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Skriven 2005-10-12 23:33:22 av Whitehouse Press (1:3634/12.0)
Ärende: Press Release (051012) for Wed, 2005 Oct 12
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President Welcomes Polish President Kwasniewski to the White House
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For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
October 12, 2005

President Welcomes Polish President Kwasniewski to the White House
The Oval Office

President's Remarks
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11:54 A.M. EDT

PRESIDENT BUSH: Thank you all for coming. I'll have a statement; Aleksander
will have a statement. We'll be glad to answer two questions per side.

Welcome back. This is a happy moment, because I get to see my friend again.
It's a sad moment because he is leaving office. He has done an
extraordinary job. We have built a strong personal relationship, but more
importantly, we have a strong strategic relationship with Poland, thanks to
your leadership.

Aleksander has helped advance the cause of peace by advancing the cause of
freedom. He has served as a mentor for new democracies in the neighborhood.
He has proven that you can be a friend to the United States and a loyal
member of the EU at the same time. We have worked hard together to improve
the lots of both our peoples.

And, Mr. President, you can leave with your -- your office with your head
held high, because of the fine job you have done. I am glad you came back,
and it's an honor to be able to praise you to the people of your country
for a job -- a fine job.

PRESIDENT KWASNIEWSKI: Thank you, sir.

PRESIDENT BUSH: Hold on, we're going to a little --

PRESIDENT KWASNIEWSKI: Yes. Thank you for --

PRESIDENT BUSH: Do want to do an interpretation?

PRESIDENT KWASNIEWSKI: Yes, I think interpretation is better.

PRESIDENT BUSH: Especially after what I just said. (Laughter.)

PRESIDENT KWASNIEWSKI: (As translated.) I want to thank you very much, Mr.
President. I want to thank you very much for those nice words. It is true
that this visit -- (inaudible) -- compilation of 10 years of my presidency,
and 10 years of Polish-American relations between our two countries.

I started my presidency in a different world. And now I'm leaving the
office when the world is different and the world now is better. We are
together in NATO. We are in NATO together with other Central and Eastern
European countries. We are in NATO, together with the Baltic states, and we
are also together in a group, in fact, family. Together we are building
peace and stability in different parts of the world. We are fighting
together against terrorism. We are fulfilling our task with joy and
satisfaction, and we do it effectively. And together we are bringing more
peace and more democracy to the world.

We are also creating more values with humanity. We are fighting for human
rights and for the dignity of human beings.

We have been cooperating together with President Bush and we have made
together very hard and very difficult and very important decisions. Today
we talked about what we have done together and we have also talked about
the fact that we will be continuing the policy of cooperation between the
two countries, and that the new Polish government and my successor in the
presidential office will continue this policy in the years to come.

I want to say that I'm very happy that we are enjoying and following the
values between Polish and American cooperation, and that we are developing
-- (inaudible) -- contacts. We have summed up our bilateral cooperation.
There is still very much ahead of us, and here, as you can see here on the
table next to President Bush, there is a document that I have presented to
him, and this document is the -- (inaudible) -- of our achievements, and it
is also information about our future cooperation. It's also the
encouragement to cooperate in the future.

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you.

We'll take a couple of questions. Deirdre.

Q Thank you, Mr. President. Why do people in this White House feel it's
necessary to tell your supporters that Harriet Miers attends a very
conservative Christian church? Is that your strategy to repair the divide
that has developed among conservatives over her nominee?

PRESIDENT BUSH: People ask me why I picked Harriet Miers. They want to know
Harriet Miers' background; they want to know as much as they possibly can
before they form opinions. And part of Harriet Miers' life is her religion.
Part of it has to do with the fact that she was a pioneer woman and a
trailblazer in the law in Texas. I remind people that Harriet Miers is one
of the -- has been rated consistently one of the top 50 women lawyers in
the United States. She's eminently qualified for the job. And she has got a
judicial philosophy that I appreciate; otherwise I wouldn't have named her
to the bench, which is -- or nominated her to the bench -- which is that
she will not legislate from the bench, but strictly interpret the
Constitution.

So our outreach program has been just to explain the facts to people. But,
more importantly, Harriet is going to be able to explain the facts to the
people when she testifies. And people are going to see why I named her --
nominated her to the bench, and she's going to make a great Supreme Court
judge.

Q Mr. President, President Bush, there is a significant change of power
underway in Poland right now. Some have already said that they would ask
for more from the United States in return for Polish support and continued
engagement in Iraq. Are you aware of these positions and do you expect any
changes in Polish-American relations, any tougher talk, maybe?

PRESIDENT BUSH: Well, we had a talk about who might succeed Aleksander, and
their opinions. My advice would be for whoever succeeds the President to
come and visit, and to exchange visits with foreign ministers, such as our
foreign minister as well as our minister of defense, and to strategize.
That's what friends do. They share concerns and share goals, and then work
together to satisfy concerns and achieve goals. And I'm confident that's
going to happen.

PRESIDENT KWASNIEWSKI: (As translated.) May I add a few words for the
Polish media here? We have talked about this and I think that this is
information important for the Polish media. Poland wants the stabilization
mission in Iraq to be a success and to complete the success. We want to be
a serious partner and we want to be a steadfast and loyal partner in the
coalition. Our troops are in Iraq and they will stay in Iraq until the end
of January, and the decision has been made and nothing changes here. But we
have to think about the future and we have to respect the right of the new
government and the right of the new president to make their decisions about
it.

It was the right suggestion of President George W. Bush, and the decision
will be forwarded by me to our authorities and people in power when I come
back, that after the new government is established, the new power's defense
minister and the foreign minister should come here to Washington to talk
about the future, because the future goes far beyond January next year. And
we have to talk about what we shall do together to continue this cause.

THE PRESIDENT: Caren.

Q Thank you. The Syrian Interior Minister committed suicide. What are the
consequences for Syria if they are implicated in the murder of the former
Lebanese Prime Minister?

THE PRESIDENT: I don't want to prejudge the report that's coming out, the
Mehlis report. I think it's very important for Syria to understand that the
free world respects Lebanese democracy and expects Syria to honor that
democracy. It's one thing to have been asked to remove troops and all
intelligence services. Now the world wants for -- expects Syria to honor
the democracy in the country of Lebanon.

Secondly, we expect Syria to do everything in her power to shut down the
trans-shipment of suiciders and killers into Iraq. We expect Syria to be a
good neighbor to Iraq. We expect Syria not to agitate killers in the
Palestinian Territories. We're making good progress toward peace in the
Holy Land, but one of the areas of concern is that foreign countries, such
as Syria, might try to disrupt the peace process through encouraging
terrorist activities.

So we have a lot of expectations for Syria beyond just the Mehlis report.
But let's see how the Mehlis report -- what it says. In the meantime, we'll
continue to work with friends and allies to send a clear message to the
Assad government there are expectations involved for countries that want to
be accepted in the international community.

Go ahead.

Q It's a question for President Bush. Mr. President, we thought that your
last summit between America and Russian leaders, American diplomacy was
stepping up the pressure on Moscow in reference to causes of democratic
reforms in that country and the situation in Chechnya. And right now we
have a long list of problems between Poland and Russia. So what's your
point of view and what would be your advice for a new Polish government how
we should handle that situation?

THE PRESIDENT: We've got -- I've got good relations with President Putin;
America has got a working relationship with Russia. And always, as a part
of our discussions with Russia is my personal -- when I have personal
discussions with him, I remind him of my deep faith in democracy, and the
people that interrelate with Russia from my government remind their Russian
counterparts about democracy and its importance.

The reason I believe in democracy so strongly is because I believe in
freedom, and democracy is a manifestation of free societies. I believe
there's a desire for everybody to be free. I also know that free societies
are peaceful societies. One of the goals of this administration is to
promote peace, and the more democracy and the more freedom there is, the
more likely it is the world will be peaceful.

So we've got a consistent message to Russia, and that is that one should
not fear democracy, one should embrace democracy. Now, having said that, I
recognize that Russian democracy will be different from the United States.
We don't expect every country to look like us; we just expect people to
embrace some universal truths -- the right of people to worship freely, the
right of women to be able to equally participate in society -- which is the
case in Russia, of course -- the rule of law, the respect for private
property. These are fundamental, basic principles that we believe should be
inherent in all societies. People need to make those choices themselves,
but one of the roles of the United States is to remind people about how
beneficial a democratic society can be to its people. And so we're
consistent in our message.

Thank you all very much.

PRESIDENT KWASNIEWSKI: Thank you. You see, this is the difference between
the President in power -- you have many questions, and the President will
finish -- "no questions, thank you."

END 12:11 P.M. EDT
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