BP Chairman "Consultor of the Extraordinary Section of the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See"

So this might end up being another Vatican Bank fiasco. BP had serious issues with safety and so forth in 2007, and the chairman stands at the nexus of a number of interests:

It was a suitably stormy day this week when I went to meet Peter Sutherland, chairman of BP and former world trade tsar. A report into Britain's biggest oil company had just seriously criticised its safety record and the political bruiser appeared to have presided over the eclipse of the BP chief executive, Lord Browne, the Sun King of the corporate world...

He had never given an interview in his capacity as BP chairman since his appointment 10 years ago, he said, and was naturally determined not to talk about the beleaguered oil group amid this week's travails and after a year in which it had struggled to deal with America's worst corporate accident in a decade, allegations of trading irregularities and oil spills in Alaska.

But on just two issues he could not help himself clarifying the situation, nor indeed checking the quotes: his own position as BP chairman with a commitment to stay until the new chief executive, Tony Hayward, was settled in, and on the legal ramifications of the Baker safety report.

He said reports that he had called the investigation "harsh" made him sound more strident than he felt. "It was harsh in places ... but actually ... I'm not complaining." He was furious at a report suggesting the board he chaired throughout the saga was in any way accountable for safety procedures. "It does not make any suggestion of legal failure on the part of the board."

Sutherland's concern for the world's disenfranchised might sit a little uneasily with his position as head of one of the world's biggest oil groups and of its most successful investment bank. Yet he sees no conflict. "I don't consider them to be in any way immoral or operating contrary to the common good."

They have continued to give him influence on the world stage. Last month he added to his illustrious CV the title Consultor of the Extraordinary Section of the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See. In other words, financial adviser to the Pope...

Perhaps ironically, his position at BP was whispered to be one factor for the French refusal to back his candidacy for the head of the European commission, most recently two years ago - he has been tipped for the job three times.

He admits to only two regrets: one is that he never played rugby for Ireland (he was a successful prop forward) and the other is that he never got that top job. "The thing I've wanted to run all my life was Europe but I don't think that will happen. It's just such a great idea. Europe for me is the most noble political process in 1,000 years."

He still has political ambitions but prefaces them by calling them unrealistic. "I'd love to be foreign minister of Europe but there are a hell of a lot of foreign ministers [who would like the job]."

He was asked by Kofi Annan, the outgoing head of the United Nations, to be his special representative for migration. It's a $1-a-year job he obviously loves but which could end this summer...