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U.S. Department of State 93/02/20 Remarks with ForMin of Syria, Damascus Office of the Spokesman Joint remarks by Secretary of State Warren Christopher and Foreign Minister Shara Damascus, Syria February 20, 1993 Secretary Christopher: I'm very pleased to be here in this great and venerable city of Damascus. I look very much forward to meeting with President Assad and Foreign Minister Shara to discuss the Middle East peace process and a number of bilateral and regional issues. I've come here to convey, personally, President Clinton's strong commitment to working as a full partner in trying to reactivate the peace process. We're in the region to encourage the parties to return to negotiations and to ensure that the negotiations produce results. The United States remains determined to help the parties to achieve a just and lasting solution based upon UN Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338. We're quite prepared to do our part as sponsors of these bilateral and multilateral negotiations provided that the parties do their part. We look forward to working with the parties to sustain their strong commitment to meaningful negotiations so that the progress can be made in a very timely manner. In recent years, the United States and Syria have worked together to advance the peace process and regional security. We anticipate that this cooperation will continue, and we look forward to it. Syria's agreement to attend the Madrid peace conference was essential to launching it. We're very pleased that Syria joined with us and other nations in reversing Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait. Syria and Israel have already engaged substantially on core issues in the peace process, and we look forward to their continuing this progress. To repeat my ambitions for tomorrow, I look forward to our discussions with both President Asad and foreign Minister Shara. I thank the Foreign Minister and his wife for welcoming me and my wife, Marie, and our delegation to Syria. Foreign Minister Shara: Just a few words to welcome Secretary Christopher and Mrs. Christopher in Damascus. I hope that his visit will be a success. We and the United States and the other parties concerned hope to be able to achieve a just and comprehensive peace in the region and to remove the obstacles standing in the way. We hope that the discussion tomorrow between Secretary Christopher and His Excellency President Assad [will] prove to be positive and constructive and to help in implementing all UN Security Council resolutions. That is, the deportees issue as an obstacle so far. We hope that all the deportees will be able to go back home, and that the parties concerned [will] be able to resume the bilateral peace talks as soon as possible. (###)