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Skriven 2005-09-09 23:33:20 av Whitehouse Press (1:3634/12.0)
Ärende: Press Release (0509095) for Fri, 2005 Sep 9
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Press Briefing by Conference Call with Michael Kozak, NSC Senior Director
for Democracy, Human Rights and International Organizations and John Simon,
NSC Senior Director for Relief Stabilization and Development
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For Immediate Release
September 9, 2005

Press Briefing by Conference Call with Michael Kozak, NSC Senior Director
for Democracy, Human Rights and International Organizations and John Simon,
NSC Senior Director for Relief Stabilization and Development



2:25 P.M. EDT

MR. JONES: I'd like to welcome everyone this afternoon. We have with us Mr.
Michael Kozak; he's the NSC Senior Director for Democracy, Human Rights,
and International Organizations. He'll be giving you the rundown on the
President's trip to UNGA this year.

We may be joined at a later time by Mr. John Simon, who is the Senior
Director for Relief Stabilization and Development. He's not with us at this
time. But Mike -- Mr. Kozak will be speaking on the record.

Mike, go ahead.

MR. KOZAK: Thank you very much. Good afternoon to all. On Tuesday,
President Bush will travel to New York to participate in the 60th U.N.
General Assembly, where he will stress the U.S. commitment to broad
international agenda that recognizes the connection between freedom,
democracy, trade and development, and security. President Bush continues to
lead with a bold, far-reaching vision on combating terror, results-oriented
development assistance policies, free trade policies that promote growth
and opportunity, promotion of liberty and democracy globally, and
strengthening multilateral institutions.

We're fighting a global war on terror against enemies whose extreme
ideologies promote violence against innocent people and threaten freedom,
democracy, and the stability of the world. America will not retreat, and
stay on the offense to ensure that we defeat terrorists and bring about an
end to tyranny in the world. So by bringing freedom and hope to parts of
the world that have lived in despair, we are laying the foundation for
peace for our children and grandchildren.

America is a leader and friend when it comes to helping those in need.
We'll continue to work with global partners, public and private, to achieve
historic victories over poverty, hunger and disease. America's generosity
and commitment leads the world. President Bush has nearly doubled overseas
development assistance, from $10 billion in 2000 to an estimated $19
billion in 2004; undertaken the largest international health initiative to
combat HIV/AIDS; provided nearly 60 percent of the global food aid to the
continent of Africa. The U.S. spent $1.47 billion on pro-democracy efforts
last year. And U.S. citizens lead the world in private giving.

Most recently, the United States joined with its G8 partners on a concrete,
actionable program for Africa, and has already begun to implement our
commitments under that program.

The U.N. high-level event that the President will be attending is an
opportunity to build a multinational consensus around a common approach and
commitment to assist leaders in developing nations to create opportunity
and prosperity by governing justly, respecting the rule of law, investing
in their people, and opening up their economies.

The United States is leading in building and adapting multilateral
institutions to meet these challenges. Last year at the United Nations
General Assembly, President Bush proposed a U.N. Democracy Fund, to give
the United Nations the capacity to help other nations build democratic
institutions. This year that U.N. institution is a reality, and President
Bush will join Secretary General Annan and other leaders in inaugurating
this new institution.

The President's visions are making this world better, healthier, safer and
more free.

I'm going to go through the President's schedule, and then take some
questions. On September 13, upon arrival in New York, the President will
meet with the U.N. Secretary General, Kofi Annan, at the U.N. Headquarters.
He'll then drop by and pay a courtesy call on the United Nations incoming
General Assembly President.

He'll then have a meeting with Chinese President Hu, who is, as you know --
his visit had to be postponed, to Washington, because of the recent
disaster. And then that evening, the President will be hosting a private
reception for leaders from throughout the world.

On September 14, on Wednesday, President Bush will sign the Convention for
the Suppression of Nuclear Terrorism. Following that signing, the President
will address the high-level plenary meeting of the General Assembly, which
will precede the opening of general debate. Following his remarks, he will
have meetings with Prime Minister Sharon and Prime Minister Blair.

The President will participate in a Security Council summit which will
address terrorism and conflict prevention, and he will meet with leaders
from democratic states in support of the recently established U.N.
Democracy Fund that I just mentioned.

Following his morning address and meetings, the President will attend a
luncheon hosted by the Secretary General, and then participate in a group
photo. After the group photo, the President will return to Washington, D.C.

So with that statement, I'll be happy to take your questions. And John
Simon has joined us, so we have our expert on development, as well.

MR. SIMON: Hello.

Q Thanks guys, and especially, thanks for doing this on the record. I
really appreciate that. A question about the state of play on the U.N.
reforms. What is the President prepared to support in New York next week in
his reform of the United Nations?

MR. KOZAK: Well, we've been working for approximately a year, I think, on
the U.N. reform effort. Some of the key elements in it, from the U.S.
standpoint, are management reforms. There are a number of proposals. Many
of these derive -- or most of them derive from the Secretary General's
recommendations that came first from a high-level panel of sort of wise men
or experts that he had assembled, and then he boiled those down into his
own proposals.

So some of the key ones are management reforms, which are somewhat
detailed, but have some important features in there, like giving the
Secretary General actual authority to move people around from one job to
another, things like funding the Inspector General's Office, where the
people who are funding it aren't the ones who are being inspected, and
details like that.

How far this will come by the time of the event is -- there's still
negotiations going on. But the themes that they're working on are these
kinds of management reforms, improvements in the human rights machinery of
the U.N., improvements in coordination amongst U.N. agencies in
post-conflict situations. So those are some of the most important U.N.
reform topic areas from our standpoint.

Q As a follow-up, do you still have -- despite the -- you've had the
oil-for-food report recently -- do you still have full confidence in
Secretary Annan?

MR. KOZAK: Well, I think we've spoken to that in other fora that we are
continuing to work with him. And I won't substitute my words for those that
you've heard from the spokesman.

Q Respectfully, we've heard those before the oil-for-food report from this
week. That's why I'm --

MR. KOZAK: And I think I'll leave it to Frederick, who is the spokesman on
those issues. But I think we've repeated that as recently as today, have we
not?

Q I don't think so, not at the White House, anyway.

MR. KOZAK: Okay.

MR. JONES: Olivier, our position has not changed at all.

MR. KOZAK: Yes, that's what I meant to say. (Laughter.)

MR. JONES: And if I'm not mistaken, it has probably been articulated by the
Secretary of State today, I believe.

Q In her press conference --

MR. JONES: In her press conference.

Q All right, thank you.

Q I have a logistical question. Which is the "major" speech that the
President is going to give at the event? Is it the one on the 14th, then?
Because there was some talk about him also being at the U.N. and in New
York on the following Saturday. But I'm just really interested in the
schedule at this point.

MR. KOZAK: No, at this point he's going to be there Tuesday afternoon and
then Wednesday morning, going into Wednesday afternoon. And I think there
are two sort of public speeches that will be available. One is in the
morning -- because we're the host country, we always speak fourth. When the
event starts in the morning, you have the incoming and outgoing Presidents
of the General Assembly; then the Secretary General speaks; and then
President Bush speaks. So that will be the longest speech, will be the one
addressing the plenary of the General Assembly high-level leaders.

Then there's a second event that I mentioned, which is the Security Council
Summit, so the Security Council will meet again at the head of state-head
of government level. And the President will have remarks to make there, but
we expect those to be much shorter. It's a shorter event. So there are two
sort of public prepared statements that he'll be making.

Q Right -- he's not going to be there any time later in the week then?

MR. KOZAK: No. That's certainly not the plan. It may have been -- this may
have been where the confusion arose. Initially, this going back a month or
two, the General Assembly was to begin I think on the 16th or 17th, and the
President was going to go up then and had booked things. And then the
Secretary General decided to have this special high-level event to kick it
off, and they sort of added that on to the front. So we adjusted our time
to meet that. And that's why he's going. And so you may be thinking of what
the original schedule was, and it's because of U.N. changing of the agenda
that --

Q -- their agenda, right, okay. So, in other words, the main speech will,
in fact, then be on Wednesday.

MR. KOZAK: Correct. Exactly.

Q Very good, thank you.

MR. KOZAK: Sure enough.

Q Could you tell us about the meeting with the Chinese President? Is that
going to be as large a meeting as if it had been here at the White House?

MR. KOZAK: No, and I don't think it's a substitute for that. I believe it's
been indicated that the visit that would have occurred this week would --
has been postponed, but will eventually occur. So this is a much briefer
meeting than the type of meeting that would have happened and will happen
subsequently.

Q Is it still a substantive meeting, or is it just sort of pleasantries?

MR. KOZAK: Well, I think whenever the President meets with the President of
China, it tends to be substantive. But I'm going to the amount of time
devoted to it. Obviously, if the Chinese President is coming here and
spending a couple of days, there's more time than spending an hour or so in
New York. But even then, they'll use the time productively, I'm sure.

Q You say it's an hour in New York?

MR. KOZAK: Or a bit more. But schedules adjust themselves. (Laughter.)
Don't want to give you an exact number of minutes, but in that ballpark.

Q Okay.

Q Could you talk a little bit about his speech, what he hopes to say, and
how is it being changed to take account of the hurricane?

MR. KOZAK: Well, I won't predict what the President will say. I think,
basically, stay tuned on that. I think, though, from the themes that I laid
out at the beginning, you get some idea. This is -- the summit was called
to review where we are on development efforts. It's also addressing the
U.N. reform topics. So, obviously, those themes are subjects that get
addressed.

But we, as I mentioned, we see all of this as part of a whole -- the war on
terror, development and trade, fighting disease, promoting democracy. And
those are all components of how you make the world a safer and better
place.

And so I think what you'll see from the President, if you look at the event
or his visit in totality, is that he's hitting each one of those elements
of the overall policy in one fashion or another.

MR. JONES: Very good. I'd like to thank our speakers, and thanks everyone
who participated. Take care.

MR. KOZAK: Thank you all.

END 2:38 P.M. EDT
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