Disobeyed orders and a dangerous message

Brendan Duddy, a secret link with the IRA, recalls his risky contacts with a British official known as 'Fred'

Peter Taylor, the veteran BBC journalist, has known the identity of the key figure at the heart of Britain's secret back channel to the IRA for the last decade. Here he interviews Brendan Duddy, a Derry republican and passionalte pacifist, who was known as "the contact"

In early 1991, Michael Oatley, the British official who had secretly kept in contact with Brendan Duddy for almost 20 years, was about to retire. Just before his retirement Oatley received a call from Duddy who suggested he come to Derry to meet someone.

Duddy's confidante and neighbour, Bernadette, who had played a vital role in smuggling IRA leaders across the border during the 1975 ceasefire, cooked dinner for the three of them and Duddy's wife, Margo. Dinner over, there was a knock at the back door and in came Martin McGuinness. Duddy had known McGuinness since the late 1960s when he used to deliver beefburgers to Duddy's fish and chip shop. He remembers that McGuinness "used to chat up the girls behind the counter and had absolutely no interest in politics".

When McGuinness arrived Bernadette said there was nothing left to eat. "He's not here for dinner," Duddy told her. Oatley and McGuinness talked by the fire in Bernadette's back parlour for two hours. Oatley said it was "rather like talking to a ranking British army officer of one of the tougher regiments, like the Paras or the SAS". He found McGuinness "a good interlocutor". Duddy was amazed: "It was at that moment that deputy first minister Martin began to emerge." Weeks later Duddy got a series of phone calls from someone claiming to be a businessman wanting to create jobs in Derry. The caller was persistent. In the end he agreed to see him. As his visitor talked, Duddy's eyes glazed over until he produced a letter, from the Northern Ireland secretary, Peter Brooke, introducing the "businessman" as Michael Oatley's successor.

Duddy's reaction was instinctive. "At that moment, I knew it - the conflict was all over." His visitor's name was Robert. But Brendan gave him the codename "Fred" .

"Fred" set about building up trust with Duddy and his contacts in the Provisional IRA, supplying advance copies of speeches to be made by British ministers that indicated political flexibility once the IRA renounced violence. On February 22 1993 John Major received a message that MI5 assured him came from Martin McGuinness. This said: "The conflict is over but we need your advice" on ending it. Preparations were laid for a meeting between McGuinness, "Fred", and the head of MI5 in Northern Ireland. Duddy was devastated when the meeting was called off after the IRA bombed Warrington and told "Fred" he simply had to come, as McGuinness and Gerry Kelly were waiting.

"If you don't come, my role as the link is over," he said. "I'm pulling out." Duddy finally persuaded him, knowing how much was at stake.

"Fred" disobeyed orders. "That's why I admire the man so much," Duddy said. "If 'Fred' hadn't done what he did, we'd still be hearing bombs going off today. No Good Friday agreement. This is the kind of guy in other days you would pin medals on." At the meeting in Duddy's house, "Fred" stepped even further over the line. He said things he was never authorised to say, suggesting that unionists would have to change and that one day the island might be united. Duddy, who was present, confirmed that these things were actually said.

The IRA naturally assumed that "Fred" had been authorised to say them. However honourable his intentions, word of the meeting and what he had said never reached the government until the following November. It was a timebomb waiting to explode.

There was no let-up in IRA violence. "That's how it works," Duddy said. "This department bombs. This department talks." John Major was challenged in the Commons by Labour's Dennis Skinner to talk to the IRA. Major replied that it would turn his stomach to "sit down and talk to Mr Adams and the Provisional IRA". At that stage, Major did not know the secret meeting had taken place. But there was even stormier weather to come.

On November 2 1993, the government received another message via "Fred" that again it believed had been sent by McGuinness. It said: "Please tell us through the link as a matter of urgency when you will open dialogue" in the event of a total end to hostilities. The government produced an encouraging reply which sent McGuinness ballistic. He had never sent the message.

Worse lay ahead. Sinn Féin leaked details of the secret contacts with the British. There was political meltdown.

The government retaliated by making public the "conflict is over" message it said it had received from Martin McGuinness earlier that year. McGuinness was incandescent. He'd never heard about the message before and denied ever sending it. Duddy said the message should never have seen the light of day. "It was the language of surrender. McGuinness didn't send it."

Suspicion fell on Duddy."Yes, the IRA thought I had sent it." The consequences were potentially life-threatening. Four "very senior Provisionals" came to Duddy's house to interrogate him. Did they include Martin McGuinness and Gerry Adams? "You pick out four senior republicans and you're right," he said. "They were the bosses." Duddy was interrogated in an upstairs room. "They questioned me for four solid hours. It was very intense but not abusive. One of them did all the questioning - and I'm not saying who."

Duddy finally convinced his interrogators that he had not sent the message. "Let me put it this way: if I'd been guilty of anything, I wouldn't have liked to have been sitting in that room." After that meeting, he knew that his role as the link was over. The IRA now wanted direct talks with the British. He was more relieved than upset. His work was done. But one of the great mysteries of the peace process remained. Who did send the famous "conflict is over" message? I pointed out to Duddy that if he didn't send it and McGuinness didn't send it, that only left "Fred".

Duddy was protective of the man he had come to admire. "I don't want to say, as he's a wonderful, honourable man." The message was written in pencil in a hotel room in London. "It seems to me that message was to encourage the British government to actually believe dialogue was possible," Duddy said. But the revelation of the messages and the unauthorised March meeting also marked the end of "Fred". The government was appalled at how he had exceeded his brief, disobeyed instructions and almost brought the prime minister down. "Fred", in Brendan's words, was "court-martialled". As he said goodbye, he gave Duddy a farewell present, a book inscribed with a quotation from Virgil's Aeneid: "One day it will be good to remember these things."

Without Duddy, it's unlikely there would have been the historic IRA ceasefire the following year that led to the Good Friday agreement - and ultimately to the peace that Northern Ireland enjoys today.

· Peter Taylor's film, The Secret Peacemaker, will be shown on BBC2 on March 26

Great Hatred, Little Room - Making Peace in Northern Ireland by Jonathan Powell is publshed by The Bodley Head on March 20 at £20. To order a copy for £18 with free UK P&P go to theguardian.com/bookshop or call 0870 836 0875