The development of democracy in Poland in the past 15 years has been "a pretty remarkable journey" and is "the best bulwark and the best sort of example" to both Ukraine and Russia, Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said in Warsaw September 17.

Armitage, who held a joint press conference with Polish Deputy Foreign Minister Adam Rotfeld, was in Warsaw to consult with Polish officials, to explain the U.S. position on various global, regional and bilateral issues, and to "seek advice on how to better improve our relationships with Europe." He also offered America's sincerest thanks for Polish contributions in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The meetings marked the beginning of a strategic dialogue between the two allies, Rotfeld said. He and Armitage answered questions about political developments in Russia, the situation in Iraq, and improved U.S. visa procedures for Polish citizens.

Armitage reiterated U.S. anxiety over possible changes to governmental structures in the Russian Federation taken for security reasons, but said it is still unclear what President Vladimir Putin is planning to do. In the war against terrorism, he said, "we must adhere to the principles of democracy."

One journalist asked Armitage to respond to a comment by United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan characterizing the war in Iraq as illegal. Armitage said the United States and its coalition partners examined the issue very carefully and felt that military action, as well as stability and humanitarian activities, was based on "fully legal international grounds."

On U.S. visas, Armitage explained that some pre-screening procedures had already begun at Warsaw airport and that the United States would "lose no opportunity" to improve the situation further. "We want Polish visitors in the United States," he said.

Earlier in the week, Armitage visited Norway, Latvia, Slovakia and the Czech Republic.

U.S. Department of State
Washington, D.C.
http://www.state.gov

RICHARD ARMITAGE, DEPUTY SECRETARY OF STATE
PRESS CONFERENCE WITH POLISH DEPUTY FOREIGN MINISTER ADAM ROTFELD

Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Warsaw, Poland
September 17, 2004

ADAM ROTFELD: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Just a few words of introduction, because as I understand, the Q&A; session will be most interesting to all of you. I will say a few words of introduction on my part.

Let me say first that this is the first dialogue -- strategic dialogue that Poland and the U.S. have engaged in. It has been initiated out of an initiative of the Deputy Secretary of State, Mr. Armitage. He started that initiative in March last year. He first talked about it, because he thought it would be useful to start a similar process of consultations like the one that happens between the U.S. and the U.K., Japan and Australia -- so the most strategic allies of the U.S. -- to start such a dialog with Poland as well.

What we have covered is both global issues -- transatlantic relations, Middle East, Iraq, military cooperation, economic cooperation, various bilateral relations issues, scientific and technological exchange, visas and the immediate neighbors of Poland. I hope it was interesting for our American partners as well, what they have heard. It has been an unprecedented dialog, definitely. I think it's useful for Poland, because the U.S. has a completely different global perspective than Poland. And I hope that for our American partners it was interesting what a country from Central Europe -- neighboring on the one hand from Germany, on the other hand with Ukraine and Russia -- had to say.

RICHARD ARMITAGE: Thank you. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'll be brief. First of all, I'd like to thank my colleague and now dear friend Secretary Rotfeld for his hospitality. Second, one of my messages today was to privately and publicly thank sincerely the government and the people of Poland -- and the soldiers of Poland for the courageous activities in support of the people of Iraq and, for that matter, in Afghanistan as well, and to express in the most sincere way possible our condolences on the loss recently of the three soldiers.

Second, in addition to the items that Secretary Rotfeld described that were contained in our discussion, we were particularly interested in exploring and understanding of what's going on in the Russian Federation due to the recent events, as well as looking forward to what we hope are free and fair elections in Ukraine, which -- at least speaking for the United States -- would allow us then to work with whomever wins the election in hopefully a more beneficial way.

And lastly, we came to seek advice on how to better improve our relationships with Europe, as well as to explain ourselves, at least our points of view in various parts of the world. So I'm grateful for your hospitality and your friendship, sir.

QUESTION (BBC) (inaudible but translated as): From the BBC. Mr. Deputy Secretary, as you know Secretary General of the U.N. Kofi Annan characterized the war in Iraq as illegal according to the U.N. charter. How does this statement change relations with Europe?

ARMITAGE: First of all, I looked very closely -- cursorily skimming -- at Kofi Annan's statement. It seemed to me that there was some room for ambiguity in how he answered the question. However, if we make the assumption that he said it was completely illegal, we disagree with that. We, our U.K. allies and others looked at this very carefully before launching the invasion of Iraq, and we feel we are on fully legal international grounds.

On the question of other participation in the Coalition, we have a subsequent resolution from the U.N., and I think there's no question that that fully justifies the participation of other nations in the stability and humanitarian activities in Iraq.

QUESTION (Trybuna): Mr. Secretary, our history makes us in Poland fear that we might become the border of Christianity with the border of democracy. I know that the U.S. has quite a critical attitude towards what Mr. Putin intends to do in Russia. Does the U.S. have any hopes or expectations towards Polish foreign policy from that respect?

ARMITAGE: First of all, if I may, one of the problems is we're not sure about what Mr. Putin desires to do in Russia. President Bush issued a statement, as well as Secretary Powell -- and I have spoken out on this trip -- about some of the anxiety we have. Our President has said that we support the Russian Federation on the global war on terror, because we feel that the global -- terrorists are against democracy. But in that war against terrorists, we must adhere to the principles of democracy. So I think the jury is still out, first of all.

Second of all, we find the democratic situation here in Poland and the atmosphere in Poland to be the best bulwark and the best sort of example, if you will, to both Ukraine and, hopefully, the Russian Federation that one could possibly have. Look how rapidly democracy has developed in this country. It was only 15 years ago that you started on this journey, and it's a pretty remarkable journey indeed.

QUESTION (TVN24): A question to Mr. Rotfeld. What is the Polish support that will be granted to Chechen refugees? Is [sic] there any plans to what it would look like? Because, as I know, Latvia and Lithuania are preparing special camps for Chechen refugees. We're expecting a huge wave of Chechen refugees at the moment.

ROTFELD: Well, I must say this is not a new problem. After each terrorist attack we have to face a new wave of Chechen refugees in Poland. I will tell you that the facilities we have at our disposal now are full and over-crowded, so the state administration will have to face the task of preparing new facilities for those who are granted the right of asylum or the right to stay in Poland.

I must tell you also that what Basayev did yesterday in the website -- he said that he was responsible for the atrocities that happened in Beslan -- is not good for Chechnya in general, because if Chechen leaders want to continue this line of thinking, it might result in a counterproductive [sic], because nobody will sympathize with them.

Second of all, I think Poland should not really advise Russia what to do, because we wouldn't like to see Russia advising us on what to do. It's a matter of their internal politics, and that's what they have to deal with themselves. And I agree with Mr. Armitage, because he said it was an internal Russian situation that is, however, a concern for the whole of the world and for Poland as well, because Russia is a superpower that has embarked on the process of democratic transformations. But right now it seems they are going in the wrong direction.

QUESTION (AFP) (inaudible but translated as): The President of Iraq visited Poland recently. He said he was working day and night to organize elections in Iraq. For his part, President Bush said that there are an increasing number of bombings in Iraq. Under what conditions will the elections be organized?

ARMITAGE: You are correct that, not only bombings, but the violent activities have increased. And as I have said at previous press conferences this week, we expect that the violence will increase, both to try to have an effect on our elections in early November, as well as to try to thwart the ability to have elections in Iraq in January.

Mrs. Perelli, the Special Representative of the Secretary General of the United Nations, is working vigorously to try to bring about a situation where we can hold meaningful elections in January. Prime Minister Allawi is quite keen on assuring that we do have those elections in January. We realize they may not be pretty, but they will be held.

I'm not naïve. I know that bad news always drives good news off the pages of newspapers. But I would caution you to pay at least a little attention to some of the small victories along the way. The town of Najaf, after a successful resolution by the government, has been secure for 18 days and is being reconstructed. The Prime Minister of Iraq announced a solution to the problem of the city of Samara yesterday. He's moving forward on a number of fronts. You might look at the hundreds of city and town councils that have come up. The fact that Iraq is exporting 2.4 million barrels of oil a day, which means that -- once stability is brought forward -- they will be able to finance themselves. There's a lot going on. You might look at the fact that civil war did not occur, which many experts quoted or thought would be the case immediately after the invasion by the United States, Great Britain and Australia. So you'll report whatever you'd like, but I would suggest that there's some good news that might creep onto the pages of your newspapers.

QUESTION (Radio ZET): A question to Mr. Armitage. I'm from Radio ZET. Could you comment on yesterday's Basayev statement? And a question to Mr. Rotfeld: Could you comment on Kofi Annan's statement?

ARMITAGE: On the question of Basayev's statement taking credit for the massacre at Beslan, this proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that he is inhuman. Anyone who would use innocents for political aim is not worthy of existence in these type societies that we enjoy. I deplore it in the strongest possible terms and hope he is brought to justice in the soonest possible time.

ROTFELD: I will be brief. I can tell you that I share Mr. Armitage's feel on the assessment of the legal basis of Iraqi intervention. Many resolutions have been passed by the Security Council of the U.N. -- the most important one from the 8th of November 2002, number 1441. And it said that Iraq will have to fulfill all the other resolutions of the Security Council's and if it didn't, it would have to face the consequences of that. The other resolutions include resolution number 678 from 1990 and 687 from 1991. So no matter what happened in 2003, the Security Council authorized us to intervene. Anyway, I would like to stress that the mandate for our military to go to Iraq was different from the one that authorized the U.S. forces to go to Iraq, because we were not granted the status of occupying powers, but of stabilization powers, which is quite similar to the U.N. peacekeeping forces. However, I think that that intervention is fully legal and in compliance with the resolutions passed by the United Nations. I think the faster we complete the mission, the better it will be for Iraq.

And now referring to the question by the lady from Agence France Presse, I can tell you that the faster the elections are held in Iraq, the fewer terrorist attacks there will be, because those terrorist attacks are aimed at delaying the elections. So we are even arguing for an earlier date of elections.

QUESTION (Agencja Informacyjna Polonia): A question about visas. Has there been, perhaps not a breakthrough, but an important step taken in the discussion on abolishing visas for Poles going to the U.S.?

ARMITAGE: That's the equivalent in football of a hand-off. I don't -- it's not for me to characterize whether there was an important breakthrough or not. Two days ago we began at the airport some pre-screening to try to eliminate some of the problems of people going to the United States and being refused. I told the President a few moments ago that I only knew one way to approach a problem, and I approached the problem like a wrestler approaches a wrestling match: you take down the problems one at a time. And I have endeavored with Daniel [Adam Rotfeld] and told the President that we will lose no opportunity to try to step-by-step make better the situation regarding the availability of visas for Polish citizens. We want Polish visitors in the United States.

QUESTION (AP): (inaudible but translated as:) A question about the Polish proposal to speed up the elections in Iraq. For example, rescheduling them for December.

ARMITAGE: It has always been said that the elections would be held in December, no later than January. We would like nothing better to have earlier elections. I agree with my colleague that this would act to slow down some of the insurgent violence. But the most important thing is to have elections which are credible and which are widely enough held to be valid. And that's the dilemma. I think you can have it very quickly and not be able to have participation that is wide enough. So though I share my colleague's desire, I think it's a practical matter to get full participation, so that it can be judged, by the way, by you all as having been a valid election, that it probably will be in January.

Thank you very much.

[End]

Released on September 17, 2004