Rice Defends U.S. Withdrawal from Racism Conference

Thomas Eichler
Washington File Staff Writer

Washington -- The United States made the right decision in pulling out of the U.N. World Conference Against Racism -- just concluded in Durban, South Africa -- because "this conference was hijacked and ... didn't deal with the agenda that it should have," says White House National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice.

Speaking September 9 on the NBC news program "Meet the Press," Rice said she had not yet seen the text of the conference final declaration but hopes, as press accounts indicate, that the document is "better" than first feared. Nevertheless, she said, "I think a lot of time was wasted on issues that were extraneous to the questions that should have been preeminent in the conference. And that is how to acknowledge the past, but especially how to move on in the future. There are still practices of slavery out there today in places like Sudan that should be roundly condemned. There should be a commitment to tolerance in international politics. There should be a commitment to tolerance of ethnic difference. But this conference spent far too much time trying to condemn Israel and single it out."

Responding to a question about Bush administration involvement in efforts to deal with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Rice said "we are working every day with the parties to try and lower the level of violence."

President Bush, she said, talks frequently to leaders from the region, and Secretary of State Powell, "the person to whom he [Bush] goes on the Middle East," speaks on the phone with Middle East officials "almost daily."

The administration, she said, recently has received new assurances from the Palestinian Authority that they are trying to stop the violence. "But we are waiting to see," she said. "We believe that they can do more, and that they really do need to do more."

Rice noted that Bush has offered to meet with officials of the two sides when necessary, "but ... at this point in time there are no plans for the president to meet with Yasser Arafat in New York" when Arafat attends the upcoming U.N. General Assembly session.

On missile defense issues, Rice said a defensive missile system is needed to counter the emergent threat of "ubiquitous" ballistic missile technology that "rests in the hands of all kinds of irresponsible states. It would not be wise of the president of the United States or responsible of the president of the United States not to respond to that threat."

Rice said it will be important to move beyond the "very restrictive" Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty. "We have several possible routes," she said, "including, we hope, cooperation with the Russians towards the building of a new strategic framework that is more appropriate to the relationship that we have with Russia. The ABM Treaty is an artifact of our relationship with the Soviet Union."

The United States, Rice said, is "in very close consultation with the Russians, with our allies. We are going to begin discussions with the Chinese. But with the Russians, we believe that there is potential to do this in a cooperative way."

On the possibility of the United States withdrawing from the ABM treaty, she said "the president understands his responsibilities in international politics to be sensitive to the concerns of others. He also understands his responsibility to the American people, our allies, and to his successors, to deal with this very bad technology that is out there in a lot of hands of very bad people. And so we are going to find a way to do that. But I will tell you we are going to make to the Russians and others an offer about a new strategic framework that we think is appropriate. We think it will be a good offer. And then we will let people judge whether or not it should have been taken."

The U.S. approach to China on missile defense will be much like that with other countries, Rice said. "It will be to tell them about the missile defense program, to be transparent about that; to convince them that in fact it is not a problem because unless a country plans to blackmail the United States somehow, this limited missile defense system is not aimed at them. And we don't believe that that's the case with China. The president will also say that it is important to maintain the moratorium on testing. We are maintaining that moratorium. We see no reason to test now. We don't believe that others have a reason to test either. And we believe that the strategic balance can be maintained on a new footing where you mix limited defenses with lower offensive numbers, and that that will actually be a more stable balance than the one of mutually-assured destruction, with which we have lived for a number of years."