*EPF205 09/04/01
Transcript: Assistant Secretary Highlights U.S.-Philippine Ties
(U.S. supports Philippines' efforts to combat terrorism) (2020)

U.S. support for the Philippine government's efforts to combat terrorism and strengthen its armed forces were topics on the agenda for Assistant Secretary of State James A. Kelly's visit to Manila September 3-5.

In a September 3 press briefing following a meeting with Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, the assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs said he and Macapagal-Arroyo exchanged views on various aspects of Filipino-American relations, "which are, certainly for me, an extraordinarily high priority."

Responding to a question on the ongoing hostage crisis in the southern Philippines, in which a number of American citizens are among those being held by the Abu Sayyaf terrorist group, Kelly noted that in his meeting he "expressed sympathy on the difficulty of this [hostage situation], and stressed the U.S. interest in supporting the government of the Philippines in difficult problems of this nature."

On the issue of assistance to the armed forces of the Philippines, Kelly said the U.S. request for military assistance for this upcoming fiscal year is $19 million, up from the $2 million in assistance allocated for the last fiscal year. In providing this assistance in equipment maintenance and training, Kelly stressed, the U.S. desires "to be as helpful as we can to our ally in making its armed forces capable in the areas the Philippines chooses to have them be capable in."

Following is a transcript of the September 3 press briefing held at Malacanang Palace, Manila:

(begin transcript)

James A. Kelly
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs
Manila, Republic of the Philippines
September 3, 2001

KELLY: Thank you. My name is Jim Kelly. I'm Assistant Secretary of State of U.S.A. for East Asia and Pacific Affairs. I was in government in the 80's, out of government for twelve years, and took my office in early May. And my responsibilities to President Bush and to Secretary of State Colin Powell involve all the countries of East Asia and the Pacific from Myanmar, Burma up to Japan and Korea. On this trip -- I started a week ago in Singapore and visited Indonesia, I was able to go out to Timor for the elections that were held last Thursday, and then had a number of meetings in Jakarta before the weekend. Yesterday I was in Brunei, and I am delighted to have arrived in Manila for the first time in an official capacity in quite a few years. I was here very often in the 1980's and came as a private citizen, of course, quite regularly since then. So I'm absolutely delighted to be back and President Macapagal-Arroyo was very generous in receiving me today. I was honored and delighted to have this meeting and to hear her comments especially an amplification of her, I think, very significant recent speech, and to discuss various aspects of Filipino-American relations, which are, certainly for me, an extraordinarily high priority. So with that introduction, I'll be happy to try to respond to any of your questions. I will be here for the rest of today and all of tomorrow, and then I have to go to Japan. We're having a meeting of the trilateral coordination process among Japan, South Korea and the USA with respect to North Korean policy, and so I'll end up the week on that one there. I look forward to coming back to Manila quite often.

ROILO GOLEZ (RP National Security Adviser): Thank you. Well, in my case this is not my first time to meet with Assistant Secretary of State Jim Kelly. We met about two years ago with common friends -- this is the U.S. naval academy group, Secretary Kelly being a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy a few years ahead of me. And the guy immediately on top of him, Undersecretary of State Richard Armitage, is also a graduate of the Naval Academy. So we have common acquaintances. The good Assistant Secretary mentioned that President Bush is looking forward to meeting President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in Shanghai in the course of the APEC meeting. And, of course, like everybody else, the Philippines, as expressed by the President, is wishing the best relationship between China and the U.S. because the two countries are friends of the Philippines. The President also stressed that the Philippines is among the best allies of the United States in this part of the world and this was clearly enunciated in her state of the nation address last late July. Assistant Secretary of State Kelly also conveyed that Washington, D.C. is looking forward to the eventual visit of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, but there's no date yet. Of course, they talked about trade, they talked about many common concerns like national missile defense, non-proliferation of missiles, reducing arsenal, etc., etc., improving trade, and also Assistant Secretary of State Kelly assured that there is now a trend towards greater military assistance from the U.S. to the Philippines. So I think, basically, that's it. There's also the agreement that the U.S. will have its own think tank, and the Philippines its own think tank, so the two groups can think about how to further improve the relationship between the two countries. Thank you.

Q: Is the U.S. Government counting on the Arroyo administration to finally extradite Congressman Mark Jimenez?

KELLY: That topic didn't come up here. We do have an extradition treaty between the two countries, and we very much hope that the implementation of it will be successful so that any person, who faces charges in a legal and procedural way, can be extradited to the other.

Q: Mr. Secretary, about a few weeks ago, the President admitted that the U.S. had, indeed, offered some kind of logistical or some material aid in trying to catch the Abu Sayyaf. At this point would you say that that kind of aid that has been given by your government has at least given the Philippines some measure of success against the Abu Sayyaf?

KELLY: The only measure of success on something like this is when those hostages are released. And that hasn't happened in adequate measures, certainly not for the Americans involved. So we do work together, and the U.S. certainly tries to help the Philippines in difficult problems like this, especially when they involve American citizens. But I certainly wouldn't say anything is a success if the results haven't been conclusive, and they haven't.

Q: Was it taken up during your brief discussion with the President?

KELLY: I just expressed sympathy on the difficulty of this and stressed the U.S. interest in supporting the government of the Philippines in difficult problems of this nature.

Q: Secretary, we usually look at the East Asian and Pacific area in somehow a bigger picture. We have on one side China, and on the other side, the United States, and the fear of the smaller nations like the Philippines is when two elephants fight the grounds tremble. Will you give us some of your candid appraisal of this new power situation in East Asia?

KELLY: Sure. I don't blame you or anyone in Asia for that kind of concern, and there's no question that there were some highly celebrated and difficult events between the U.S. and China during the first part of this year. But the fact is I accompanied Secretary Powell to Beijing in July. I had my own visit there in the latter part of May. President Bush will be, of course, attending the APEC meeting in Shanghai in October, and he goes on from there to a meeting with Chinese leaders in Beijing. What this really means is that there is a very good, sound working relationship, a very honest and direct dialogue going on. This is not a matter of confrontation. The atmosphere now is, in fact, very positive indeed. So I don't think anybody needs to be particularly concerned about that. I know there was a lot of worry and tension about it before. The relationship of China and the U.S. is going excellently right now, and I expect it to continue to move that way. The development of China is something that is in all of our interest all of the time. The accession of China to the World Trade Organization this year, the establishment of more rules involving its trade and development and the way its institutions form together and work with these things is something that's very important. It's important for the Philippines, it's important for America, and, of course, it's important for China too. And so we feel pretty good about the direction that it's going now.

Q: Could I ask a follow up question to that, sir? There has been some confusion over the weekend over U.S. policy towards China in relation to the missile defense system and, reportedly, the U.S. agreeing to a build-up of the armed forces of China in return for its support for the missile defense system.

KELLY: I know of no plans to build up the armed forces of China by the U.S. That is not in the cards. What is in the cards though is a very active dialogue on strategic questions; the long-range missiles that China has, and the capabilities we have. President Bush's speech on May 1st spelled out our commitments to non-proliferation to unilateral reductions of our own strategic nuclear missile forces and also to pursuing various options on missile defense. I went to China to start to explain that. China is not (sic) continues to seem to express the view that this is some kind of hazard to them or a threat to China. It's not. And I think what you may be referring to is that President Bush' s National Security Adviser, Dr. Condoleeza Rice, I think, made some remarks that we need to talk more in depth with China and that's good news. And I hope the Chinese are receptive to that. I think they will be.

Q: Mr. Secretary, I'd like to know if there was any discussion at all on multilateral exercises and if you were able to get some kind of commitment from the Philippines on this?

KELLY: No, multilateral exercises did not come up, and so I'm not sure I have anything to say on that.

Q: Just a follow-up on the Abu Sayyaf. Were you able to get any commitment at all -- any assurance as to the time frame under which you can assure that the hostages will be released?

KELLY: I'm sure that if President Macapagal-Arroyo knew the date that they were going to be released, especially if it were today or tomorrow, she would have made some remark. There's no question that the President and this government are strongly committed to doing something about this problem. It's very celebrated out there around the world, and it is damaging to the people who are involved. It's damaging to all kinds of things. But I don't think there's any way to make a commitment to make something like that happen. It's not easy, and if it were easy, it would already be done.

Q: Could you elaborate on what you mentioned earlier about greater U.S. military assistance in the Philippines?

KELLY: The U.S. request for military assistance for this upcoming fiscal year is for 19 million -- it was under 2 million last year. So this would be primarily focused on helping the Armed Forces of the Philippines maintain some of the equipment they have and necessary training, and things along that line. Compared to a lot of the numbers a long time ago, this isn't so big. But the trend, we think, is serious. We want to as helpful as we can to our ally in making its armed forces capable in the areas the Philippines chooses to have them be capable in.

(end transcript)

(Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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