Meredith Preston McGhie on how to become a mediator

Secretary General of the Global Centre for Pluralism, Meredith Preston McGhie, reveals the backroom story of working closely with Kofi Annan to resolve Kenya’s violent political crisis in 2008, typing out the peace deal as each word was negotiated, with senior ministers circling her to glimpse the draft on her laptop. She lays bare the mediator’s craft while describing her work to resolve conflicts in Asia and Africa, admitting that while heavily pregnant she once threatened to go into labour when negotiations began to stall.