*EPF401 12/30/2004
Transcript: Powell Says Effective Disaster Aid Distribution Systems Critical
(Secretary also discusses Iraq, Pakistan, and Israeli-Palestinian relations) (4450)

The major challenge to the disaster relief efforts in some countries affected by the December 26 earthquake and subsequent tsunami is setting up effective distribution systems to those most in need, according to Secretary of State Colin Powell.

In an interview with Agence France Presse December 30, Powell expressed concern that there has been some difficulty in transporting relief supplies from airports in Sri Lanka and Indonesia to more remote areas.

"It's one thing to get the supplies to the airport. It's another thing to get those supplies out to remote villages where the supplies are needed," he said. Powell stressed the importance of putting in place effective distribution systems and "making sure that you don't overwhelm the governments you're trying to help."

According to the secretary, the United States began assembling agency task forces, dispatching disaster assessment teams, and alerting all U.S. military forces in the South and Southeast Asia region as soon as it received reports outlining the extent of the disaster. The secretary noted that the United States has had six airplanes land in the region in the last 24 hours, "with many more planes coming and we've got our ships on the way."

Powell said that so far the international community has put forward $500 million in disaster assistance funds -- $250 million in national contributions and a $250 million pledge by the World Bank. He noted that there has also been "a large outpouring of private concern ... translating itself into donations, monetary donations."

Powell said monetary donations, which are fungible and easily transported, are of more use than canned goods or other items.

"People want to help, so they'll bring canned goods to a church, but getting those canned goods to Sri Lanka is not a trivial matter. We'd rather send them a check or wire the money to the World Food Program," he said. "[W]hat we need is money, which is fungible and easy to move, and will buy the right things, not transporting things that cost more to transport than they're worth in the first place and are not needed when they get there."

Powell stressed that the provision of disaster assistance is an international humanitarian effort, not a "contest" or an "auction" between countries. He noted that the United States, Australia, Japan, and India have formed a coalition to coordinate relief efforts in the region. He also said that there have been discussions of holding a donors' conference to fund the long-term reconstruction needs of the affected countries.

"There are 5 million people who we estimate have been made homeless by this. And so it's a question of doing it an organized, effective way, and we have to realize that this is probably a multi-year effort to get on top of this," he said. "Loss of life is the loss of life. People who are without homes have to be taken care of. People who are injured have to be taken care of. And then you have to get about rebuilding, reconstructing and repairing the economy."

During the interview, Powell also discussed the upcoming elections in Iraq, Pakistani leader Pervez Musharraf's decision to retain control of the government and Pakistan's efforts to fight terrorism, and Israeli-Palestinian relations.

Powell said that the coalition in Iraq is "aware of the security concerns in the Sunni area."

"We have to keep in mind what it is that keeps us from having a good Sunni turnout; it's terrorists and murders and criminals and people who want to go back to the past. And sometimes the desire to be free and to have a chance to decide how you wish to be governed might cause you to take risks that you might not otherwise take," he said.

Regarding Musharraf's decision to remain in power, Powell said that "President Musharraf and the parliament made a judgment that they think it's best for them to move forward with a president who also continues to wear the uniform, and that's a judgment they have made and we have to accept that judgment."

On Israeli-Palestinian relations, Powell said that if Abu Mazen wins the election to become president of the Palestinian Authority, he will need political help from Israel and the United States -- and economic help from the international community -- "to put in place a government that is seen as reforming, non-corrupt, on a solid basis, that is going after terrorism and that has its security forces under control."

Following is the State Department transcript of the interview:

(begin transcript)

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Office of the Spokesman
December 30, 2004

INTERVIEW

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell
With Peter Mackler and Francis Kohn of Agence France Presse

December 30, 2004
Washington, D.C.

(11:30 a.m. EST)

QUESTION: Well, Mr. Secretary, a number of people -- Chancellor Schroeder and President Chirac -- called for a moratorium on debt payments by countries hit by the tsunamis. Where does the U.S. stand on that issue?

SECRETARY POWELL: Well, I think this is an interesting proposal. I don't know that we've taken a position on it yet, but this is an example of the kind of thing we need to look at because these countries have received a very serious blow which not only causes great loss of life and made a lot of people homeless, but affects their economy, and so they need to be given all the relief that we can provide to them. But I'm not in a position right now to confirm exactly what the United States will be able to do, but I think debt relief is something clearly the international community should look towards.

QUESTION: How do you see the timeframe, considering the urgency and the enormous catastrophe? How do you see the timeframe of what the world community and the U.S. need to do?

SECRETARY POWELL: Well, as you know, this happened last Saturday night. We first got reports of it late Saturday night, early Sunday morning. But those reports said something serious has happened and there's a great loss of life, but it really wasn't until late Sunday and Monday that we got a better understanding of the extent of it, and even that was incomplete. And so we stood up task forces. We have been through these many times. We began dispatching assessment teams and we began to alert all of our military forces in the region as well.

By Monday we started to get a better understanding of it, made the initial contribution of $15 million. Tuesday added another 20, for 35 million. And we're going to add a lot more because the need is so great. I can't tell you how much more because this is the time now for all of us to take a deep breath, get the assessment teams in and get the humanitarian aid flowing, and start to see how long it's going to take to rebuild as well.

One of the challenges we're going to have is that all of the humanitarian aid that is now starting to arrive -- we've had six airplanes land in the region in the last 24 hours, with many more planes coming and we've got our ships on the way. It's one thing to get the supplies to the airport. It's another thing to get those supplies out to remote villages where the supplies are needed. So it's a matter also of putting in place distribution systems and making sure that you don't overwhelm the governments you're trying to help. Some of the governments have already said, please, slow down, we can't -- you're cramming our airport and we need some time to organize ourselves.

But the need is urgent. There are 5 million people who we estimate who have been made homeless by this. And so it's a question of doing it an organized, effective way, and we have to realize that this is probably a multiyear effort to get on top of this. Loss of life is the loss of life. People who are without homes have to be taken care of. People who are injured have to be taken care of. And then you have to get about rebuilding, reconstructing and repairing the economy.

QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, for this multiyear effort, do you see other steps, like a donor conference?

SECRETARY POWELL: Yes, a donors conference is being planned for the very near future. The European Union called for it and it's now being pulled together for, I think, sometime next week. I know that I just got off a television conference with the Secretary General, Kofi Annan, to make sure that we are knitted up with the United Nations. So far, the international community has put forward $500 million, $250 million in national contributions and a $250 million pledge by the World Bank. There is probably at least that much more that has been provided in in-kind assistance, you know, supplies.

And of course there is a large outpouring of private concern, and that private concern is translating itself into donations, monetary donations. And I hope somewhere in your reporting you will say we need money, not goods. People want to help, so they'll bring canned goods to a church, but getting those canned goods to Sri Lanka is not a trivial matter. We'd rather send them a check or wire the money to the World Food Program. And so what we need is money, which is fungible and easy to move, and will buy the right things, not transporting things that cost more to transport than they're worth in the first place and are not needed when they get there.

QUESTION: Do you have any more details of this donors conference -- where it's going to be, who is organizing it?

SECRETARY POWELL: No, I don't. It's just now gelling. And perhaps Richard can get it right after this meeting, but we just finished a conference on this.

QUESTION: At this donors conference --

SECRETARY POWELL: Marc Grossman will have it.

QUESTION: Sure. I mean, President Bush and yourself have said that the United States is ready to contribute a lot more. I mean, other countries have already contributed considerably more than the United States: Sweden, 75 million; France, 60. It's not a contest --

SECRETARY POWELL: No, but you -- the press is trying to make it a contest. You're trying to make it an auction. It's very unfortunate. The United States gave $2.4 billion in emergency assistance last year in humanitarian relief, more than anyone. When the hurricanes went through the Caribbean earlier this year, we started out with a few million; but when we did our needs assessment and saw the damage that actually had occurred, we upped it and we gave $120 million. Nobody else came anywhere near that.

And so we're not second to anyone with respect to our ability to respond to a disaster. But it's in the interest of the countries that are in need for this to be done in a sensible way, and that's what we will do. And you can be sure that we will participate in donors conferences and all other efforts that will help them. But I can't tell you now how much money we're going to pledge because I don't know what the need is yet and I have to work it out within our government, to include our Congress.

QUESTION: No, I really did want to make the point that it is not an auction and we're not trying to characterize it as that.

SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah, yeah.

QUESTION: But my question was -- is when do you think you're going to be in a position to define what are the fuller needs that the United States will (inaudible).

SECRETARY POWELL: The assessment teams are there now and we will start to get reports. And it is not just one report that says it's this amount of money. I suspect that over time the needs will be better and better defined and we will respond to those needs. And so I cannot say that it will be
one more number that we'll put on the table. It's probably something that's going to continue over time, that we'll add over time.

QUESTION: On the question of coordinating activities, I mean, again, trying to follow this in the press, we see a whole bunch of initiatives, the one the President announced about the core group.

SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah.

QUESTION: We do have the European Union is meeting of itself, the UN is organizing an appeal. Who is in overall charge of exactly where the resources are going to (inaudible) each country? Is there a danger of everybody stepping over their feet?

SECRETARY POWELL: We created the core group because we were concerned that there might be sort of a problem. And so why these particular countries? The United States, Australia, Japan and India? One, they're in the region. Now we're in the region with a presence, our military presence. Our Pacific Command is in the region. And India has assets it can apply. India was perhaps the first one out of the dock because they're so close to Sri Lanka and so they were able to provide almost immediate assistance within hours and they have hundreds of people working in Sri Lanka. So India was a logical candidate, even though they were struck as well. They can handle it. It's a large country with assets and they know how to do it. They face natural catastrophes regularly.

So we thought India, Japan because of its financial resources, the United States and Australia, because of its capability and its assets -- let's create this core group. The reason we called it the core group is because it's not -- that's not the end of it. It's just the beginning of something. And we have now heard from other countries that want to build on that core group concept and in our meeting with the Secretary General just now I had Ambassador Grossman, who is running this for us, Under Secretary Grossman, and the representatives of the core group countries, and on the conference with Secretary General Annan we had Jan Egeland, who is overall in charge of humanitarian relief for the UN and we also had Jim Morris of the World Food Program, Carol Bellamy and Mark Malloch Brown of the United Nations Development Program.

And so what we said to the Secretary General and his colleagues is that this is going to be complementary to your efforts. And so we hope the core group will grow and we will coordinate with the UN. I would say that the UN will have the lead international responsibility for this, but there are a lot of international groupings and organizations that will do their own thing and then feed into this. The European Union, what Chancellor Schroeder has said about debt and what Louis Michel has said about the donors conference. The core group is a way to sort of start to feed all of this in so they aren't just disparate efforts.

We also have to realize that the ultimate -- the ultimate agency to determine what happens will be the country. The country will have to make its own judgment of what it needs and how it wishes to receive this support. India, for example, even though they were hit and took losses, they don't need any international assistance and say we can handle it ourselves, we want to help others, not receive assistance.

The big challenge: Sri Lanka; northern Indonesia, Sumatra and Aceh; and Thailand can pretty much -- it needs some help, I think, and the unique part of the Thailand equation is so many tourists were in Thailand that have to be located. And then the Maldives, which is a somewhat unique problem, not a significant loss of life but considerable damage to this very low-lying island group.

QUESTION: Are you worried about what we're hearing about the bottlenecks, as I think you referred to it, the airports in Sri Lanka and Indonesia?

SECRETARY POWELL: Yes, yes. It's --

QUESTION: What can be done about it?

SECRETARY POWELL: Well, you try to resolve it. One of the things we just talked about is how can we get to these bottlenecked areas and use of aircraft to distribute supplies away from the bottlenecks, get them to the central point and with the use of helicopters. Helicopters will become very important and fixed-wing aircraft of not large -- requiring large landing fields will also be important.

And so the Secretary General and the core group are working right now on identifying the bottlenecks and how to get around the bottlenecks or to open up the bottlenecks. We've got considerable experience in these kinds of matters, and as you know we're going to be using Utapao, Thailand, as a staging area for support coming in from U.S. Pacific Command.

QUESTION: There was an idea for the (inaudible) a special G-8. That was Mr. Berlusconi who I think proposed a special G-8 summit on the debt relief.

SECRETARY POWELL: I'm sorry. Yeah, I haven't heard that. I've been doing condolence books all morning. I haven't heard that one yet. It would certainly be an idea worth considering.

QUESTION: Could we turn to -- there's some other international questions, specifically three that we'd like to ask in the time we have remaining.

SECRETARY POWELL: Mm-hmm.

QUESTION: On the Iraq elections, I know at your latest news conference I asked you just about the possibility that the elections were not going to work out as well as you thought, and what are contingency plans. My question is this, is that on January 31st, the day after the elections, how are we going to be -- what is -- is the United States going to accept any result that happens (inaudible)? How will we know -- how will you know and how will you tell us if the elections were credible and did what you hoped they would do?

SECRETARY POWELL: By looking at the results of the election. You've been asking me to project myself out a month and make an analysis of something that I can't make an analysis of yet. And so we will see what the results of the election are and then make a judgment, but you're asking me to give you an answer to hypothetical outcomes, which I can't do.

QUESTION: Let me just reformulate that. Is there sort of a threshold that you say would have to be met so you would be satisfied with the results, either in terms of participation, the number of Sunnis, other --

SECRETARY POWELL: We will see the results of the election and then we will make a judgment at that time. But even before we make a judgment, it's more important to see what the international community thinks of the election, and more importantly what the IECI, the Iraqis themselves, think of the election. And I don't think it would be helpful to speculate as to what redlines are or not or what would be acceptable or not acceptable. Let's see what happens on the 31st.

We are aware of the security concerns in the Sunni area. This is a challenge to us and we haven't denied that. We do want a good Sunni turnout. We're encouraging the neighboring nations to encourage the Sunnis to participate. We're reaching out to Sunni leaders. The Iraqi Interim Government is reaching out to Sunni leaders. We want a good Sunni turnout. We have to keep in mind what it is that keeps us from having a good Sunni turnout; it's terrorists and murders and criminals and people who want to go back to the past. And sometimes the desire to be free and to have a chance to decide how you wish to be governed might cause you to take risks that you might not otherwise take. We saw that in Afghanistan, where people were worried about turnout and murderers and bombs going off, and yet the Afghan people turned out and took that risk. I hope Sunnis will realize that this is their chance to express their view as to how they wish to be governed.

Okay. Is there anything else, because I do have to --

QUESTION: We have two more. We wanted to ask you on Pakistan, President Musharraf just announced he was going to retain his position, military position. What's your reaction?

SECRETARY POWELL: This is a judgment for the Pakistani people to make. The parliament provided for means for him to do this. He has exercised that option and it is now a matter for the Pakistan people and the Pakistan parliament, which has already judged this, to make any other judgments they wish to make. We will work with President Musharraf and the Government of Pakistan. He said he was going to take his uniform off and retire some time ago and he has subsequently, with the support of the parliament, decided that would not be in the best interest of the country.

What I have to look at is where Pakistan has been back in 2001 and where it is now and the significant changes that have taken place as it has moved toward democracy, as it has dealt with the problem of A.Q. Khan and as it has joined the war against terrorists and made a fundamental strategic shift in September of 2001 to stop supporting the Taliban and thereby giving al-Qaida a home, to where Pakistan is now a good friend of the United States, an economy that's improving, and significant and positive change that has taken place in society.

President Musharraf and the parliament made a judgment that they think it's best for them to move forward with a president who also continues to wear the uniform, and that's a judgment they have made and we have to accept that judgment.

QUESTION: But there are complaints that they're not being as forthcoming as they should be in terms of interviewing A.Q. Khan and also in terms of the ISI intelligence along the border to try to net the Taliban.

SECRETARY POWELL: They have done --

QUESTION: Are you --

SECRETARY POWELL: They have done a tremendous job on the border. Many Pakistani soldiers have been killed in recent months, hundreds, in dealing with the border issue. Have they scooped up every al-Qaida or Taliban individual that's hiding in the frontier areas? No. Have they gotten a lot of them? Yes. Are they working hard? Yes. Are they working in a more cooperative manner with the Afghans? Yes, they are.

I think it was our encouragement of Pakistan to do more and their response by doing more, under President Musharraf's leadership, that helped to create the conditions that allowed for a successful -- helped to create the conditions that allowed for a successful election in Afghanistan.

With respect to A.Q. Khan, we continue to put questions to the Pakistanis. We hope more information will be forthcoming. But Mr. A.Q. Khan is no longer involved in the kinds of activities he had been involved in. Now, we want to make sure that his entire network has been ripped up, every single piece of it, and I've had many conversations with President Musharraf about this, and as has the President, and I am confident that's his desire as well. He has to manage this in a way that is consistent with his domestic political considerations.

QUESTION: Can we have one last question?

SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah.

QUESTION: On the Middle East, we have Abu Mazen (inaudible) appears to be heading towards a victory or at least has been well placed there. When he was Prime Minister, he had all good intentions to try to rein in the violence, but he was undercut because he couldn't get any concession from the Israelis, particularly on the prisoners. He's now asking that the wall come down. He's still asking for the prisoners to be released.

Do you think it's appropriate at this time to advance Abu Mazen as a credible negotiating partner that the Israelis should be making some sort of concessions?

SECRETARY POWELL: The Israelis did release 159 prisoners recently. They have started to open up the area. They had successful Palestinian elections recently. They were able to get around. The Israelis have said they will make sure the conditions will support proper election on the 9th of January, so I think the Israelis are taking some steps.

We all understand that Abu Mazen, if he is successful in the election, will need help from Israel and from the United States, and economic help from the international community, especially the EU, to put in place a government that is seen as reforming, non-corrupt, on a solid basis, that is going after terrorism and that has its security forces under control. And the President stands ready to help Mr. Abu Mazen, as he was last year when Mr. Abu Mazen was Prime Minister. But we believe he was seriously undercut by Mr. Arafat. Mr. Arafat is not there any longer and Mr. Arafat is no longer an obstacle. And Mr. Sharon and Mr. Peres and our other colleagues, if that's how the Israeli Government ends up in the next few days, will have to deal with the elected president of the Palestinian people.

QUESTION: And --

SECRETARY POWELL: I won't -- I'm not saying he's going to be the president. That's up to the Palestinian people.

QUESTION: But when he says, "Mr. Sharon, take down this wall," as he said yesterday, is it something the United States think that the Israelis should be considering seriously to build up his credibility and to --

SECRETARY POWELL: Israel still has a security problem. There are still attacks against the state of Israel. Israel believes that the fence that they have put up has stopped the majority of those attacks and it's unlikely that they would respond to anyone at the moment saying take down the entire fence.

We hope the fence is a temporary feature that will go away -- the Israelis have said this -- hope it will go away when a Palestinian state is established that has foresworn terrorism and is organized and reformed and ready to live in peace with its Israeli neighbor.

Gotta go.

QUESTION: Thanks, Mr. Secretary.

SECRETARY POWELL: Thanks.

QUESTION: Happy New Year.

QUESTION: Happy New Year to you, sir.

SECRETARY POWELL: Happy New Year.

(end transcript)

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

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