U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
95/06/02 Christopher: Charting Transatlantic Agenda
Office of the Coordinator for Business Affairs


                         U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE 
                         Office of the Spokesman 
 
                             (Madrid, Spain) 
 
___________________________________________________________________ 
Text As Prepared For Delivery                 For Immediate Release 
 
 
 
      "CHARTING A TRANSATLANTIC AGENDA FOR THE 21st CENTURY" 
 
          ADDRESS BY SECRETARY OF STATE WARREN CHRISTOPHER 
 
                          Casa de America 
                           Madrid, Spain 
 
                            June 2, 1995 
 
     Thank you, Director Remiro, for that kind introduction.  Since its 
founding several years ago, CERI has already established itself as a 
leader in foreign policy research.  I also want to thank Ambassador 
Garrigues and the Casa de America for co-hosting this event.  I feel at 
home here -- not only because of the name and purpose of this respected 
institution, but because the Ambassador served as Spain's Consul General 
in my home city of Los Angeles. 
 
     There is no more appropriate place to discuss the transatlantic 
partnership than Spain -- a true Atlantic nation.  As a member of both 
NATO and the European Union, you have placed your future in the vibrant 
mainstream of Europe and the transatlantic community of democracies.  
The spirit of renewal so evident here in Madrid is a tribute to King 
Juan Carlos, to Spain's democratic leadership, and to the determination 
of the Spanish people. 
 
     For half a century, the transatlantic partnership between the 
United States and Europe has been the leading force for peace and 
prosperity, not only in our countries, but around the globe.  Together, 
the Old World and the New World have created a better world. 
 
     Together we helped transform former adversaries into allies, and 
dictatorships into democracies.  We built the institutions that ensured 
our security and economic strength -- most important, NATO and the EU.  
We created the great institutions of global cooperation -- the UN, the 
IMF and the World Bank, the OECD, the GATT and now the WTO.  By standing 
steadfast through the Cold War, we have brought a democratic, undivided 
Europe within reach. 
 
     These are truly epic achievements.  But at the threshold of the new 
century, there is another new world to shape -- with challenges no less 
critical than those faced by our counterparts half a century ago.  
Terrorism, international crime, aggressive nationalism, and the 
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction threaten our security.  
Global problems like environmental degradation, unsustainable population 
growth, and mass movements of refugees undermine emerging democracies 
and the prosperity of all nations.  The new global economy offers great 
prospects for growth, but also brings wrenching dislocation as our 
industries and workers seek to adapt. 
 
     Although the world remains a dangerous place, our opportunities are 
enormous.  Open societies and open markets are on the march.  We have 
the opportunity to reduce the threat of nuclear weapons, enhance our 
prosperity, and, for the first time in history, build an integrated, 
undivided, peaceful Europe. 
 
     Nevertheless, there are those who question whether Europe and the 
United States have the will to maintain our partnership to meet these 
new dangers and seize these opportunities.  In the absence of a single 
unifying threat, and at a time of understandable focus on domestic 
concerns, some argue that the ties that bind us are fraying, and that 
America and Europe will inevitably drift apart. 
 
     I reject that view.  From World War II to our strong support for 
German unification, the United States and Europe have shared a common 
destiny.  But we must not take this relationship for granted.  It cannot 
be sustained by nostalgia.  Every generation must renew the partnership 
by adapting it to meet the challenges of its time.  It is our 
responsibility to build the partnership that will ensure that, by 
working together, our next fifty years will be as great as the last.  To 
achieve this goal, we must widen our horizons and lift our aspirations. 
 
     I believe this goal is shared on both sides of the Atlantic.  In 
recent months, a number of European leaders have set forth their ideas 
on this very theme.  President Clinton and Prime Minister Major 
discussed this issue when they met earlier this spring.   
 
     I have come to Madrid, on behalf of the President, to say that the 
United States welcomes this transatlantic dialogue.  It is timely.  It 
is constructive.  And it should be intensified -- to reaffirm our common 
purpose, to advance a common vision, and to forge a common transatlantic 
agenda for the 21st century.  Today I want to suggest goals for our 
common agenda and how we might strengthen our ability to achieve them 
together. 
 
A Comprehensive Strategy for European Security 
 
     In this year in which we commemorate the 50th anniversary of V-E 
Day, we cannot forget that security comes first.  It is the bedrock of 
our partnership and the guarantor of our freedom.  That is why President 
Clinton is pursuing a comprehensive strategy for European security, 
based on America's continuing commitment to remain engaged on the 
continent. 
 
     That strategy has five key elements: adapting and enlarging NATO; 
strengthening the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe; 
supporting Europe's integration and EU enlargement; enhancing a European 
security and defense identity complementary to NATO; and engaging Russia 
in Europe's security structures. 
 
     NATO remains the central security pillar for Europe, and the core 
institution for linking the security of North America to Europe.  In the 
last five years, NATO has undertaken sweeping changes to match the sweep 
of Europe's transformation. 
 
     I have just come from the NATO ministerial meeting in the 
Netherlands, where we took important steps to advance these goals.  
Russia's decision at that meeting to cross the threshold into active 
engagement with NATO puts into place an important element of our 
comprehensive strategy.  We also reviewed the great progress made in 
just a year and a half by the Partnership for Peace -- NATO's mechanism 
to deepen cooperation with Europe's new democracies.  And we reaffirmed 
that the Alliance remains on a steady course toward enlargement. 
 
     These efforts are strengthening the security pillar of the 
transatlantic relationship to meet the challenges of the post-Cold War 
world.  But for our partnership to thrive, it must be comprehensive.  
That means taking specific steps in the economic and political arenas 
that will complement and reinforce our security relationship. 
 
The Economic Dimension 
 
     Deepening our economic relationship is central to this agenda; it 
undergirds not only our prosperity but also our security.  Although our 
ties have expanded with the Asia-Pacific region and Latin America, it is 
important to recall that the United States and Europe enjoy the largest 
combined external trade and investment relationship in the world today. 
 
     American exports to EU countries and European investment in the 
United States support over 7 million American workers.  All told, Europe 
accounts for almost half the foreign revenues of American firms.  Our 
investment in Europe alone roughly equals that in the rest of the world 
put together.  And since the Berlin Wall fell, the United States has 
become the top foreign investor in Central and Eastern Europe. 
 
     Together, the United States and Europe have led the world toward 
open markets and greater prosperity.  Our cooperation made possible 
every global trade agreement from the Kennedy Round to the Uruguay 
Round.  Through the G-7, we work to stimulate global growth.  And at the 
OECD, we are developing strategies to overcome structural unemployment 
and adapt to demographic change. 
 
     A hallmark of the Clinton presidency is its focus on global 
economic growth and expanding trade.  Indeed, President Clinton is 
advancing the most ambitious international economic agenda of any 
American President in half a century. 
 
     In addition to implementing the North American Free Trade 
Agreement, his efforts include leading the way to the Miami agreement to 
complete negotiations on a free trade area in the Americas by the year 
2005.  He also helped forge APEC's decision to achieve free and open 
trade and investment in the Asia-Pacific region by 2020.  None of these 
efforts will raise barriers to non-participants or exclude any economic 
sector.  And they will meet the requirements of the new World Trade 
Organization. 
 
     Our vision for the economic relationship between Europe and the 
United States must be no less ambitious.  The long term objective is the 
integration of the economies of North America and Europe, consistent 
with the principles of the WTO. 
 
     We should undertake a transatlantic economic initiative to multiply 
trade, investment, and jobs on both sides of the ocean.  It will make us 
an even more powerful engine of the global economy.  It will align our 
efforts to promote transatlantic integration with the forces of 
integration around the world.  And it will, like our other efforts, 
reinforce the open global trading system to the benefit of all nations. 
 
     Thoughtful observers from Europe, Canada, and the United States 
have proposed that we seek a Transatlantic Free Trade Agreement.  EU 
Commissioner Leon Brittan has launched a study of this proposal, and we 
too intend to give it the serious study it deserves, with its 
considerable potential to form an element of our overall strategy.  
There are, of course, important issues that need to be addressed.  For 
example, any free trade agreement must advance our overriding objective 
of global trade liberalization, be consistent with an effective WTO, and 
not disadvantage less developed countries. 
 
     Even as we undertake these studies, there are concrete measures 
that we can take in the near term to eliminate trade barriers 
progressively and deepen our integration, building on the momentum we 
achieved in the Uruguay round. 
 
     First, we can create a comprehensive investment regime.  The vast 
region from Honolulu to Helsinki is essentially a common investment area 
without common ground rules.  We should promptly negotiate a 
Multilateral Agreement on Investment as agreed by OED ministers last 
month. 
 
     Second, the United States and the EU need to develop more flexible 
rules to widen market access and spur innovation in information 
technology fields.  At stake is open competition in one of the most 
dynamic sectors of the global economy. 
 
     Third, the United States and the EU should work to eliminate 
barriers to trade that result from differences in product standards and 
testing systems -- and do so without compromising health or safety.  
Incompatible standards inhibit billions of dollars in new trade. 
 
     Fourth, we should open our skies.  The aviation agreements we will 
soon complete with nine European countries will make transatlantic 
travel easier and cheaper and will spur trade and investment. 
 
     The United States and the EU should also work together to complete 
the unfinished business of the Uruguay Round.  We must move forward to 
reach agreements to liberalize financial services within the next month-
- and telecommunications within the next year.  And we must work to 
overcome our differences in key sectors such as audio-visual products 
and services. 
 
     Trade means competition -- and vigorous competition is healthy for 
our relationship and for our economies as well.  But that competition 
must be fair.  American businesses operate under the appropriate 
constraints of legislation barring bribery of foreign officials.  Our 
nations made a commitment to address this problem multilaterally through 
the OECD last year.  We must make progress now. 
 
     The private sector is the driving force in our economic 
relationship, and its leaders should have a larger voice in shaping our 
agenda.  The Pacific Business Forum has helped propel the APEC process; 
the Transatlantic Business Dialogue launched by Commerce Secretary Ron 
Brown and Commissioners Bangemann and Brittan can do the same for 
transatlantic economic integration.  I know that this is a special 
interest of Foreign Minister Solana, with whom I discussed this issue 
last night. 
 
Global Political Cooperation 
 
     The United States and Europe are partners not only for prosperity, 
but in promoting stability, human dignity and opportunity around the 
world.  We share common interests and a common responsibility to lead.  
The political dimension of our proposed agenda will allow us to shape a 
world more conducive to our interests and consistent with our ideals. 
 
     First, we must intensify our efforts to halt the spread of weapons 
of mass destruction and their delivery systems.  The indefinite 
extension of the Non-Proliferation Treaty last month would not have 
happened without the leadership of the United States and our European 
partners.  The same leadership will be needed to achieve a Comprehensive 
Test Ban Treaty and a global ban on the production of fissile materials; 
to bring the Chemical Weapons Convention into force; and to strengthen 
the Biological Weapons Convention.  We must also bolster our common 
support for dismantling nuclear weapons and safeguarding nuclear 
materials in the former Soviet states. 
 
     Second, we must strengthen our cooperation against international 
crime, terrorism, and narcotics trafficking.  The United States and 
Europe have collaborated to combat money laundering through the 
Financial Action Task Force.  Regular meetings of top American and 
European anti-narcotics officials could strengthen our arsenal in the 
fight against drugs.  Those who traffic in weapons, narcotics, and human 
lives recognize no national borders.  We must make sure they have 
nowhere to hide. 
 
     Third, we must coordinate our humanitarian and development 
assistance more effectively.  Ninety percent of all global humanitarian 
assistance is provided by the United States, the European Commission, 
and the member states of the EU.  We need to build on our successful 
joint experience providing food relief to the Caucasus and technical 
assistance to Central Europe to develop a common strategy and to 
coordinate priorities, especially at a time when we all face financial 
constraints.  More generally, we need to broaden our cooperation  
to address a range of emerging global problems.  Our joint efforts in 
Cairo made the International Conference on Population and Development a 
success.  And our annual high-level environmental dialogue has helped 
pave the way for multilateral initiatives like the Berlin Climate 
Conference and major agreements such as the Montreal Protocol.  The 
joint program for cooperation between the United States and Japan -- 
"the Common Agenda" embracing issues ranging from population to health, 
the environment, science and technology-- provides a model of the 
concrete and high-impact opportunities for collaboration.  Human rights, 
too, is an area where working together we can enhance our impact. 
 
     Fourth, we must bolster our cooperation in regions where the United 
States and Europe share common interests and historic ties -- for 
example, the Middle East.  With EU support, the 1991 Madrid Conference 
launched the most promising opportunity for Arab-Israeli peace in two 
generations.  Now is the time to make that promise real by more 
effectively coordinating our economic assistance and working together to 
bring into being the Middle East Development Bank proposed by Egypt, 
Jordan, Israel and the PLO.  And at the Amman summit this October, 
together we can build on the start we made in Casablanca last year to 
generate the private investment that is so essential to lasting peace 
and prosperity in the region.  
 
     We should also expand our cooperation in the Mediterranean, an area 
of vital interest to the EU and the United States.  Spain has played a 
key role in advancing the EU's initiative on this important region, and 
we look forward to cooperating with you as the Barcelona Conference 
approaches.  We can also explore new ways to work together to sustain 
democracy in the Americas, an area where Spain is an especially valuable 
partner. 
 
Cooperation in Europe 
 
     Of course, nowhere is our regional cooperation more important than 
meeting the new challenges and opportunities facing Europe itself.  We 
in the United States know too well that our security is at risk when 
Europe's is imperiled.  And we have a common interest in assuring that 
the historic transformations now underway in Central Europe and the 
former Soviet Union are consolidated -- and that these countries become 
integrated into our transatlantic community. 
 
     We have worked closely together to coordinate our assistance 
through the G-24, the World Bank, and the IMF.  Our financial and 
technical assistance is helping countries like Russia, Ukraine and 
Poland to free prices, privatize industry, and ease the pain of 
dislocation.  Our economic assistance efforts are complemented by our 
support for durable democratic institutions throughout Central and 
Eastern Europe and the New Independent States.  Together, the European 
Union and the United States are a vital force for stability in the 
region. 
 
     We are also advancing European integration by extending our 
economic and security relations to the east.  Our steady program for 
enlarging NATO is reinforced by the steps being taken by the EU.  The 
prospects for stability in Europe's new democracies are unmistakably 
linked to their potential for prosperity -- and to our willingness to 
open our markets to their goods. 
 
     The EU does more than open its markets to the new economies of the 
region, however.  It provides incentive and shelter for the development 
of civil societies that are the surest guarantee for stability and 
security.  And it encourages the resolution of ancient enmities, today 
in Central Europe as after World War II between France and Germany. 
 
     As we look to the future, the United States and the EU should work 
together to develop new areas for common action aimed at assisting the 
new democracies of Central Europe.  For example: 
 
     --  We could help these states to cope better with the scourge of 
organized crime through efforts such as the International Law 
Enforcement Academy in Budapest; 
 
     --  We could promote the development of citizens groups and NGOs 
that can help build democratic societies from the ground up; and 
 
     --  We could refocus our technical assistance to ensure that the 
basic structures of a modern market economy are fully in place as the 
Central European countries make the transition from aid to trade. 
 
     The United States and the EU also have a special interest in 
supporting a democratic Turkey, integrated into the transatlantic 
community.  Turkey is at the strategic crossroads of the Balkans, the 
Middle East, and the former Soviet states.  We hope that the European 
Parliament will ratify the critically important customs union agreement 
between the EU and Turkey.  At the same time, we strongly encourage 
Turkey to move ahead with democratic reform and strengthen the 
protection of human rights.  We are also redoubling our efforts to 
achieve a political settlement in Cyprus prior to the start of EU 
accession talks. 
 
     The terrible conflict in Bosnia remains the single greatest threat 
to our vision of an integrated Europe at peace.  The United States and 
Europe are working together, although it is clear to all that we have 
not achieved the results we seek.  We have sought to contain the 
conflict, to alleviate suffering, and find a lasting peaceful settlement 
to the war.  On behalf of the American people, I want to thank our 
European allies, Spain among them, who have put their troops and 
personnel in harm's way to help the people of the former Yugoslavia and 
to uphold the principles of the international community.  We believe 
that a strengthened UNPROFOR is the best insurance against an even worse 
humanitarian disaster that would follow its withdrawal.  That is why 
this week, the Contact Group and others have undertaken efforts to 
reinforce UNPROFOR's ability to carry out its mission safely and 
effectively.  The United States will continue to coordinate closely, 
through NATO, the United Nations, and the Contact Group. 
 
     One of the few bright spots in the midst of the Bosnian tragedy has 
been the agreement of the Muslim and Croat communities to end their 
conflict and establish a bicommunal Federation.  The United States and 
the EU have joined forces to help support this enterprise through the 
Friends of the Federation -- helping to keep alive hopes for preserving 
a multi-ethnic society in Bosnia.  This is a model for the joint 
initiatives that we should develop for the future. 
 
The Way Ahead 
 
     To achieve the ambitious agenda I have set forth today, we must 
enhance our ability to work together more effectively.  This will 
require commitment on three fronts. 
 
     First, the United States and Europe must remain engaged in the 
world, on our own and as partners.  Our nations have the unique capacity 
to provide global leadership.  We must resist the siren songs of 
isolation and withdrawal. 
 
     Second, the United States looks to Europe to be a strong partner 
for the United States and a capable actor on the world stage.  Of 
course, the choice of mechanisms is for EU members themselves to decide.  
But the United States has a clear interest in Europe's continued 
integration and its enhanced ability in foreign and security policy.  
And the EU should move ahead with its historic process of enlargement.   
 
     Forty years ago today, six European foreign ministers gathered in a 
monastery in Messina to launch a process that ultimately led to the 
Treaty of Rome and the Establishment of the European Communities.  
Tomorrow, history will be made in Messina once again, as the EU under 
Spanish Chairmanship meets to plan the ambitious Intergovernmental 
Conference.  The objective, as President Truman's Under Secretary of 
State Robert Lovett said in 1948, "should continue to be the 
progressively closer integration, both economic and political, of 
presently free Europe, and eventually of as much of Europe as becomes 
free." 
 
     Finally, we must strengthen the mechanisms of our cooperation.  We 
must take advantage of immediate opportunities, such as the upcoming 
summit between President Clinton and Presidents Chirac and Santer, to 
define common goals and to advance them more systematically.  In the 
next six months, the United States looks forward to working closely with 
the Spanish presidency of the European Union to develop more fully our 
common agenda.  By the end of the year, we should have developed a 
broad-ranging transatlantic agenda for the new century -- an agenda for 
common economic and political action to expand democracy, prosperity, 
and stability.  Between now and the end of the year, we are prepared to 
engage seriously with representatives of the EU to forge this agenda. 
 
     Closer government ties are essential, but in a time of generational 
change on both sides of the Atlantic, we need to deepen our interaction 
at every level.  We should call on business leaders to tell us what must 
be done to tear down barriers to trade and investment in Central and 
Eastern Europe and between North America and Western Europe.  We should 
encourage our elected representatives to intensify their contacts, from 
parliamentary exchanges to sister cities.  We should broaden the 
academic and cultural exchanges to enrich our deepest ties of all -- 
those between our people. 
 
     We must act now.  For as President Kennedy told a European audience 
in 1963, "time and the world do not stand still.  Change is the law of 
life.  And those who look only to the past are certain to miss the 
future."  I know that the partnership that brought us to this hopeful 
point in history will continue to shape the future as boldly as it 
shaped the past. 
 
     Thank you very much.