Ten years after 9/11, the world is a safer place — but not a happier one

WHERE were you on 9/11? What were you doing when you heard about the attack on the Twin Towers?

I was at Stormont that afternoon, Irish time. It was a busy day, as I recall. Three governments were trying to find ways of persuading David Trimble to return as First Minister of the Assembly after his post-dated resignation had come into effect in the absence of IRA decommissioning.

The phones were busy and I had been screening his calls. David had temporarily commandeered my third floor office looking down on Edward Carson’s statue and the mile-long drive having forsaken his own on the ground floor, the office previously used by Stormont prime ministers such as Lord Craigavon and Viscount Brookeborough. So I was in the larger ante-room but we were popping to and fro.