David Donoghue
UNIVERSITY COLLEGE DUBLIN
HONORARY CONFERRING
Thursday, 7 September 2017 at 2.30 pm
TEXT OF THE INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS DELIVERED BY PROFESSOR PATRICK PAUL WALSH, School of Politics and International Relations on 7 September 2017, on the occasion of the conferring of the Degree of Doctor of Literature, honoris causa on DAVID DONOGHUE.
President, distinguished guests, graduates, ladies and gentlemen
David Donoghue, a native of Dublin, graduated from UCD obtaining a BA in Modern Languages and a MA in German Language and Literature in the early 1970s. He then set off on an extremely successful career path in the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs, with overseas postings in Rome, Bonn, Paris, Moscow, Vienna, Berlin and finally a posting in the UN in New York City.
In the first instant, I wish to highlight the work of David Donoghue on Anglo-Irish relations and the Northern Ireland peace process. He was involved in the negotiation of the Anglo-Irish Agreement in 1985, the Downing Street Declaration in 1993 and the Good Friday Agreement in 1998. He served as the Irish head of the Anglo-Irish Secretariat in Belfast during the period 1995 to-1999. This was a particularly challenging and sensitive post during this time. In this capacity he was a member of the Irish Government’s negotiating team for what was to become the Good Friday Agreement 1998. This was an agreement, between the British and Irish governments and most of the political parties in Northern Ireland, about how Northern Ireland should be governed. Professor John Coakley, and myself, noted at an International conference on Peace and Sustainable Development in Columbia in June of this year, the comprehensive nature of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998 and now it was reflected in many aspects of the peace goal in the UN 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, which was negotiated by David Donoghue in 2015.
He went on to become the Irish Ambassador to the Russian Federation from 1999-2001, coinciding with Vladimir Putin’s initial ascent to power. In 2001 he returned to Dublin as Director-General of Irish Aid. His three years at the helm of Irish Aid coincided with a significant expansion in the resources and thematic range of the Irish Aid programme.
In 2004 he became the Irish Ambassador to Austria and the Vienna-based UN agencies.
In 2006 he was then appointed the Irish Ambassador to Germany, serving in Berlin for three years at the beginning of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s period in office.
In 2009 he returned to Dublin as the Department’s Political Director, a post which gave him a broad overview of Ireland’s foreign policy in all its dimensions.
In addition to his time in Northern Ireland I wish to highlight the contributions of David Donoghue to the work of the UN. In September 2013 he took up duty as Ireland’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York. Immediately on his arrival, he served as co-facilitator, or co-chairman, for UN negotiations to produce an agreed outcome from a Special Event of the General Assembly which reviewed the progress made to date on the Millennium Development Goals. In 2014 he was appointed co-facilitator, with the Ambassador of Kenya, for intergovernmental negotiations which led to the adoption of the ground-breaking UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in September 2015.
This Agenda is a moral compass for the world in the 21st century, a policy blueprint outlining a pathway to sustainable livelihoods, inclusive societies and sustainable environments, at local, national, regional and global levels.
The co-facilitators worked tirelessly to include the voices of the UN Major Groups and other stakeholders in setting the agenda. They understood, that when it came to implementation, this ambitious agenda can only be achieved if all stakeholders work together to achieve the economic, social, environmental goals in peace and partnership in harmony with nature. It is truly an Agenda, of the people, by the people, and for the people. Two years in we see the SDGs becoming the backdrop to global finance (including research funding of the EC), global business, government policy, strategic plans of Universities and Civics courses in our schools, to mention a few. The UN 2030 Agenda is already having a global impact but there is much work to do, so that the agenda leaves no one behind.
In 2016 he served as co-facilitator, with the Ambassador of Jordan, for negotiations which produced a landmark agreement, called the “New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants” on a wide set of issues relating to the protection of refugees and migrants. By adopting the New York Declaration, member States made bold commitments to start negotiations leading to an international conference and the adoption of a global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration in 2018 with similar supports for adopting a global compact on refugees, also in 2018. The importance of setting up formal committees on inter-state arrangements for migrants and refugees should not be understated. It may be too late for those who suffer today, but it will be needed in the future as climate, economic and conflict induced migration and refugees will increase, particularly if we fail to achieve many of the SDGs by 2030.
In summary coming out of UCD with beautiful writing skills and an intellect second to none, David Donoghue set off to build agreements, declarations and new institutions to ensure peace and sustainable development on the Island of Ireland and indeed the world.
Borrowing from the Seamus Heaney poem “Digging”;
“Between my finger and my thumb
The squat pen rests.
I’ll dig with it.”
Well President, ladies and gentlemen, he did just that…..
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Praehonorabilis Praeses, totaque Universitas,
Praesento vobis hunc meum filium, quem scio tam moribus quam doctrina habilem et idoneum esse qui admittatur, honoris causa, ad Gradum Doctoratus in Litteris; idque tibi fide mea testor ac spondeo, totique Academiae.