Tony Blair has said setting aside "ideology" over Brexit's Northern Ireland Protocol will help resolve the dispute.
The former Prime Minister said a resolution to the impasse can be found if both the UK and European Union are flexible and pragmatic.
Mr Blair also reflected on the forthcoming 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, saying the peace deal has "worked in a way, mostly, but it's not working as it should at the moment".
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However, he added: "I still think the peace will hold. And I think that people on the island of Ireland are determined not to go back to the past."
In an interview with Eamonn Mallie for UTV, Mr Blair discussed Brexit and the protocol dispute which has seen the DUP block Stormont power-sharing in protest against the Irish Sea trade deal.
Talks are continuing between the UK and EU in a bid to resolve differences over the protocol.
Mr Blair said: "If both sides are flexible and you take the ideology out of it... if you approach this in a practical way, you can find a solution."
Reflecting on his involvement in events leading up to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, the former Labour leader said the deal was "on a knife edge right up until the very last moment".
He also shared his fond memories of childhood family holidays spent in Co Donegal, and how his staunchly Presbyterian grandmother had urged him on her deathbed not to marry a Catholic.
Mr Blair said: "And I did. I didn't actually have the heart to tell her at the time that I was going out with one."
The hour-long episode of "Eamonn Mallie Face to Face with.." airs on Wednesday January 25 at 9pm on UTV.
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