community. And he proved that he would be fair. And I think that that triggered something. And everybody else, including eventually Ian Paisley, and they wound up just working things out.

Look, I don't know any government where everybody agrees on everything. But if you can take these big divides and say, we agree on 70 percent, 80 percent of the things, and we're going to do those things, I think that made a huge difference. So that's why all of us hope the government will come up again, because it has worked when it's been up.

AMANPOUR: What do you think? When you look at this blueprint, why do you think it hasn't worked elsewhere? For instance, let's just take the Middle East.

CLINTON: Well, the difference is -- let's just start with the Middle East. Tony spent years working on this, so we started with a different model. They started with the model here that they could share the future and that they had not enough land to fight over, and they had to work together.

So I think the real question is, the Middle East is now waiting for somebody to answer the now what question, Because I still believe that people everywhere would prefer to work together than be at war.

There are very few places where -- we had a special problem in Bosnia because we couldn't make the peace without the Bosnian Serbs, and then from the beginning, either a hardline Serbian government or their Russian sponsors were always pushing for paralysis, paralysis, paralysis. There's still way better off than they were when they were slaughtering each other in massive numbers. But I hope that will be resolved someday.

But this is different because they decided to share the future from the beginning, and to guarantee everybody a role in it.

AMANPOUR: So we've talked about war, the current war in Europe, which threatens us all is happening because of Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine.

[14:50:06]

How do you see, do you see the possibility of any kind of negotiation, anything even based on this kind of thing or any other kind of thing, right? How do you see that ending?

BLAIR: It's extremely difficult and it's a whole other subject. And the difference between the Russia-Ukraine conflict and Israel- Palestine or what happened in Northern Ireland, is that in the case of Israel and Palestine, in the case of Northern Ireland, you have two sides in conflict, but both of whom have a cause that is, you could say is reasonable, United Kingdom or one side, united island on the other, OK? The trouble is, I'm afraid I don't -- there's no justification for

what has happened in Ukraine. So I think that it's a different category of conflict. But one principle is the same, which is if once you determine what is the right outcome, and in my view, the right outcome is that the aggression in Ukraine does not succeed, then you don't give up.

The one thing I think that that was very clear about the Northern Ireland peace process, for whatever reasons, is that none of us were prepared to give up on it at any point in time. We never really -- we never really resigned, even though at points it did look absolutely impossible. And so I think if you want to resolve anything, you've got to decide, first of all, what is the just and the fair outcome. And then you've got to keep committed no matter what the obstacles.

CLINTON: If I could just say one thing. I think one of the things that everyone needs to understand, trying to make sense of Ukraine and comparing it to what happened here, none of us thought we would stay for life. We all believed in democracy within our own jurisdictions. I loved being president. If we didn't have the term limit, they would have had to take me out in a pine box or beat me. But I believed in it because I don't think anybody should stay in power for life.

If you determine to stay for life, then the only thing you really care about is breaking the opposition. And it's very hard to get a good outcome. And you see that now in Mr. Putin's Russia. He never agreed with Boris Yeltsin when Yeltsin promised me and actually signed an agreement that he would, with John Major, your predecessor, and with NATO, that he would respect the territorial integrity of Ukraine.

AMANPOUR: After you urged them to give up their nuclear weapons.

CLINTON: I did. And I still -- that was the right decision at the time. They were the third biggest nuclear power in the world. Brazil had an active nuclear program. India had an active nuclear program, still does. Pakistan did. But South Africa and Brazil were about to join. And they totally gave up their programs because of what we were doing. So Ukraine played a very positive role there. And we tried in turn to guarantee their territorial integrity.

But I will give this to Mr. Putin. He was totally honest with me. He told me three years before the invasion of Crimea that he did not agree with Yeltsin, and Yeltsin never got this adopted by the Duma. It was not a treaty. He wasn't bound by it, and he didn't agree with it. But he always wanted to reconstitute in some form or fashion the Soviet Union, or a capitalist version of it.

And so we can't forget that the fight for democracy goes on even as we try to use democracy here by giving everybody a say and making sure everybody was represented to make a better future.

AMANPOUR: In retrospect, do you regret having persuaded them to give up their nuclear weapons?

CLINTON: No, because at the time I had reasons to believe that we could build a world with fewer nuclear weapons. And I had reason to believe that I knew Boris Yeltsin would keep his word. He wasn't an imperialist. But I regret what happened.

AMANPOUR: President Clinton, Prime Minister Blair, Prime Minister Ahern, thank you all very much, indeed.

CLINTON: Thank you.

BLAIR: Thank you.

CLINTON: Thank you.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

AMANPOUR: So when you think of the bloodshed and the destruction in the world right now from the war in Ukraine to the fighting in Sudan and beyond, it truly was an extraordinary moment to talk to these architects of peace and to cover a good news story, a success, that was backed in large part by the indispensable force of American diplomacy.

[14:55:02]

And finally, we also want to highlight the role of the former U.S. Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell, famed for reaching out across the aisle, and an indefatigable negotiator who President Clinton has sent to shepherd the Good Friday Agreement through to completion.

Mitchell, at 89 years old and battling leukemia, returned to Belfast to offer a message of hope and resilience for the future. Although Northern Ireland is at peace, it is not yet perfect, and it might take another generation to finally seal that Good Friday deal.

Fredricka, back to you.

WHITFIELD: Thank you so much Christiane Amanpour.

And thank you for joining me today. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. SMERCONISH starts in a moment.

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