Cead Mile Failte Geraldine Byrne Nason, Ambassador of Ireland to the USA

Cead Mile Failte Geraldine Byrne Nason, Ambassador of Ireland to the USA!

Cead mile failte is Gaelic for “a hundred thousand welcomes.” These words capture the welcoming heart and hospitality of the Irish people!

It was my honor to interview ⁠Ambassador Geraldine Bryne Nason⁠. She is currently the Irish Ambassador to the United States and for five years served as Ireland’s Ambassador to the United Nations, most recently during Ireland’s term serving on the Security Council as an elected member, working for international peace and security.
After our interview, enjoy a performance by Lisa Hannigan who I recorded at Travel Classics Ireland 2023 at The Lodge at ⁠Ashford Castle⁠.

She is currently the Irish Ambassador to the United States and for five years served as Ireland’s Ambassador to the United Nations, most recently during Ireland’s term serving on the Security Council as an elected member, working for international peace and security. Additionally, she chaired the 62nd and 63rd sessions of the UN Commission on the Status of Women. In 2022 she received Concern Worldwide’s annual Women of Concern Award “in recognition of her outstanding career as a female leader within the diplomatic and civil service and her unwavering dedication to advocating for women’s rights at home and abroad.” Join me in warmly welcoming Ambassador Nason, a true advocate for diplomacy and a beacon of hope in an ever-evolving global landscape.

Lisa Niver:

Ambassador Byrne Nason, thank you so much for making the time to speak with me on this show and for your many incredible years of service. Previous to being the Ambassador of Ireland to the United States, you were Ireland’s Ambassador to the United Nations and secured the seat on the Security Council for Ireland, working for international peace and security.

It was my great honor to be invited twice to the United Nations as a journalist for the Champions of Humanity Project and to represent Ms. Magazine during the UN General Assembly and Gates Foundation Conference. Can you share with my listeners one of your most memorable days working with the UN Security Council and / or what you’re most proud of during your time in that position?

Ambassador Geraldine Byrne Nason on her last day on the U.N. Security Council.

Ambassador Geraldine Byrne Nason:

Thank you. So great to speak with you, and you’re right. I’ve just come from a job, a privileged job, sitting representing my country at the Security Council. That’s a once-in-a-generation opportunity.

So, probably my proudest moment was to be elected. We had to fight to get to that table in a contested election, but once there, we decided we would use our representation on that body to reflect what you’ve mentioned in your introduction, humanity, and I think Irish foreign policy and the way in which we have a humanitarian vocation in there was really expressed very well during our time on the council.

If I think of the memorable moments, I certainly, in a rather negative way, remember the 24th of February last year. I sat there through the night as we learned that President Putin had invaded Ukraine. That we had the Ukrainian Ambassador sitting at the table in the Security Council that night. I was looking at him, knowing his wife, his children are back, not knowing what was happening, as Russia invaded an independent, sovereign country. We stand full square with Ukraine still.

So, that’s a moment that’s very poignant, but in a worrying way. Two other things I might say that I carry with me still, at the moment, of pride really. One is that I chaired the work on Women, Peace and Security during our tenure. Women in Northern Ireland make a critical difference to peace in our country. We tried to bring that sense of the role of women being in the room and at the table, negotiating peace for their communities, for their nations.

Ambassador Geraldine Byrne Nason on her last day on the U.N. Security Council.

We hold a record for having brought more women’s voices to the Security Council table, during our presidency of the council, than any other country ever. I was absolutely dogged in my pursuit of the issues that arose around Afghan women and the deprivation and the banning of Afghan children from education, young girls. So, we did a lot to work for women’s role in peace and security, and the other thing, just to finish off, I guess, is that Ireland is unique as a UN member in having an unbroken history of service in peacekeeping.

We’re a small country. We raise our defense forces to help keep the peace across the globe, and we had a groundbreaking resolution that we brought to the council during our time there, looking at what happens when those peacekeepers move on. How do we populate that space when the good work of peacekeepers is done? So, that’s just a flavor of what I was doing as Ireland’s Ambassador at the Security Council.

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Lisa’s book, Brave-ish, One Breakup, Six Continents and Feeling Fearless After Fifty, includes her visits to Dublin to be in the St. Patrick’s Day parade, Kilkenny to learn hurling and Ashford Castle to walk with hawks!