We were great mates [with Rajiv Gandhi]: very, very, very close friends. In fact, on my visit to India as Prime Minister, we were going to his home for dinner. There were two aspects I remember: one is him saying how he had trouble with his security people, because they insisted he wears a vest. He said it was very uncomfortable and he often took it off, but of course, in the end, it wouldn't have mattered if he'd been wearing three vests - he would have been gone.

It was a remarkable relationship. Margaret [Thatcher] and I had a love/hate relationship. She was always defending the South African regime and we had some terrible fights, including an enormous one in Canada.

Don't talk to me about what's happened since [Nelson] Mandela! His successor was absolutely hopeless - "no such thing as AIDS" - and this present President... It's a tragedy, you know, what's happened there post-Mandela, because he was an iconic figure.

We will not allow to become a political issue in this country the question of Asianisation.

I just loved him and he loved me... He was a most humble man, the most decent man I've ever met in my life and he always looked for the best in people to find positives and he said something to me that always remained with me. He said if you believe in the fatherhood of God you must necessarily believe in the brotherhood of man, it follows necessarily and even though I left the church and was not religious, that truth remained with me.

I really had very little to do with Pierre Trudeau. He was off the scene very soon.

Geoffrey [Howe] and I were mates, and he disagreed with [ Margaret Thatcher] position. So, we cooperated surreptitiously.