US Department of State Daily Briefing #70:
Thursday, 5/7/92
Tutwiler
Source: State Department Spokesman Margaret Tutwiler
Description: Washington, DC
Date: May, 7 19925/7/92
Category: Briefings
Region: MidEast/North Africa, Eurasia, East Asia, E/C Europe,
South Asia, South America
Country: Israel, USSR (former), Angola, Russia, India, Iran,
Argentina, Chile, Lebanon, Serbia-Montenegro, North Korea
Subject: Mideast Peace Process, Development/Relief Aid,
Human Rights, Refugees, Security Assistance and Sales,
Arms Control, Terrorism, CSCE, State Department,
Nuclear Nonproliferation
12:49 P. M.
(ON THE RECORD UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED)
MS. TUTWILER: I don't have any statements. I'll be
happy to try to answer your questions.
Q Margaret, Senator Boren is asking that Secretary
Baker support an international investigation of the murder or
assassination, whatever, of two former Savimbi associates. Do
you have -- does the Secretary have any response to that
request, please?
MS. TUTWILER: I'm not even aware, Barry -- this is the
first I've heard of this request -- if the Secretary himself is
aware of the request. I'll be happy to check with the
Secretary's office and also with our Congressional office. It's
the first I've ever heard of it.
Q Margaret, can you confirm that you've been now
informed by Israel of its intentions with regard to the
multilateral talks next week?
MS. TUTWILER: No, I can't confirm that, because we
haven't. And we checked again this morning at our Embassy,
we've checked here, and we do not have a formal Israeli
response.
As I've said every day here, we have had any number of
discussions since January at any number of different levels --
both here and in Israel -- concerning this subject. So we are
well aware of the Israeli view.
I would also note that I have seen myself this morning
Israeli officials in different news reports saying that they
have not -- the government has not reached a decision and has
not informed us. I can only tell you that we do not have an
official Israeli response.
Q Margaret, I have one more on the Middle East which
I don't expect you to have an answer to, but maybe I can pose
the question, and you can take it, and then we could raise it
again tomorrow.
Does the United States support United Nations General
Assembly Resolution 194 of December 1948 which talks about the
right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes or get
compensation? I don't expect you to have an answer --
MS. TUTWILER: Thank you.
Q -- but if you could take the --
MS. TUTWILER: Because I don't.
Q Margaret, here's another one that will blind-side
you. Mr. Armitage was on "Worldnet" this morning and some of us
who got up early to hear him heard him say that this one booster
rocket deal between Russia and India was not a cause for
punitive action; that one --
MS. TUTWILER: Who said this?
Q Mr. Armitage -- Richard Armitage. That one such
deal was not a cause, and you just a couple of days ago
suggested the opposite -- that if the deal went through, the
U.S. might apply sanctions, I suppose to both India and Russia.
Could you, number one -- again like Alan's question you
may not have an answer right here, but could you find out, is
the deal as a Russian official said the other day, definitely
on, and what is the policy? Are you about to try to punish
these two friendly governments for this deal, or has Mr.
Armitage got it right that it would take a pattern of such
behavior for the U.S. -- he called it unfortunate, but he didn't
say it was a basis for sanctions.
MS. TUTWILER: I was up early, but I did not see
Ambassador Armitage's remarks on Worldnet, so I'm going to
refrain from addressing that part of your question, because I
don't -- I'm not doubting it, but I don't know what he said.
Concerning what we have consistently said every day
here from the podium, that has not changed today, but I don't
have anything new to announce for you today on that subject.
Q Well, are you aware that the deal -- I mean, is it
so? Is the deal a fait accompli as the Russian official says?
MS. TUTWILER: We have seen reports, as we mentioned
the other day, that various Russian officials have said they are
going ahead with this, as have the Indians. What I've got to
refrain from doing -- if it's okay, for just today, sticking
with that; I don't have anything new for you on this today.
I'll refer you to three days this week -- Monday, Tuesday and
Wednesday -- I said very soon you should expect something; that,
yes, there would be penalties/sanctions if this indeed went
forward, and we haven't changed our policy overnight concerning
this subject.
Q Margaret, on that subject --
MS. TUTWILER: Yes.
Q Excuse me if this has been answered in the last
three days --
MS. TUTWILER: That's O.K.
Q -- but I don't think it has. Press reports from
India quote Indian officials as saying that the United States
offered to sell a very similar rocket to the Indian Government
but that the price was too high. Is this true and, if so, how
does the U.S. distinguish between what it wished to sell and
what the Russians may wish to sell?
MS. TUTWILER: It's not true. No United States firm
has made a formal bid or submitted an export license application
for such a sale to India. Many months ago the Indian Government
suggested informally that a U.S. aerospace company provide an
upper rocket stage to be mated to the lower stages of the Indian
space launch vehicle to launch Indian satellites. But the
United States firm concluded that the deal was undesirable to
pursue.
The United States Government has not licensed and will
not license exports of MTCR class rocket engines or other MTCR
category items to countries of proliferation concern. Under the
MTCR guidelines, there is a strong presumption that licenses to
export such items will be denied, and exports of specialized
production technology for such items will not be authorized.
Q Do you know why they decided --
MS. TUTWILER: So there was a discussion, Don, with an
American company, and the American company decided not to pursue
it.
Q When you use the word "undesirable," did they
decide it's undesirable because it wasn't profitable enough for
them, or do you think they didn't want to run afoul of the
regime?
MS. TUTWILER: I don't know. Since it's private sector
and they made this decision, that was a decision that they came
to is my understanding this morning on their own -- the American
company.
Q Yes. You know, the central thing would be not
their profits and losses, but whether the U.S. helped persuade
them for good non-proliferation reasons not to go ahead, and
they took your advice.
MS. TUTWILER: That was not my brief understanding this
morning by one of the experts, but I did not delve into this
part of the story in great detail. But my impressions left from
the gentleman was this was a -- my impressions -- unilateral
decision based on private sector reasons by this American
company. I'll re-check if my perceptions are right or wrong and
ask in more depth.
Q Also on that question, another press report from
New Delhi suggests that the Indian Government -- possibly the
Russian Government -- would be willing to submit this case to
some kind of a panel in which the United States had a hand to
determine whether something can be worked out and what the facts
are. Is the U.S. interested in having it submitted to a panel
of some kind?
MS. TUTWILER: Not that I'm aware of.
Q Margaret, does the United States officially have
any comment on the reports that the United States believes that
Iran had a hand in the bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos
Aires?
MS. TUTWILER: Wait just one second. Just to refresh
your memory, when this tragedy originally happened, as you all
will recall, there was one, as I remember, radio report out of
Beirut that said that said that Hizballah or Islamic Jihad was
claiming responsibility for this. On that first day we said
we'd seen the report, but we could not substantiate it.
On the second day after the tragedy, we came out and
said that that would be a likely suspect. Islamic Jihad, which
we all know is sponsored by Iran, was an early suspect in this
bombing, and the group did issue a claim of responsibility for
the attack.
When its claim was questioned, it released a videotape
of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires taken prior to the
bombing. Such photographic evidence is often used by Islamic
Jihad to, in their words, "authenticate its claims."
Information gathered to date supports this claim.
As the bombing is still under investigation, I really
do not have any more details or specifics that I'm going to be
able to provide you. But I would, in general, say that at the
time of the attack, I said that it was a likely suspect, and our
view about that has not changed since then. And I would refer
you to our 1991 terrorism report we issued two weeks ago where
we have an explanation of the connection between Islamic Jihad
and the Iranian Government.
Q Beyond the photographic evidence, is there any
other evidence that you can tell us about?
MS. TUTWILER: Not that I can go into. No.
Q Margaret, in that same report --
MS. TUTWILER: Which report?
Q The report that my colleague was referring to --
MS. TUTWILER: The author of which may be sitting in
this room, that had us all scrambling for the last 15 minutes.
[Laughter]
Q I'm very sorry.
MS. TUTWILER: No problem.
Q An official said that Iran had resupplied
Hizballah in south Lebanon by shipping arms, including Katyusha
rockets, through Damascus from where they were trucked to south
Lebanon. Do you have anything on that?
MS. TUTWILER: No, I don't.
Q You were asked about the further evidence, whether
you could provide it. You said you couldn't.
MS. TUTWILER: I don't think so.
Q All right.
MS. TUTWILER: At this time.
Q All right. But a two-part question, as I look at
it. Does the U.S. have further evidence?
MS. TUTWILER: I would rather, on that, check with the
-- I'm not conducting this investigation. As you know, the
United States is assisting in this with the Argentinian
Government. I'd rather take that question for you if we have
specific evidence.
Q Margaret, can I go back to --
MS. TUTWILER: Because -- excuse me -- I'm positive,
Barry, that it's in a classified manner.
Q Could I go back to the multilateral talks?
MS. TUTWILER: Multilateral?
Q Yes. When Mr. Levy met with Mr. Baker here, there
was no agreement, according to Israeli reports, about the
participation of the diaspora Palestinians, and you mentioned
that you support this, and the Russians are supportive of that.
Wasn't this enough to give you the idea that Israel was
threatening to boycott this before, or are you waiting for a
letter that they will boycott the talks if the diaspora
Palestinians will come to these talks?
MS. TUTWILER: Just as I've said almost every day here,
it comes as no surprise to us, the views of the Israeli
Government. Those are well known. They have said them
publicly. There have been discussions with our Government and
their government about this since January. But that addresses
one part of this.
As far as an official Israeli response concerning these
two meetings, the United States Government as of 1:00 o'clock
today -- we simply do not have one.
Q And about the bilateral talks, there are reports
today that July 20 will be the date for the bilateral talks in
Rome after the Israeli elections. Do you have any comment on
this date?
MS. TUTWILER: Number one, I haven't seen that report.
Number two, I've never heard that date mentioned. And, number
three, I'm not aware that there's any kind of agreement that's
been reached on the date. My understanding is that those
discussions are still going on.
Q Margaret, is there agreement on the formation on
the composition of the Palestinian delegation -- the delegations
to Brussels and Ottawa particularly, which the United States has
said could include diaspora Palestinians?
MS. TUTWILER: Agreement?
Q Agreement on the personnel. Do you -- have they
given you a list? Have you accepted it?
MS. TUTWILER: I don't know. Let me ask.
Q That may not be your function, because you're not
the host. So I wondered --
MS. TUTWILER: We're still co-sponsors.
Q In fact -- all right. But I have the same
question, when you say the Israelis haven't told you --
MS. TUTWILER: Officially.
Q I hear you. What the Israelis are saying is that
they notified the two host countries, and that as a courtesy
they were also about to tell the U.S. Government.
MS. TUTWILER: Right. I'd rather refrain from
addressing myself, because I would really be -- you'd put me in
an awkward position of addressing myself to the Israeli
Government or the Canadian or the Belgian, which I don't want to
do. I can only answer factually for the United States
Government. And it may be a fine nuance, but officially, which
is what started yesterday afternoon -- granted, by unnamed
Israeli officials -- that they had officially notified the
United States Government.
I got a number of calls from many of you, and I
checked. I have really checked, and we checked this thoroughly
this morning. We have no evidence of such. And, in fact, just
this morning there are again unnamed Israeli officials saying
that they have not. So, you know, that's all I can deal with.
Q All right. I hear you, but could we get a little
bit into the substance, because the United States, by virtue --
MS. TUTWILER: The substance of it?
Q Well, yes. Now, let's go back a little bit.
MS. TUTWILER: O.K.
Q You're the sponsor, but you're not the host, so
you can use either -- I mean, you can stand under Column A or
Column B, depending on how you feel about a particular issue in
this case. But Israel came forward with a proposal that's on
the record. They offered a compromise, or at least it's well
known, and the U.S. said something to the effect you were glad
to hear that they have some ideas or something.
And then you, the State Department, would not take a
position on that proposition and said it was up to the parties.
O.K.? Now, what we're hearing is that the parties -- meaning
the Arabs -- have rejected the proposal. To date, does the U.S.
have a position on whether Israel's compromise is acceptable to
the U.S.?
MS. TUTWILER: I know that we have a position. I'm not
positive that we've ever stated it publicly. So let me --
Q I know you haven't publicly.
MS. TUTWILER: I didn't think so. When you were saying
what our position had been, that was --
Q On whether it's O.K. or not O.K. No, no. You
have stated publicly -- at least State Department officials have
said they were, you know, happy to see that the Israelis had
come forward with something.
MS. TUTWILER: Right. But I don't believe we ever gave
an opinion of it.
Q What you haven't said publicly is whether -- right
-- whether it's an acceptable proposal or not.
MS. TUTWILER: Correct.
Q And I'm trying to figure out if you're in that
game, because you're not the host; you're the co-sponsors. I
don't know where you fit into this puzzle.
MS. TUTWILER: You don't?
Q On this one.
MS. TUTWILER: Right. Well, we are co-sponsors, as we
were for Madrid, as we have been for all the bilaterals, and as
we are going to be for the multilaterals. Yes, there are going
to be five different working groups that other nations have
agreed to host, and they'll be hosting those. But the
co-sponsors are still very involved.
In fact, the arms control working group meeting here,
which is a working group we're doing, will be on the United
States -- Ambassador Dennis Ross and Assistant Secretary Richard
Clarke will be co-chairing that working group.
Q Can you give us --
Q By the way, we're being asked who -- are you going
to ask the same thing or --
MS. TUTWILER: The participants? The participants
we're not going to do today.
Q No, we're being asked about the U.S. -- you know,
the various other groups -- we're being asked who the U.S. is
sending, if you can supply that at some point.
MS. TUTWILER: I'll get that for you. Let me tell you,
what I can tell you is that Dennis Ross and Dick Clarke will not
be doing a press briefing prior to May 11. There are, as you
know, going to be no special press arrangements, as there
weren't for the bilaterals, meaning credentialing, etc.
We're not yet, today, ready to make the list public of
all the participants. And, as Richard explained yesterday,
concerning the agenda, these first meetings will be seminar-type
meetings. We expect a general exchange of ideas and sharing of
experience at this initial session. We do not expect this
working group to be a formal negotiation, nor will parties table
formal position papers at this session.
The purpose of this initial working group session will
be to organize the working group on arms control. Such topics
as agenda, follow-on meetings, etc., will be discussed by the
participants. Tomorrow, I will be able, I hope, to have
additional organizational details for you.
Q Margaret, can I go back to the same issue, about
multilaterals? If Israel did not tell you officially -- and now
we are not dealing with a hypothetical situation -- Israel,
officially, from the reports, said that they will not
participate. So what's the strategy of you, as the United
States, which is a co-sponsor -- and at times you were a host of
these meetings -- what will you be doing in dealing with this
situation? Will the peace process completely collapse?
MS. TUTWILER: Well, heavens no.
Q Excuse me.
MS. TUTWILER: I said, "well, heavens no." As you will
recall, in Moscow, the Palestinians did not attend. The peace
process did not collapse.
As you will recall, the Syrians and the Lebanese, as I
believe, did not attend. The peace process did not collapse.
So, no, that is not our view whatsoever.
Q Margaret, another subject?
MS. TUTWILER: Yes.
Q As I'm sure you're aware, the confirmation from
the podium yesterday that the United States was discussing the
sale of aircraft to Argentina has caused some considerable
concern in the Falkland Islands. The islanders want to remind
people that they were, in fact, attacked by Sky Hawk planes in
1982. Can you confirm that British officials have asked the
United States not to make this sale because of the threat to the
Falkland Islanders?
MS. TUTWILER: No, I can't, because, to be honest with
you, it's a subject that I have not had an opportunity to look
into at all. Richard [Boucher], in depth, yesterday, briefed on
this. No, I don't have anything to add to what he said
yesterday.
Q Can you find out? Could you ask whether or not
the U.K. has asked?
MS. TUTWILER: Yes. Be happy to.
Q After the briefing, late -- in fact, most of us
didn't see it until this morning -- you put out the statement --
MS. TUTWILER: Well, you were up early.
Q Yeah, right. You know, those things tend to come
out around 7:00, 8:00, 9:00 at night. But one of the latest of
those pieces of paper, there was a tribute -- I can't call it
anything else -- but a tribute to Argentina's policies, but you
never quite dropped the other shoe and said that because of
changed behavior, it's like selling arms to Belgium or to
Britain.
MS. TUTWILER: Let me just see if we have anything
additional for you before 7:00 or 8:00 p.m. tonight, or first
thing in the morning, and see if we can try to help out some
more.
Q Margaret, on another subject, please. Do you have
any reaction to former President Gorbachev's speech yesterday?
Specifically, some of the suggestions that he made, like
expanding the U.N. Security Council or ceasing sales of
conventional weapons in particularly dangerous areas of the
world?
MS. TUTWILER: No, we don't. The question of the U.N.
has been addressed before to the President and the Secretary of
State, so they've both addressed this.
I don't have anything specific today on any aspect or
parts of his speech.
Q More generally, does the U.S. have a view on
Gorbachev's visit here? Specifically, his attempt to raise
funds from American philanthropic organizations?
MS. TUTWILER: I haven't heard the United States
Government express a view on this. I think that President Bush
and Secretary of State Baker are very much looking forward to
seeing him. I believe he's here either later -- this week or is
it next week? -- next week.
The President, I believe, has a meeting with him at the
White House and I believe followed by a dinner. You'd have to
check at the White House. But we are very, as a government,
pleased that he is in our country and are looking forward to
seeing him here in Washington.
Q There is a report from Lebanon that the PKK, the
Kurdish group that's based in Bekaa, is disbanding and
surrendering its arms -- or giving its arms to a Palestinian
group, according to an agreement with the Syrians to disband.
Do you have any confirmation of that, or any --
MS. TUTWILER: No, I don't. Let us look into it.
Q Margaret, how is the campaign to have the Belgrade
government expelled from the CSCE coming?
MS. TUTWILER: The CSCE senior officials are still
meeting today, and they had not concluded their meeting. So as
of this briefing, I didn't have a conclusion yet.
Q Margaret, there are so many agreements signed with
Ukraine everyday, it's hard to keep track. Could we have
today's. You haven't given it to us.
MS. TUTWILER: They were supposed to be handed out --
Q I can't separate today from yesterday. Do we have
today's?
MS. TUTWILER: There were three yesterday at the White
House. They had "White House" on the top.
Q Yeah, I was there for those.
MS. TUTWILER: And there are three here for the State
Department today that say "State Department." They were
supposed to be ready and available the moment the Secretary and
the President [Kravchuk] cleared the room. So they're here --
Q Those agreements tend to look alike.
Q Back on the question of the CSCE. Margaret,
yesterday, when Ambassador Kornblum spoke, he said that the time
had now come for sanctions. He then went on to mention
suspension of Serbia from the CSCE.
MS. TUTWILER: Correct.
Q Was that what he meant by "sanctions," or is there
something broader or more extensive in the works?
MS. TUTWILER: I'm not aware of anything broader or
more extensive in the works. That is our United States view at
this emergency meeting of CSCE.
As you know, CSCE operates by consensus, and I can't
predict for you what the other countries are going to decide
today on what their instructions will be from their government.
But that's the only, if you want to call it "sanctions,"
sanctions that I am aware of. As you know, they already are in
effect -- economic sanctions that have been in effect for a long
time.
Q He used the specific word "sanctions."
MS. TUTWILER: I don't know why he chose to use that
word. I'm not personally aware of other potential steps that
follow right behind this particular one.
Q He did mention drastic actions if there wasn't an
improvement in the Serbian position. Presumably, there are
other thoughts about it.
MS. TUTWILER: We think it's a seriously grave
situation that -- in our limited ability, as I have explained
before, economic sanctions -- we only had, before this tragedy
began, about $5 million worth of aid to Yugoslavia. So we
readily acknowledged, in the economic area, we didn't have a
whole lot of leverage.
We have thought consistently, without trying to speak
for Serbia-Montenegro, that questions such as successor state to
the former Yugoslavia, such as legitimacy, are important to some
governments. Maybe this government doesn't care. Maybe they do
care.
At different, various times, we've had reasons to
believe that, indeed, they do care.
Q Margaret, can you bring us up to date now that
Ukraine and the United States have reached agreement on a
protocol for Ukraine to adhere to the START treaty? What is
happening and what is your outlook to get this adopted by the
other states so that the START treaty can go ahead toward
ratification?
MS. TUTWILER: Just this morning, the Secretary has had
another phone call -- conversation with the Foreign Minister of
Russia. To my knowledge, he does not have any other ones
scheduled for today. He will continue to work this issue with
the other three, as he has been. He will continue, right now,
working that by telephone and by messages through cables to
capitals.
Q You say right now. As you know, Mr. Bush said
yesterday he expected Secretary Baker would go "soon," I think
was the word he said, out there. Do you anticipate that before
Nazarbayev comes here?
MS. TUTWILER: There's no way for me to predict that
since the Secretary was, just this morning, in another
conversation with the Russians.
I have said here almost every day from this podium that
one of the options that has been discussed, is the Secretary
meeting with these gentlemen at some place. But there has never
been a time set. There has never been an agreement that, yes,
we would, indeed, do this. So there's really nothing to
announce.
The President, obviously, is very well aware of this
option, and that's what he meant yesterday, where we are
prepared to do this. But prepared to do it, to be honest with
you, once you have more of the substance put to bed.
Q He didn't say "go there," by the way. Today, for
instance, Armitage pointed out that all 15 Republics will be
sending people to Lisbon for the Aid Conference.
MS. TUTWILER: That's correct.
Q Is that another possible options --
MS. TUTWILER: It's one of the options.
Q -- for Mr. Baker to get into this subject?
MS. TUTWILER: Sure.
Q Could you -- recently, you or Richard (Boucher),
or maybe both, when asked about the North Korean nuclear
program, have said that you wanted to see what the report was to
the International Atomic Energy Agency. This has now been --
they've issued press releases on it, and I presume -- in fact,
I'm pretty sure by now the U.S. Government has taken a fairly
good look at what they submitted. Do you now have some response
as to what the U.S. thinks of what the North Koreans have
presented?
MS. TUTWILER: I don't have a U.S. response. I have
U.S. views of the IAEA press release of the other day. As you
know, the rules are that the IAEA issues to everyone through a
press release. They do not deal directly with governments. So
our experts, I'm sure, will be continuing to review this. But I
don't have anything other than our initial response to that
press release. I believe it was two days ago.
Q Did you ever make this response?
MS. TUTWILER: I thought we've done all this. We
didn't?
Q I think you said you didn't have enough
information.
MS. TUTWILER: As you know, they have submitted their
initial inventory and design information, although the details
of the information provided, beyond that contained in the IAEA
press release, are held in confidence by the agency. IAEA's
press release indicated it had received an extensive initial
report which we, of course, welcome. The promptness of the
report is also encouraging.
Under the terms of its safeguards agreement, the DPRK
is required to provide to the IAEA by May 30 a complete
inventory of all nuclear material and all of its nuclear
activities along with a list of the facilities containing
nuclear material.
The DPRK is also required to provide design information
on all existing facilities so that arrangements for safeguarding
the facilities can be finalized by July 9. Design information
on new facilities is required as early as possible before the
introduction of nuclear material.
Does that help you?
Q Do you see anything encouraging in a pattern of
this and the agreement signed between North and South Korea? Is
there some changing pattern of behavior that you see in the case
of North Korea?
MS. TUTWILER: I don't think, Jim, that I'm in a
position today to take a guess at that for you. We obviously
have all seen changes over the last 18 months in various
patterns of behavior. But I'd rather, if you don't mind, defer
and let someone who is an expert in this area give you a more
analytical analysis of their interpretation of what's going on.
Q On that point, the U.S. Government -- certainly,
Mr. Gates and I believe Secretary Baker -- have made a good deal
of the belief that the North Koreans are building a reprocessing
plant, making it possible for them to produce plutonium.
One of the things mentioned in the press release and in
the North Korean submissions is, indeed, a plant or a
laboratory, as they call it, to separate out uranium into
plutonium. You probably can't do it now, but could someone
either verbally or on paper give us some idea of what the U.S.
Government thinks of the North Korean report that they, indeed,
do have a facility which, at least on an experimental basis, is
doing this and whether inspection of that facility would
alleviate the U.S. concern about it?
MS. TUTWILER: What I'd rather do -- I have something
here on a reprocessing plant, but I'd rather get you a fuller
answer that more directly answers what you're asking, if that's
okay.
Q Margaret, does the State Department have any
reaction to the amended rules of firing or engagement by Israeli
forces and the Palestinians (inaudible)?
MS. TUTWILER: We don't have anything specific for you.
We have inquired previously concerning the rules of engagement.
It is something that we have raised and that we have discussed
with the Israeli Government. But, no, I don't have a specific
reaction for you. As you know, we condemn the violence, any
violence that is there -- not this specifically -- and that we
have looked into it, is basically where we are. I don't have
anything specific for you.
Q Can you possibly take the question --
MS. TUTWILER: Can I what?
Q Can you take possibly the question and expand on
it? One officer insists that there will be killing or firing to
kill before any questions will be asked.
MS. TUTWILER: I know the question and --
Q There is mention of the story in the New York
Times today.
MS. TUTWILER: I did ask this morning. To be honest
with you, I do not have any more for you. I'm positive I won't
this afternoon. It's something that, as I said, we have asked
and inquired about. It is something that we have raised, and
there's really nothing else that I'm going to have for you.
Q Margaret, one question on Lebanon: Do you have
anything on the situation in Lebanon after the resignation of
the government and fear of a power vacuum in the country?
MS. TUTWILER: My understanding is that President
Harawi has not yet accepted the Prime Minister's resignation.
Our reports from Beirut indicate that public demonstrations are
decreasing.
Q Thank you.
(Press briefing concluded at 1:20 p.m.)