US Department of State Daily Briefing #24:
Friday, 2/14/92
Boucher
Source: State Department Deputy Spokesman Richard
Boucher
Description: Washington, DC
Date: Feb, 14 19922/14/92
Category: Briefings
Region: MidEast/North Africa, Caribbean, E/C Europe, Eurasia
Country: Iran, Haiti, Libya, Israel, Algeria, Lebanon, Iraq,
Yugoslavia (former), USSR (former)
Subject: Arms Control, Mideast Peace Process,
Regional/Civil Unrest, Democratization, Human Rights,
Nuclear Nonproliferation
12:24 P.M.
(ON THE RECORD UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED)
MR. BOUCHER: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. My
only announcement today is in the way of housekeeping, to remind
you that you have a 3-day weekend coming up. Monday is a
Federal holiday, and we won't be briefing on Monday. With that,
I'd be glad to take your questions.
George.
Q Could you tell us the drill concerning the Supreme
Court deadline this afternoon regarding the Haitian question?
MR. BOUCHER: No, I can't. I think you'll have to get
that from Justice.
Q 3:00 o'clock.
Q Richard, today is the third anniversary of the
fatwa, or death sentence passed by Iran on Salman Rushdie. Does
the United States have any words to mark this event?
MR. BOUCHER: I'd note that at the time that Khomeini
issued the decree, President Bush called it deeply offensive to
the norms of civilized behavior and said we would hold Tehran
accountable for any ensuing actions. That remains our position.
Recent statements by senior Iranian officials confirm
that the decree remains in effect.
We've repeatedly cited the death threat against Salman
Rushdie as evidence of Iran's disregard for basic standards of
behavior and Iranian support for terrorism. As a designated
state sponsor of terrorism, Iran is already subject to a range
of U.S. sanctions.
Along with other nations, we have publicly urged the
Islamic Republic to lift the decree. Our efforts in this regard
have not diminished.
Q When the Japanese translator of "The Satanic
Versus" was stabbed to death last April and when the Italian
translator of "The Satanic Versus" was stabbed and wounded
around the same time, how did the United States then hold Iran
accountable?
MR. BOUCHER: Alan, I don't know what we said at the
time. As I said, Iran, for a variety of reasons, including its
support for the assassination of Iranian dissidents overseas,
remains on the terrorism list. For those reasons, they also
remain subject to the sanctions and restrictions that we have
against Iran.
[Haiti: Repatriation Issues]
Q Can we go back to the drill on Haiti and tell us
if they're still being repatriated and what the State Department
still believes, and nobody is being persecuted for his political
views? Who goes back?
MR. BOUCHER: Who goes back? Let me start out with the
numbers, if I can find them.
Five hundred and eight Haitians are due to be
repatriated to Haiti from Guantanamo today. This will bring the
total number of Haitians repatriated since the coup to 3,403.
That number includes 538 that went back in November.
Further repatriations are expected to take place next
week on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.
As for the issue you raise on persecution and violence,
let me remind you that our human rights report, for example, and
our other statements, discuss and condemn the violence that's
going on in Haiti. The judgment that we have to make under our
law is whether individuals have a well-founded fear of
persecution, and that's why we screen people. We interview the
people who are picked up at sea. Those who have a plausible
claim are allowed to pursue their claim.
Q Richard, on Haiti again. Has the Embassy in Haiti
been able to come up with anything on its investigation on the
incident involving Alan Tomlinson and Matt Sheppard?
MR. BOUCHER: At this point, I don't have any
information on that. It's a report that we take seriously, and
we will be looking into the report.
We also -- I understand our Embassy is meeting with the
two journalists who reported yesterday on their detention
up-country -- that they'll be meeting with them this afternoon.
The detention of the journalists is something we also take very
seriously, and that we expect to raise with the Haitian
authorities.
Q Concerning the substance of the story, do we have
any information to show that pro-Aristide supporters throughout
the country have been the victims of a recent crackdown by the
military regime there?
MR. BOUCHER: I wouldn't phrase it the way you're
phrasing it. The situation, as we see it, is that there is
violence and persecution in Haiti. Our human rights report, as
I said, goes into considerable detail on that point.
But the policy question, the choice that we're faced
with, relates to the qualifications to asylum and whether people
sent back might be persecuted. Political violence or unrest in
a country does not automatically mean that all its citizens
qualify for asylum in the United States.
Those who were picked up sea who were interviewed, who
have this plausible claim for asylum, are allowed to pursue
their claims. Those who don't qualify for asylum are returned
to Haiti under the bilateral agreement.
The agreement's purpose, to begin with, is to try to
make sure that those who are seeking better conditions don't put
to sea and risk death.
We're concerned when we hear allegations that people
are being persecuted for trying to leave Haiti. We've increased
our Embassy staff to better investigate these allegations.
We're in contact with human rights and humanitarian groups in
Haiti, including the International Federation of the Red Cross
and Red Crescent Societies, Haitian Red Cross, and various other
groups.
So far, we have no evidence that returnees are being
singled out for persecution. All Haitians -- those who have
returned and those who never left -- obviously face a very
difficult situation. We're doing what we can to change that.
We continue to work with the OAS to try to and restore
democratic rule to Haiti, the surest way to end Haiti's
suffering and to answer Haiti's humanitarian needs.
Q Is anyone from the -- as a follow-up -- is there
anyone from the Embassy who is checking out reports specifically
dealing with the "chefs de section" who were reportedly involved
in the incident with Tomlinson and Sheppard?
MR. BOUCHER: As I said, we take those reports
seriously. We're going to be looking into it. We're meeting
with the reporters involved this afternoon, and I'm sure our
Embassy will take it from there.
Q Have we previously been aware of the activities of
this particular group, which are apparently active in the rural
areas of Haiti?
MR. BOUCHER: I think the question of the chefs de
section is addressed in our human rights report. I'm told it's
either the second or third paragraph on Haiti. It's prominently
mentioned.
Q Richard, is the State Department able to identify
the people who, when they try to leave the country, were
threatened with persecution? Do you know who those people are?
Because if you do, and they got out, the question is
whether any of them were repatriated? Because I suppose the
logic would be, if someone is threatened with doing something
and he does it, it's conceivable he would face at least as much
a threat if he came back -- when he came back.
MR. BOUCHER: I think that's the point of interviewing
people -- to find out on an individual basis, to talk to them,
to hear from them their stories about any threats that might
exist against them on an individual basis. That's why those who
have such well-founded fears of persecution, or who appear to,
are allowed to pursue their claims and are not sent back.
We send back people who do not appear to have that kind
of plausible claim, that kind of specific individual reason to
fear persecution upon being sent back. In the cases that we've
checked out, and based on the information that we have available
to us from this wide network of contacts, those judgments appear
so far to be accurate. We don't have any information that the
people that we have sent back are the people that face that fear
or have, in fact, been persecuted upon their return.
Q Richard, do we have any numbers on the number of
"double-backers" that we've had? And how many of these have
been granted entry to pursue asylum claims? We've been asking
the question since --
MR. BOUCHER: I don't have the numbers on that. I
think we told you at one point that INS wasn't really counting
them that way. We know here only of the 42 that have been
reported, but you would really have to check the numbers with
INS.
Q According to the documents that some of the
refugee groups who are advocating for the Haitians, they say
five of these "double-backers" told INS initially that they were
Aristide supporters and that they were still sent back. But on
the second time back, they were given entry. Do you have
anything to confirm or deny that?
MR. BOUCHER: No. That's a question that you really
have to ask INS.
Now, we had very specific reports that we got of the
interviews with at least four of those people, and we're seeking
the rest of them. When we went to check out those reports on
the ground, both in parts of Port-au-Prince and in another city
called Petit Goave, not only did we not find any information to
corroborate those reports but we found some information that
directly contradicted the stories that these people had told at
Guantanamo.
Q Can you say by how much the Embassy staff has been
increased?
MR. BOUCHER: We've increased the Embassy staff in
about the last week by ten people to work specifically on
refugees. That includes two INS officers. I think, as we've
said, the Embassy is using all the people available that it can
to work on this subject, and we have something like 18 people
working either full or part-time on the question of refugees and
monitoring.
Q Can you bring us up to date on how the State
Department is doing in trying to round up the Middle East
parties for a February 24 session?
Q Can we have one more question on Haiti?
MR. BOUCHER: Let me try to answer Barry's question
quickly. The Jordanians, I think, have stated publicly that
they plan to attend. We've been in contact with all the
parties. We think it's up to them to announce publicly their
plans concerning attendance. We certainly hope that they will
attend the next round of bilateral negotiations, and we
encourage them to do so.
Q Well, the Secretary said some while ago that he
thought it would be appropriate someplace down the road to have
the talks in the Middle East since the talks concern the Middle
East.
Do you have any idea when that might turn out to the be
the case? Is there some round in the future that the
Administration figures ought to be in the Middle East? This is
Round 3 coming up now.
MR. BOUCHER: We've stated our view on that in the
past, Barry. The exact arrangements that will be made, I think
are for the parties to decide and announce.
Q No, no, I'm sorry. Well, the formula has been the
U.S. says the talks are here, then, at this time; come or don't
come. So I don't know if the parties get to decide the formula.
Because so far only one party -- actually, there are two --
have agreed to come February 24 to Washington. Israel prefers
another formula, and I think Syria does, too.
So, really, the U.S. has something to do with
concocting the formula.
MR. BOUCHER: Barry, that's not the formula that I've
expressed. I haven't expressed a formula like that. As I said,
we're in contact with all the parties on the next round. And
other issues regarding timing and venue, and things like that,
we have been all along. At this point, I don't have any further
announcements to make.
Q Richard, the State Department -- sorry. The
United States, which is holding the Chair at the U.N. Security
Council, I understand, is beginning consultations today on a
resolution that will include mandatory sanctions against Libya.
Can you give us any detail on that?
MR. BOUCHER: Alan, I don't know why you say you
understand that. There is no resolution that's yet been tabled
on this subject.
Q Well, I'm a journalist and I talk to people and
they tell me things.
Are you beginning consultations?
MR. BOUCHER: We've been in consultations all along
with other countries about this issue. We had one resolution.
I believe that resolution itself -- maybe not in the resolution
but at the time we talked about if Libya didn't comply, we would
consider further measures.
We've been discussing these things with other
countries, especially with the U.K. and France, which are the
two other countries most directly involved.
Q Are you now putting some time limits on it,
though?
MR. BOUCHER: Not that I've heard of, no.
Q Richard, the Israelis this morning say that the
United States is giving next weekend as the deadline for
proposing or presenting the United States with ten favorite
cities for holding the bilateral talks outside the United States
and that the 24th will be the last time that they will be
talking here. Do you have any comment on this?
MR. BOUCHER: I hadn't seen that report, and I'm not in
a position to comment.
Q And also on the same subject, in the last
bilateral talks here -- the round -- I think the second round,
there was a proposal made by the Israelis to the Palestinian
delegation about self-government. Today's papers in Israel say
that Israel will not be discussing in the upcoming talks -- the
24th -- anything of such a nature, but the whole talks will be
procedural matters that they will be discussing. They are
reneging on the proposal they made last month here in the talks.
Do you have any comment on this?
MR. BOUCHER: No, I don't.
Q Can we turn the question around, though? From the
State Department view, should this next round be a matter of
dealing with substance or are there still procedural matters
that ought to be ironed out first?
MR. BOUCHER: Barry, our view remains the view that
we've expressed before -- that we think it's important that the
parties get beyond procedural matters and discuss substance.
Q Richard, give us a read on the situation in
Algeria today. Are things worse?
MR. BOUCHER: The reports that I have from Algeria are
as follows: Following Friday's prayers, there was no attempt to
stage the march of the Islamic Salvation Front which had
previously been called.
We have one report of a shooting incident at Martyr's
Square in which one child was hit.
We are concerned about the upsurge in violence. As
we've said repeatedly, we urge all parties to remain calm and to
find a peaceful solution to the crisis.
As the Secretary said in Congress last week, we hope
that Algeria gets back on the road to political reform as
quickly as possible.
Q Richard, by chance, you might look for a reaction
from State to an Arms Control Association report that since
President Bush proposed limiting arms sales to the Middle East
in May, the United States has transferred roughly $6 billion in
weapons to Middle Eastern countries.
Are you able to say whether these transfers are
consistent with the President's initiative?
MR. BOUCHER: Barry, first of all, I haven't done the
total myself. The transfers are notified and announced publicly
in accordance with the procedures that we always follow, so I
don't know what the numbers are.
As you know, our arms tranfers are done under very
careful criteria that are set out in law and policy. Yes, I
would say that any transfers that we engaged in are fully
consistent with the President's initiative and the guidelines
that have been agreed upon for conventional weapons transfers
already by the five countries involved in the initiative.
Q Just to make sure -- it so happens there's an Arms
Control Association report and there's an Arms Control and
Disarmament Agency report. I was asking you, of course, about
the Arms Control Association --
MR. BOUCHER: I know you were. The Arms Control and
Disarmament Agency report, I think, only has numbers up to 1989.
Q On the peace talks again, can you tell me if the
meeting between Ambassador Djerejian and Mr. Jaja of Lebanon, on
Tuesday, focused on Lebanon's participation in the peace talks
or other issues?
MR. BOUCHER: The meeting, as I understand it, focused
on the situation inside Lebanon -- our support for the
continuation of the process begun under the Taif accords.
Q We were told in Moscow that the Syrian-Lebanese
boycott of the Moscow Conference did not spill over, did not
carry over, to the bilaterals that the U.S. expected they would
be attending. Even though they haven't announced yet, does the
U.S. expect Syria to -- what? -- and Lebanon, which tends to do
what Syria does -- does the U.S. expect those two countries to
be in Washington? Or have you heard something that is negative
along those lines?
MR. BOUCHER: Barry, we're still at least a week and a
half to ten days away from it. We are in touch with the
parties. We hope that they all will attend. We encourage them
to attend. What their specific plans are is for them to
announce.
Q Richard, can you please elaborate further on the
meeting with Mr. Jaja and Ambassador Djerejian?
MR. BOUCHER: I'll do that after the briefing. I don't
have the piece of paper with me.
Q Would you please, while you are making contacts
with the parties, ask the Israelis if you can, or inquire about
a statement attributed early this week to Mr. Netanyahu who says
that Israel will be offering cantonization of the West Bank for
cantons of heavily populated Palestinian territory instead of
self-government? That's what the Israelis want to propose to
the Palestinians.
MR. BOUCHER: We'll take your suggestion on-board. If
you really want to know what the Israeli Government thinks or
you want an explanation of Mr. Netanyahu's remarks, I'd suggest
you question him.
Q Richard, is something there you can take down from
the shelf on Iran's nuclear program? Does the U.S. -- I know
it's a little bit off the wall, but it's come up -- is there an
assessment by the State Department or the U.S. Government as to
whether Iran is pursuing a nuclear weapons program?
MR. BOUCHER: I don't have anything on the shelf on the
subject, Barry. As you know, we've said that repeated Iranian
statements in recent months call into question their commitment
to the Non-Proliferation Treaty. There was an IAEA inspection
team that was recently there, and we welcomed that at the time.
I don't have anything really further I can say at this point.
Q You just referred to the Taif Agreement. Do you
have any progress report on how that is being implemented?
Could you get one? My question goes to this: The agreement set
out the demilitarization or disarming of various armed groups in
Lebanon. Palestinian and Christian militias have been disarmed,
but the Hizbollah has not been disarmed. It should have been by
now.
I'm interested in the State Department's view on how
the Taif Agreement is being implemented in view of the fact that
Hizbollah has not been disarmed.
MR. BOUCHER: Alan, I don't think I'm in a position to
do the analysis of that. I think you see the reports that are
out there, and you can do your own analysis against the
agreement. I'd say that we have seen the process underway. We
have welcomed the progress it has made, and we encourage
everybody to continue the process.
Q Richard, Rolf Ekeus came down yesterday to talk
with Brent Scowcroft, apparently about some stepping up and the
effort to get ballistic missiles out of Iraq. Is there anything
that you can share with us on that?
MR. BOUCHER: He was over here as well. I understand
he met with Mr. Kanter yesterday and other senior State
Department people. As you know, the President said on January
31 to the Security Council that we must continue to focus on
Iraq's capability to build or maintain weapons of mass
destruction.
We certainly support continued intrusive inspections by
the U.N. and the IAEA in Iraq to determine the full extent of
the Iraqi program for weapons of mass destruction. We also
strongly support both the U.N. Special Commission and the IAEA
moving promptly to gain the destruction of a large number of
Iraqi weapons-related facilities and equipment. That is
something that's specified in the U.N. Security Council
resolutions.
We expect Iraq to cooperate fully with ongoing
inspections and U.N. destruction demands. The U.N. Special
Commission Chairman Ekeus met yesterday with General Scowcroft
and senior State Department officials. We've reiterated to him
our support for the Special Commission's work.
Q Is that basically what Mr. Kanter read to the
Iraqi diplomat, or can you give us some report on the talks?
MR. BOUCHER: Excuse me?
Q I'm sorry. Are you getting any place?
MR. BOUCHER: What Iraqi diplomat? This is Rolf
Ekeus--
Q Oh, I'm sorry.
MR. BOUCHER: -- the Swede who's in charge of the U.N.
Special Commission --
Q I misunderstood.
MR. BOUCHER: -- whose efforts we fully support. I
didn't say we fully supported the efforts of an Iraqi diplomat.
Q I'm sorry. I misunderstood.
Q Richard, will the U.N. Special Commission shortly
be entering into a stepped-up destruction phase on Iraqi
missiles and other weapons facilities?
MR. BOUCHER: Mark, the exact timing of specific
inspections is something that the Special Commission and the
IAEA are going to have to set. There have been something like
30 inspections so far. I think the tenth nuclear team just left
the other day, and I just said that we strongly support their
moving promptly to gain the destruction. That's something
that's specified in the U.N. resolutions, and we support that
moving along briskly.
Q But you don't know the timetable.
MR. BOUCHER: I don't have the timetable formula.
That's something they'd have to specify.
Q Richard, you promised two hours ago that we would
go back to Haiti shortly.
MR. BOUCHER: Sorry, George. You didn't have your hand
up again.
Q You said before that there is no evidence that
returnees are being singled out for persecution. I think the
previous formulation as of two or three days ago was that you
had no evidence that any returnees had been persecuted, and this
is a slight change which leaves open the possibility that some
may have been persecuted.
MR. BOUCHER: George, I'm sorry if we changed the words
on you today. We don't have any evidence that any returnees
have been persecuted for having gone off and come back. But we
will continue to look into any allegations or reports that we
get on that subject, obviously.
Q Richard, not to belabor this point, but groups
like -- human rights groups like Amnesty International and some
others described even today again that Haiti is a killing field
essentially; that they are getting reports of people being
tortured and killed.
What explains this dramatic difference between what
they're hearing, and what your people apparently are not?
MR. BOUCHER: I don't think there is that much of a
difference, and I think if you look at our Human Rights Report,
you'll see how we report on the very deplorable conditions that
do exist in Haiti, and it's for that reason that we interview
people to examine, based on our law, whether those individuals
would face this kind of violence if they were sent back to
Haiti.
People that we think have a plausible claim to this
well-founded fear of persecution are in fact the people who are
allowed to pursue that claim, and who are not sent back. People
that don't have a plausible claim that they might face that kind
of violence or be singled out or have that well-founded fear,
those are the people that are sent back.
And to date in our research and our efforts to keep in
contact with these people, and our efforts to check out reports
that we get, we have not found any documented cases where the
people that were sent back in fact did suffer persecution as a
result.
[Former Yugoslavia: Ceasefire/US Conditions for Recognition]
Q Richard, on Yugoslavia, do you have an updated
assessment of the Yugoslavian civil war, for one; two, whether
any policy changes are to be expected vis-a-vis recognition of
Slovenia and Croatia in the near future; and, thirdly, whether
the United States is prepared to contribute peacekeepers to a
U.N. force and, if not, perhaps provide logistical support like
air transport, things like that?
MR. BOUCHER: O.K. At this point, Frank, I'm running
out of fingers. But number one was the situation on the ground
in Yugoslavia. As we've, I think, noted before, the ceasefire
is generally holding. There have been and has been an upsurge
in some of these incidents of violence. We're concerned about
that, but -- well, we're very concerned about that. But at the
same time I do have to say that in general the situation is
holding.
On the question of recognition, the Secretary addressed
that in his testimony last week. He made very clearly the
points that the recognition policy is under review; the
questions of recognition remain under review, and we'll continue
to look at them; and that the key factor in our judgment was
whether what we do or don't do contributes to the peace process
there. So I don't really have any change in that. That remains
the situation.
As far as the U.S. contribution to the peacekeeping
operation, I think I'd first have to point out the Secretary
General has not yet presented his final estimate of the forces
necessary and the cost of such a force and things like that. We
don't anticipate that any U.S. ground forces would take part in
the actual peacekeeping operations, but we will be offering
other assistance such as logistical and communications support.
Q Richard, can you tell us if there's been any
dialogue between the United States and U.N. officials on the
possibility that U.S. forces might be part of a peacekeeping
force? Has any request been made, and what was the American
response?
MR. BOUCHER: We have stayed in close touch with the
U.N. envoy and the Secretary General on the issue of Yugoslavia.
I'm not aware of any request. As I said, we don't anticipate
that the U.S. troops -- U.S. ground troops would actually take
part in a peacekeeping operation, but we're going to offer this
logistical and communications support.
Q Can you elaborate on that a little bit? I mean, I
can think of all sorts of possibilities --
MR. BOUCHER: I can't at this point, because, as they
work out the final details of the operation, we'll have to see
what the details are of our help.
Q I didn't mean so much on the details. I meant on
the thinking as to where peacekeepers should come from. Is it
the feeling that the European situation and the Europeans should
take the lead? I mean, you know, why would the U.S. not be part
of it? What's the thinking behind it?
MR. BOUCHER: I don't think I can really do that from
here, Barry, because the Secretary General has to work out those
questions of composition, size, cost, and things like that, and
it's really for him to determine.
Q Back on the Salman Rushdie matter, are you
considering any new initiatives in his behalf, or are you just
going to stick with the sanctions?
MR. BOUCHER: I'm not exactly sure what you're
proposing.
Q I'm not --
MR. BOUCHER: We're sticking with the sanctions. We're
sticking with our condemnation of Iranian support for state
terrorism, and we're sticking with our -- urgings along with
those of other governments that the death threat be lifted. As
you know, Iran has not yet done that.
Q Has the Secretary revealed to people, wherever
they are now, his future plans? I mean, will he celebrate
President's Day in Washington or mark another holiday overseas?
Do you have any idea what lies ahead? When will we see him
again, on television or wherever?
MR. BOUCHER: Barry, the party today is in
Yekaterinberg and going to Chelyabinsk. They may -- probably
have finished that already. Over the weekend they'll be in
Tashkent and Samarkand. They get to Moscow on Monday and return
here on Tuesday. At least that was the way --
Q (Inaudible) Moscow will be wrapped -- arms
control will be done in one day basically.
MR. BOUCHER: I don't want to prejudice exactly the
Secretary's schedule. I have to say that was the latest
schedule I had a couple of days ago. I understand that they're
keeping to it, but I don't have any precise revisions or changes
that might be made on the road.
Q Thank you.
Q Monday you --
Q Thank you!
Q Monday you expressed your concern about abusing
Israeli -- or Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.
Yesterday, Israel said that they will not conduct an
investigation into the killing or the death of Mustafa al-Akawi,
and they consider the file is closed. What do you comment on
such answer to your concerns?
MR. BOUCHER: I've said before that we were concerned
about the reports coming out of Israel about the mistreatment of
Al-Akawi while in Israeli custody. We have raised this
particular case with Israeli authorities.
As you note, the press reports indicate the
investigation has been completed, and the results are being
presented to the Attorney General. We don't yet at this point
have the details.
Q But you'll have future comment on that?
MR. BOUCHER: Perhaps.
Q Thank you.
(The briefing concluded at 12:53 p.m.)