11 January 2002

Transcript of State Department Noon Briefing

State Department Spokesman Richard Boucher briefed.

Following is the State Department transcript:

STATEMENTS -- Four Month Anniversary of September 11 Attacks -- Situation in Zimbabwe

SINGAPORE -- Arrest of Suspected Terrorist

ZIMBABWE -- Status within Commonwealth/Elections

RUSSIA -- Closure of TV-6

INDIA-PAKISTAN -- Situation Update/Tensions -- Secretary Powell's Talks with Leaders

DEPARTMENT -- FSO Charged with Attempted Murder

AFGHANISTAN -- Justice for Taliban Members

ISRAEL/PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY -- Arms Ship -- Netanyahu - Pollard Meeting -- Schlicher - Arafat Meeting

Mr. Boucher: Okay, ladies and gentlemen. If I can, I'd like to start with a few words about the four-month anniversary of the bombings on September 11th, and then go on to a statement on Zimbabwe.

Today marks the four-month anniversary of a day that shook America's human foundations, but also aroused in us a mighty and dauntless spirit. We will never forget those that we lost in the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and in rural Pennsylvania, for their spirit and the way of life that they stood for are stronger than any evil menace.

With them in mind, and cooperating with our coalition partners around the world, we have achieved a lot. At the same time, there is much more to do to rid Afghanistan of foreign terrorists, to eliminate al-Qaida cells around the world, and to wipe out the scourge of terrorism that threatens us all.

Now, I would also like to mention on another topic that we are putting out a statement on Zimbabwe about the actions of the government there. We condemn the intensifying government-directed intimidation and violence against the opposition supporters, against the media, and against civil society in Zimbabwe. We think at least five opposition supporters have been killed in the past two weeks, based on the reports we have seen. Judging from the past performance, there is little prospect that the government will investigate or prosecute these crimes.

Yesterday, as you know, the parliament of Zimbabwe passed legislation that further restricts political freedom in Zimbabwe, and in addition, in a rather remarkable and disturbing statement on January 9th, the chief of Zimbabwe's defense forces declared that Zimbabwe's military and security services will withhold support from any elected president they deem unfit for office.

We think that Zimbabwe's military should respect and support the verdict of the electorate, and that the people of Zimbabwe are entitled to a free and fair electoral process. We call upon the government to disavow the statements made by the military, to ensure that elections are free and fair.

So with that, I would be happy to take your questions on these or other topics.

Question: Can I ask about Singapore? There was a remarkable story there this morning about the arrests of suspected al-Qaida operatives, and it seems that most of their targets were related to US interests. Do you have any comments?

Mr. Boucher: We have talked about this, I think, a few times over the last -- about the last couple days, since the weekend, when Monday we applauded the arrests made by the Singapore authorities, and I think by Tuesday, we were able to confirm that the United States Embassy and other interests were indeed among the targets that they were thinking about.

The Singapore authorities have issued a very extensive statement now on the situation there. I've got about three or four pages of details that they have put out about the individuals and what they were doing. So why don't I make that available to you.

And as I have mentioned before, we are cooperating very, very closely with the Singapore authorities. We welcome the active engagement that Singapore has taken in the campaign against terrorism. And we have applauded their arrests in this matter.

Question: Can I go back to the statement?

Mr. Boucher: Yes.

Question: What do you think about New Zealand's call that Zimbabwe should be suspended from the Commonwealth?

Mr. Boucher: Well, we're not members of the Commonwealth, so I don't think I could --

Question: No, I know, but --

Mr. Boucher: I hesitate to try to comment off the cuff on somebody else's business. Let me just put it this way, our view of Zimbabwe and the actions that have been taking place there is quite clear. We have tried to make it very clear in the statement we are issuing today that we think that the actions of the government, and the support that the government has given to actions against the opposition, deserve the attention of the international community and deserve the scrutiny, and as appropriate, the action and the pressure of the international community to reverse.

So I will just leave it at that. They and others in the Commonwealth will have to decide what the Commonwealth decides to do.

Question: It sounded from your statement that you still hold out a hope that the election could be free and fair. Is that correct?

Mr. Boucher: Well, we have talked, I think, for many months about the difficulties that the government has imposed in the preparation. And indeed, with these latest statements and actions, the difficulties have only gotten worse.

One would hope that all these actions would be reversed, and that they could have a free and fair election.

Question: But is it salvageable?

Mr. Boucher: That depends on the government.

Question: But it's possible? Can I ask one more on Singapore?

Mr. Boucher: Not impossible is probably a better way to put it.

Question: What's the -- are you trying to send observers there? Do you know if that's been settled once and for all?

Mr. Boucher: I don't know if the issue is settled or not. I know that there have been some statements about European observers going in. But clearly, if you have the kinds of preparations for an unfair election that seem to be taking place, and then the kinds of statements being made by the military that they might not accept the results, it is difficult -- a lot of this has to be reversed if we are to have the prospect of observing any kind of free and fair election.

Question: Richard, can I just ask -- go back to Singapore for one second?

Mr. Boucher: Yes.

Question: I am unable to find anything particularly new in this story of Singapore. Other than this three-page statement detailing more specifically what these guys were going to do, is there anything new there?

Mr. Boucher: I don't know, a list of names of individuals, of targets, of --

Question: These people were named and arrested days ago.

Mr. Boucher: Yes. I'm not the one that goes looking for news. I try to --

Question: I know, I'm asking you. Did you learn something new out of --

Mr. Boucher: Not us, because we've been cooperating --

Question: Okay, that's all I wanted to know. Thank you.

Mr. Boucher: We know this stuff because we are working with the Singapore authorities in all kinds of ways, and sharing all kinds of information. So what you and the public might learn from the statement of the Singapore Government I'm sure is quite a different question, and I'm not in a position to evaluate.

Question: But you're going to release that to us?

Mr. Boucher: I will be glad to make copies for you, since we have it.

Question: That would be nice.

Question: Well, the point is that these people were not arrested today or overnight; they were arrested several days ago.

Mr. Boucher: No, they weren't.

Question: And the general idea of what they --

Mr. Boucher: I appreciate that. I rely on people in the news business to tell me what news is, even if I try to tell them that I think it is something.

Question: I think it's a good story.

(Laughter.)

Mr. Boucher: All right. Do you want CNN to chime in on defense of their story, too?

Question: What do you think about Russia finally deciding to close down TV-6?

Mr. Boucher: We expressed a view just yesterday, or the day before, about the action being taken against TV-6, so it won't come as a surprise that we take a very dim view of this today.

The rapid and unusual manner in which the Presidium, the Supreme Arbitration Court, acted in this case raises serious questions about TV-6's ability to get a fair hearing. It adds to the already strong appearance of political pressure in the judicial process against Russia's independent media. These unusually rapid developments take place at high judicial levels, where legal action normally takes months. Moreover, it appears to be that the law under which TV-6 is being prosecuted has only been applied in two cases, both of them against independent media outlets. That's NTV and TV-6. And the law in question actually lapsed on January 1st, 2002.

We continue to believe that the development and protection of an independent media are essential for Russia's political and economic development and that freedom of the press and promotion of the rule of law are best served by allowing TV-6 to remain on the air.

Question: Have we talked to the Russian Government about it, except to put out statements from Washington?

Mr. Boucher: This just happened. I'm sure we will or are, but I don't have any specifics on that yet.

Question: India-Pakistan. Do you have any latest comment on the Indian general's claim that they're ready for war? And is the Secretary worried about his trip?

Mr. Boucher: Let me try to talk a little bit about the general situation that's there. We stay in regular contact with Indian and Pakistani leaders through our ambassadors in Islamabad and New Delhi, or our embassies, since Ambassador Blackwell has been back here temporarily. He is on his way back to Delhi now.

The Secretary has also remained in touch with leaders of India and Pakistan. He spoke again this morning to President Musharraf and will continue to work to help defuse the tensions and resolve the crisis.

We believe that India and Pakistan must resolve their differences through political and diplomatic means. War or military action is not the way to resolve this crisis. Both sides have said that they are willing to pursue political and diplomatic solutions, and so we will continue to work with them in that regard.

Once again, I would say President Musharraf has taken significant steps against terrorists. We have noted the arrests, we have noted the closing of offices and the freezing of assets. He has spoken out against terrorism and arrested other individuals as well.

We are looking forward to the speech that he will be giving soon on how he intends to deal with this issue and to the additional actions against terrorism that his government will be taking.

Question: Can the United States play a major role in this mediation without having a position on the major issue in dispute? Is it enough to be a super -- I mean, the United States and to say, you know, please come to some agreement, do it through dialogue, not through fighting, and you offer no opinions about the future of Kashmir? Is that it?

Mr. Boucher: Yes.

Question: An article in a major paper today says the Administration is more worried now, today, about this dispute than a few days ago. Would you agree with that?

Mr. Boucher: I don't think we have tried to give you a barometer or a thermometer of tension every day. We have made clear all along that it is a very dangerous situation. The Secretary has said that repeatedly, I think almost every day, every time he was asked by the media. So I don't believe there has been any change in our view that the situation is dangerous, that we have military forces in close proximity and potential confrontation, and stressed again and again the importance of political and diplomatic solutions.

Question: Would you at least acknowledge that it hasn't gotten any better, then, over the past few days?

Mr. Boucher: People have asked us, "Has it eased off? Has the crisis broken?" and things like that, and we have never been wiling to use those kinds of terms, because it is a dangerous situation and, as you know, we have been engaged in very intense activity about it.

Question: Did Secretary Powell, in his conversation with General Musharraf, enumerate specific agenda items he would look forward to seeing in the speech?

Mr. Boucher: I'm not in a position to go through specifics of things. He has been hearing from President Musharraf about the kinds of steps he was looking to take, the kinds of actions he was looking to announce, so we will have to see what he says. But we have been working with the parties all along, talking to each of them about the overall situation, about the need for a political and diplomatic solution, about the futility of conflict in this matter, and about the kinds of steps that they could be taking to stop the buildup, reduce the tensions, and find the political and diplomatic solution that we all say we want.

Question: Yesterday the Indians announced that they were going to start conducting military exercises along some of the borders. Do you have a position on whether this would be a provocative act or not?

Mr. Boucher: I hadn't seen that specifically, so I don't have a specific reaction to that. But as we have always said, we are looking for both sides to ease the tensions, to take steps to deescalate.

Question: When was the phone call?

Mr. Boucher: It was at about 11:43 this morning.

(Laughter.)

Question: Before the Secretary committed himself to visit the region, did he have a pretty good idea of what President Musharraf is going to say in his speech?

Mr. Boucher: Again, we look forward to hearing what President Musharraf has to say. The Secretary has been talking to him about the kinds of steps that he has been taking against extremism and terrorism, the kinds of steps he intends to continue to take, the direction he intends to go. That has been, in a more general sense, part of our discussions with Pakistan for some time, including the Secretary's discussions last time.

So, yes, we have some idea about what he intends to do and what he intends to say. But in the end, it is for him to say and for him to announce, for him to do what he decides. We will see what he says when he says it.

Question: Richard, what did Ambassador Blackwell do here that he couldn't do by phone or by e-mail or by --

Mr. Boucher: He was here for the visit of the Indian Home Minister. So he just came back and they just -- as you know, he has been here for a couple days participating in those meetings. Now he has headed back.

Question: Did Secretary Powell speak to anyone from the Indian Foreign Ministry, Foreign Minister Singh or --

Mr. Boucher: Not yet.

Question: Is he going to later today?

Mr. Boucher: Maybe.

Question: Will you let us know?

Mr. Boucher: Always do.

Question: If you can? Before the close of business?

Mr. Boucher: If he talks to somebody from the Indian side, we will try to tell you.

Question: Did the Indian minister or the government give a deadline that how long they are willing to wait, maybe until after the visit or something?

Mr. Boucher: I haven't seen anything like that. What I have seen from the Indian side, of course, is continued discussion of the tensions, continued discussion of the attack. And we all recognize the very, very serious nature of this attack. It was an attack on India and on democracy, on the Indian leadership and government. We have made clear all along we do think the Indian Government needs to be able to take steps against terrorism. We want to keep the focus on terrorism for both of them. As I've said, we have seen consistent statements in public, and as well as in our discussions, from the Indian Government that they would like to see a political and diplomatic solution, and we think that is the only way to really get a solution to these problems. So that is what we're working with them on.

Question: Different subject?

Mr. Boucher: Please.

Question: Margery Landry. She has been charged with murder today. Can you -- or attempted -- I guess it would be attempted murder. Can you say whether she is, in fact, an employee of this building and what her duties were and what her status is?

Mr. Boucher: There are Privacy Act and other limits to what I can say about a particular individual, but because she is a government employee I can tell you certain pieces of information. Margery Lemb Landry is a career Foreign Service officer. Her rank is FO-01. She is assigned to the Bureau of Consular Affairs to the Office of Children's Issues, and she entered on duty with the Foreign Service in August of 1980.

But any information about current status, security clearance, other personal information, I am not allowed to give. And obviously any questions about investigation belong with the people who are investigating.

Question: So you can say that she was employed? I mean, she's currently employed here?

Mr. Boucher: Yes. She is a career Foreign Service officer of the rank FO-01.

Question: Is she still on payroll?

Mr. Boucher: The current pay status or leave status is something I can't get into.

Question: Different subject. The Administration is demanding that the top al-Qaida and Taliban leaders in Afghanistan be turned over to the US. But the new government in Afghanistan is releasing some of those leaders. Is this an impasse, and will it be solved?

Mr. Boucher: No, and yes. You are referring to a situation which apparently arose -- first of all, I think the reporting was not about the interim government, the new people in the Interim Authority. It was about an official in Kandahar who had some people in custody and released them. But we have talked about this with the Interim Authority. I have talked about it in public a little bit. We understand that the Interim Authority is looking into the case of the former Taliban officials who surrendered to local authorities in Kandahar and were later released.

At this moment we don't have any new information. But as we said yesterday, the Interim Authority leader, Hamid Karzai, wants to bring to justice Taliban members who committed crimes. He has made clear statements about that, and we are confident that we can cooperate in this matter.

Question: Double-edged question also. Has the Palestinian Authority asked for the US to participate in the investigation of the "ship of fools" -- that is the ship? And secondly, the captain is now being reported in Jerusalem to have been on the staff of the security officer for the Palestinian Authority and the West Bank. Are you aware of any of the other backgrounds? He disappeared 15 months ago, according to the report out of Jerusalem.

Mr. Boucher: I think that is all quite interesting, but I'm going to have to maintain the position today about not talking about other people's information. And to the extent that the Israelis have such information, it would be up to them to talk about it.

What I would tell you once again is that based on the information that we have seen, but also on information that we ourselves have been able to acquire and assess, we do believe there is a compelling case to say that senior Palestinian officials, as well as officials from Fatah, were involved in this arms smuggling operation, and we do think that Chairman Arafat has a responsibility for senior officials of the Palestinian Authority. He needs to give us a full -- provide himself a full explanation of what went on, and take action to ensure that it doesn't reoccur.

Question: Can you give us any more details about Arafat's meeting with Schlicher yesterday? And secondly, can you tell me about the visit by Bebe Netanyahu to Jonathan Pollard earlier this week, and whether the State Department has any role in approving who gets to see Mr. Pollard?

Mr. Boucher: I don't think we do. Would we? I don't think we do at all.

Question: I don't know.

Mr. Boucher: I will double-check that, but neither one is in our custody at this point.

The question of the meeting yesterday. Our Consul General in Jerusalem, Ron Schlicher, met yesterday with Chairman Arafat. They really discussed what I have been discussing with you. Schlicher made clear that the information that we have indicates a compelling case, that Chairman Arafat has a responsibility as leader of the Palestinian Authority to provide a full explanation, and a responsibility to take immediate action against those responsible, and to ensure that no activities of this type can occur again.

So it was really conveying that message directly, and discussing it with him.

Question: Did Arafat say anything?

Question: Can you tell us anything about what Arafat conveyed to Mr. Schlicher?

Mr. Boucher: He conveyed I think -- indicate a willingness to investigate, a willingness to look into it, an understanding of the seriousness of the matter. And we will see what further information might be forthcoming.

Question: Did he repeat his disavowal of any involvement?

Mr. Boucher: I'm not sure if he did yesterday. I think --

Question: That's what I mean; I mean yesterday.

Mr. Boucher: But I would say that in the meeting yesterday he understood the seriousness that we attach to it, and did say that he was looking into it, and would get us more information.

Question: -- the Administration that suggests that this operation was of such magnitude that Arafat had to have known about it. Does the State Department believe that Arafat could have been involved in this, and if so, what -- how do you think he can man an investigation that perhaps would implicate him?

Mr. Boucher: I'm not going to speculate at this point on any -- I don't have any further information on Chairman Arafat's personal responsibility in this, except to say that he is responsible as the leader of the Palestinian Authority for the actions of Palestinian Authority officials, and therefore he has the logical responsibility to come up with information. But as we have made clear, that's not the sole source of our information on this matter.

Question: Can I ask you if you think the United States can accomplish anything through mediation while this matter is as unsettled as it seems to be?

Mr. Boucher: Well, first, we would hope that this matter would not remain unsettled for very long. We want to see immediate action to hold people responsible and to ensure that no further activities of this kind can occur in the future. But the President said yesterday we must remain engaged, we intend to remain engaged, and we do remain committed to achieving a restoration of calm, the implementation of the Tenet work plan, and of the Mitchell Committee recommendations.

Question: Clearly that's the goal, but I wondered if you could actually do anything useful. I'm not going to ask you if General Zinni is going back next week or whatever, because I know you'll announce that when you'll announce it, but is there anything practical that the US can do, except express an overall interest in seeing all these goals met?

Mr. Boucher: Well, let me put it this way. There are still practical steps the parties can take to ease tensions. There are still practical steps they can take to end the violence, to prevent the actions by violent groups, to prevent arms smuggling, whether it is inside or outside of any particular group or authority. So we do think that there are practical steps that the parties should be continuing to take, and to the extent that the United States has always had a role in trying to make that come about, we will continue to have that role and we do continue to have that role.

Question: President Bush is visiting Japan, South Korea and China next month.

Mr. Boucher: Who says? You would have to ask the White House. I can't take a question based on the premise until the White House might wish to make an announcement of something at some time.

Question: The Japanese Government has already announced it so --

Mr. Boucher: We don't announce Presidential visits. You'll have to check at the White House. I'm sorry.

(The briefing was concluded at 1:20 p.m. EST.)