Europe’s invisible guide

Date: 02/05/1996

AMEDEO de Franchis has been grappling with mountains all his life.

As a lieutenant in the Alpine infantry, the then 25-year-old Neapolitan tested his nerve on the craggy ledges of the Dolomites.

Thirty years later, de Franchis assaults perhaps even more daunting mountains - the documents piled high on his desk between the marble walls of the Farnesina Palace, home of Italy's foreign ministry.

As Italy's political director, de Franchis is charged with steering his country's foreign policy and, for the duration of Italy's EU presidency, guiding his Union counterparts through the tangles of world events as chairman of its Political Committee - otherwise known as PoCo.

De Franchis revealed some of the strains of the job during a recent meeting of foreign ministers in Palermo when his boss, Foreign Minister Susanna Agnelli, and her partners walked into the tricky terrain of Middle East terrorism and how to combat it. The Union had to respond to Hamas bombing in Israel and decide how to act in the face of calls to end the Union's policy of dialogue with Tehran.

Measuring each of Agnelli's words like a fireman holding a net under a tightrope walker, de Franchis appeared uncomfortable with the inner conflict between the desire to correct a series of faux pas and just as strong a desire not to appear disrespectful.

Iran and the Islamic world are old stomping grounds - long familiar subjects for de Franchis, who served as chargé d'affaires in Italy's embassy in Tehran for two years in the 1970s and then as ambassador in Islamabad a decade later.

In Tehran, the young diplomat threw himself into the job with an energy that would distinguish him in later assignments.

With Iran in the public eye for its young fundamentalist government and its rising oil prices, de Franchis learned Farsi and explored the country.

In Pakistan, he again arrived at a lively time and plunged into the politics of the day. Seeking out the Afghan chiefs leading the resistance against Soviet forces in Kabul, he made frequent trips to their headquarters in Peshawar and came to know some of them well.

De Franchis still regales listeners with tales of hiking in northern Pakistan, where a stray bullet fired by feuding mountaineers narrowly missed him, and of getting stuck at sundown in the sands of Iran's Great Salt Desert.

With the Pakistan posting adding a knowledge of Soviet strategy to what he had learned about American politics during an earlier posting to New York, de Franchis was an ideal choice when Rome was looking for a top diplomat to serve at NATO headquarters in Brussels in the late 1980s.

As deputy secretary-general of NATO from 1989 to 1994, de Franchis helped Secretary-General Manfred Wörner steer the alliance through the end of the Cold War.

For an enthusiast of world politics, those days at NATO were momentous and sometimes moving.

De Franchis often recalls the emotional day when Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevarnadze made the first official visit to NATO headquarters in Brussels by a representative from a Warsaw Pact nation. Amazed by the cheering crowd of NATO staff who gathered to greet him, Shevarnadze told Wörner and de Franchis that he never expected such a welcome for a former “enemy”. His hosts had to reassure him repeatedly that the applause was not pre-arranged.

De Franchis credits that warm reception with helping to bring the Soviet Union into the alliance's partnership with the former eastern bloc. But his own work also played a key role in building vital bridges.

As chairman of NATO's high-level task force, he drafted allied positions for the Conventional Forces Europe (CFE) negotiations which culminated in a continent-wide disarmament process which still continues today.

“He was instrumental in getting that agreement,” says a NATO colleague, explaining de Franchis' role in forging a common NATO position and then raking in the still-smoking embers of the Warsaw Pact.

Although Moscow had already signed the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty, the CFE “meant the real end of the Cold War”.

Getting nations to cut nuclear stockpiles was one thing, but persuading them to dismantle conventional forces was quite another - much more politically sensitive and economically difficult.

His NATO colleagues believe they know why de Franchis was able to bring those difficult negotiations to a successful conclusion.

“He's a great mediator,” said one. “He listens to everyone, then finds his position, and you understand you have to do it.”

De Franchis' firmness is complemented by a warmth and caring which have surprised colleagues in the bureaucratic settings in which he has spent most of his life. Devoid of “bureaucratic arrogance”, his receptions at home during his time at NATO were noted for including guests of all rank, not just senior officials, and workers would often be surprised by a note or a phone call from him on a personal occasion. “He was always caring of the people around him,” said one.

But de Franchis' name will probably not go down in NATO history. Perpetually in Wörner's shadow, he never won the prominence achieved by his successor, Sergio Silvio Balanzino, during the chaotic years which included Wörner's death and the resignation of his successor as NATO Secretary-General Willy Claes.

The same obscurity may befall de Franchis in his current job, where again he serves under a strong personality whose charisma keeps the limelight from straying.

Now Rome's top policy man shuttles around Europe, but remains almost anonymous as he glides into closed-door meetings, details of which are revealed afterwards only in veiled terms and by nameless sources.

Through countless hours of PoCo meetings, he guides his 14 partners in crafting common positions on policies towards countries ranging from Albania to Zaire.

De Franchis has diplomacy in his blood. The son of a diplomat, his childhood prepared him for adapting to different cultures.

At the age of eight, he arrived at an English nuns' school without speaking a word of English. His secondary school education was in French, ending with a mention très bien on his baccalaureate.

Although born a Neapolitan, de Franchis considers himself a citizen of the nation, the four corners of Italy mixed in his blood inherited from grandparents from Sicily, Trieste, Tuscany and Naples.

The northern reaches still hold a place in his heart, and he returns faithfully to infantry reunions, donning the Alpini Corps' felt hat with its single feather.

Fellow Italians, however, say he looks and behaves more like an English gentleman. “He doesn't have that Mediterranean thing,” said one, describing his distinguished looks and perfect British accent.

“Even while working, he has this kind of self control. He is never rough, never angry. He's a man from another era, very atypical for an Italian.”

When he moves into embassy residences, de Franchis transforms them with a warm elegance his friends describe as 'English-style'. The compulsive collector's eye has landed on Belgian Art Deco kitchen clocks, wooden buckles from Persia, and kelim carpets. A collection of menus includes one from the last Shah of Iran's imperial anniversary banquet in Persepolis.

De Franchis' wife Ilaria, a freelance interpreter at the EU, two-year-old daughter Vittoria, and 10-month-old son Filippo have seen little of him since he took on the EU presidency load and are unlikely to do so until his stint at the helm of PoCo ends on 30 June.

The mountains of Union correspondence are bound to grow as Italy winds up its presidency.

As he tackles the stack of documents requiring his personal attention, de Franchis could be forgiven for leaning back from time to time, closing his eyes and dreaming of the peaks he saw during a long hike to the 5,000-metre summit of Mount Nanga Parbat.