*EPF401 07/13/00
White House Report, Thursday, July 13, 2000
(Camp David Summit) (700)
CLINTON CALLS FOR SPIRIT OF RECONCILIATION AT CAMP DAVID
President Clinton temporarily left the secluded Camp David site in the Maryland mountains July 13 to fly to nearby Baltimore to address the annual convention of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People).
"Now, as all of you know, I came here from Camp David this morning, where we are meeting with the Israelis and the Palestinians in an effort to resolve the profound differences that have kept the people of the Middle East apart for a very long time," he told the convention.
Invoking the memory of the late civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Clinton told the NAACP delegates, "I know that in our quest for a full, fair and final peace -- which Dr. King reminded us is more than the absence of war but the presence of justice and brotherhood and genuine reconciliation -- I know we will have your prayers and your best wishes."
"I had to come to Baltimore today," he said, "because you embody the spirit of freedom and reconciliation we're trying to capture there, that we need so badly in our talks."
Clinton said he hoped the summit would "resolve the profound differences that have kept the people of the Middle East apart for a very long time."
From Baltimore, Clinton went to a previously scheduled engagement in Washington, and was to return to Camp David in the late afternoon. In his absence, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was leading the U.S. delegation, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher told reporters at a morning briefing at the Thurmont briefing center.
"There is a very full day planned," he said. "The Secretary will continue the pattern of meetings that have been occurring over the last two days and continue to work on moving the ball forward."
"The Secretary, during the course of the day, expects to meet with the leaders and with the negotiating teams."
Boucher said all three delegations and their leaders dined together the night of July 12, as they had the previous evening.
"They sit at a large table with the President on one side and Chairman Arafat and Prime Minister Barak at either end," he said. "Everybody's talking to each other."
"There's an informal atmosphere in Camp David," Boucher said. "These are people who have talked to each other before in a variety of settings, and they're comfortable with each other. But at the same time, they're all very, very aware of the seriousness of the issues that face them, the toughness of the issues, the fact that these do involve the vital interests of both sides. And trying to understand the interests and reconcile them is a very difficult process that we are going through now."
Boucher reported that Prime Minister Barak and Chairman Arafat met at Chairman Arafat's cabin before dinner for about an hour. That meeting included some members of both their delegations, he said. They "met with each other on their own initiative" but the United States was "aware of the meeting," Boucher said.
The spokesman also reported that President Clinton spoke with Chairman Arafat. "They walked together for a while and then met back at the President's cabin for some time after that. And then the President spent some additional time with some members of the Palestinian negotiating team," Boucher said.
Asked about reports that Arafat wants to meet with three ranking members of the Palestinian leadership, who are not part of the Palestinian delegation at the talks, Boucher said the United States had not received a request for their presence.
But he said "there are expectations from the beginning that provisions can be made to bring a limited number of people for a limited period of time as necessary, as we decide is necessary. So they would have to make the request to us, and then in conjunction with them we would determine if we felt such a thing was necessary."
(Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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