For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
June 8, 2004
Briefing on Meeting with Prime Minister of Japan
Background Briefing by a Senior Administration Official on the President's Meeting with the Prime Minister of Japan
Sea Island, Georgia
2:10 P.M. EDT
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: I've just come from the bilateral
luncheon meeting between President George W. Bush and Prime Minister
Junichiro Koizumi. It began at 12:30 p.m. and ran until about 1:45
p.m. or so. As usual, in the bilateral meetings between these two
leaders, there was a lot of good cheer and good, friendly
conversation. They meet frequently and talk frequently on the phone.
Prime Minister Koizumi opened up by expressing condolences on the
loss of Spot, the President's dog, and then asked after Barney, whom he
knows. You probably saw that before the actual bilateral meeting, the
two leaders took questions on the record and did a number of issues
there.
In the actual substance of the luncheon meeting, they talked about
Iraq, North Korea, the economy, and other issues. Prime Minister
Koizumi congratulated the President on the very strong prospect that
the U.N. would unanimously vote for the Security Council resolution on
Iraq and reiterated that Japan will do its part to the utmost to assist
with the reconstruction of Iraq, and in that context, that Japan was
preparing to continue its deployment of self-defense forces, based on
the new resolution and based on a decision to be made in Tokyo sometime
next week, and also that Japan is continuing its work with economic
reconstruction, based on a pledge of $5 billion made several months
ago.
The President and the Prime Minister talked quite a bit about what
they can do, together with the other G8 leaders and international
leaders, to move forward with a successful transition in Iraq. And the
President likes to make the analogy to Japan, as some of you know, and
he and the Prime Minister talked about that. Where we were at war with
Japan half a century ago, as the President likes to note, today
Junichiro Koizumi is one of his closest friends and Japan one of our
best allies. And that, he thinks, and the Prime Minister agreed, is a
good model for thinking about Iraq, that someday he, the President,
will sit down, perhaps with Prime Minister Koizumi and the leader of
Iraq, and talk about peace and talk about our economic growth and the
welfare of our people in the same way.
Prime Minister Koizumi gave the President a detailed readout on his
trip to Pyongyang. He went on May 22nd. He spent several hours with
Kim Jong-il. The Prime Minister reiterated Japan's very firm stand
that there would be no normalization with North Korea until North Korea
had addressed the three key issues to Japan, eliminating nuclear
weapons verifiably, dealing with the missile threat to Japan, and
resolving the abductee issue. And the President gave the President
some of his insights into Kim Jong-il's character and some of the North
Korean approach, and they agreed that the six-party talks -- and we
have another round coming up soon -- that the six-party talks are the
right process to bring China, Japan, the ROK, Russia, and the U.S.
together to make it very clear that North Korea will not face a good
future if it refuses to give up its nuclear weapons.
The Prime Minister emphasized that he told Kim Jong-il to think
carefully about the benefits North Korea could receive if it verifiably
gave up nuclear weapons -- economic aid from Japan, security
assurances, energy assistance from the international community -- that
these were all things that weighed against whatever benefit comes from
nuclear weapons which surely outweigh the benefit of nuclear weapons.
And the President completely agreed that these things were possible for
North Korea, but the key was verification and making sure that the
North Koreans kept their promise. And the two leaders agreed that in
that context, making sure that the North Koreans make a commitment to
all of the six parties, or all of the other five parties, was
absolutely essential.
On North Korea, the Prime Minister talked a bit about the Japanese
abductees. The President and the Prime Minister have talked about this
frequently, and as you know, the President has said several times in
public that the United States, and indeed the President, will stand
with Japan until every abductee, every abducted Japanese citizen is
accounted for.
The Prime Minister described the situation of Ms. Soga, whose
husband, Sergeant Jenkins, is a defector and a deserter, and the
humanitarian situation and the sympathy that the Japanese public feels
for Ms. Soga. The President explained the legal situation, and his
understanding of what Sergeant Jenkins had done, which was to defect to
the North. And they agreed they would keep in close touch on this.
They talked about the economy, and compared growth between the U.S.
and Japan; both economies doing quite well. They talked a bit about
U.N. reform. The Prime Minister reminded the President that Japan pays
the second highest dues to the U.N. after the U.S., and more than any
other P-5 country, other than the U.S. And they agreed to work
together on U.N. reform and on the importance of Japan's permanent
membership in the Security Council as a goal.
And finally, they talked a bit about force posture and U.S.
military presence overseas, particularly in Asia. The President
explained that he's had these conversations with the Prime Minister
before, that we are reviewing our global posture, that we are focusing
on increasing our capabilities and living up to our commitments to our
allies based on technology, not just people. And they agreed that they
would keep in close consultation on how to shape U.S. forces in Japan
in the years to come, to take maximum advantage of technology, to
maintain a strong deterrent. And those discussions are just underway.
That was it. I'm happy to take questions. I'm assuming I can hear
people in Savannah. I'm told I can hear them, but it's awfully noisy
here.
Q Could you tell me how Mr. Koizumi explained Kim Jong-il's
character?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: You may want to ask, obviously,
the Japanese delegation for more details. But in short, the Prime
Minister contrasted his meeting with Kim Jong-il in May this year to
the meeting in September a year ago, and thought he detected in Kim
Jong-il a bit more of a recognition that there might be advantages to
giving up nuclear weapons. But it was mostly atmospherics. And they
agreed that the best way to explore and see whether the North Koreans
were indeed prepared to change their position was in the next round of
the six-party talks, which we expect at the end of this month.
Q I just wanted to ask you to elaborate a little bit about the
discussions on the economy, and specifically, did the President say
anything about the Japanese government's decision to stop their
interventions?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: They did not talk about that.
They mostly talked about the factors behind growth in the two economies
and the expectation that the economic growth in Japan was sustainable
because it was based on domestic demand from capital investment and
consumer demand, and was the result of steady reform implemented by the
Prime Minister. But they didn't talk about that issue you raised.
Q Could you just give us the precise -- what have President said
about Mr. Jenkins, what did Prime Minister Koizumi ask him or said to
him, and what did President respond to it?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: The Prime Minister described the
situation that Ms. Soga faces, and the President was quite interested
in hearing about it. The Prime Minister explained, as you all know
well, that Ms. Soga was married to Mr. Jenkins, that she's now in Japan
and does not want to go back to North Korea, that the Japanese
government is trying to find a way to have them meet.
The President expressed real sympathy for this situation and an
understanding of why the Japanese public and why the Prime Minister
want to do everything they can to help find a humanitarian answer to
this real puzzle, and something that would help Ms. Soga be reunited
with her children. The President explained to the Prime Minister that
Sergeant Jenkins deserted from the U.S. Army in 1965 and, therefore,
he is still technically in the U.S. Army and still wanted on four
different charges. And the Prime Minister acknowledged that that was a
real dilemma, as well. And so there was no conclusion, but they both
agreed that the governments would keep in touch on this.
Q Can you explain if Mr. Bush expressed his feeling about how he
felt about compromising with Germany and France concerning the
resolution? And also, did the talks on broader -- and North African
nations come up during the meeting?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Yes, in fact, the Prime Minister
congratulated the President and made the point that if there is, as
most people expect, a 15-0 U.N. Security Council resolution passed on
Iraq, that from his perspective, this was a real demonstration of the
respect for the position the President has been pushing, which is for
the Iraqi people to take on the role of restoring their country to
sovereignty, with the help of the international community.
So it wasn't talked about in terms of a compromise, but rather in
terms of a real success that was something both the Prime Minister and
the President were eager to see, and had been for some time.
And they did talk about the broader Middle East. The Prime
Minister expressed his support and the President thanked him. They'll
be talking about it, of course, with the other G8 leaders in the days
ahead. The Prime Minister expressed his support; the President thanked
him. They talking about it, of course, with the other G8 leaders in
the days ahead. And the President explained that this was a real
opportunity for the leaders of the G8 to demonstrate support for reform
and for change in many of these countries generated from within, but
with support from leading economies and democracies of the world. But
it was a very brief discussion, and they'll talk about it more with the
other leaders today, tomorrow, and the next day.
Q I'd like to know more about global postal -- did President
Bush and Prime Minister Koizumi talk about in some detail about
changing presence of U.S. military station in Japan?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: No, they didn't really talk about
detailed plans because the official discussion between the U.S. and
Japan on that is still fairly new. For the most part, the two
governments, the Defense Department, State, Gai Musho and Boeicho, have
been talking about strategy, assessing the threat, assessing the
technology. They've been doing the broader homework to get ready for
some discussions about how to shape our presence in a way that takes
maximum advantage of new technologies that eases the burden as much as
possible on the people of Okinawa or the rest of Japan, and maintains,
or even enhances, the capability and the flexibility of U.S. forces.
And the case in Korea and the ROK is a little further ahead -- and
we've actually had lots of discussion with the ROK government. The
President has talked to President Roh, and it's a little further
ahead. In the case of Japan, we're just starting now to think about
how U.S. presence in Japan fits into what is our much broader effort to
reposture or revise and relocate our global posture review. So they
didn't get into real details about forces or figures.
Q I'm wondering if the two leaders discussed any trade issues.
You may recall that Senator Grassley wrote President Bush last month
asking him to raise the KAMPO privatization dispute and the BSE beef
ban. Were any of those or any trade issues raised?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: They did talk about some trade
issues. I'm not going to get into every detail. The only one I will
flag specifically is beef, because at lunch they ate beef -- and it was
very good, I might add. And the President did, in commenting on how
delicious it is, asked where we are on that. And they both expressed
confidence that talks will lead to a mutually satisfactory solution.
Because beef exports to Japan for us are traditionally a billion
dollars a year. It's a very important market for us, and the Prime
Minister knows that.
Q I just wanted to clarify, the discussion about Japan becoming
a permanent member of the Security Council -- is that a new position,
or is that -- why did it come up in this context, given the battles the
administration had with the Security Council that looked like the
administration trying to stack the Security Council with some of its
friends?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: It's always been the U.S. position
that -- or has been for at least a decade -- that Japan should be -- in
any reformation, any effort to reform the Security Council, that Japan
should be a candidate, a leading candidate to have a permanent seat.
There's no concrete plan in place, there's no initiative about to
begin. It was a reiteration of a position that we've had since 41,
since the first Bush administration, held by the Clinton
administration, and continued by this administration. And it was in
the context of Prime Minister Koizumi talking about a very important
theme for Japan, reform of the U.N., reform of the Security Council,
that the President did reiterate that we still have this goal with
Japan that's finding a way in reform of the Security Council to have
Japan on it permanently.
There's no agreement on how you do that. There's no plan ready to
unfold, to unveil, and there's no initiative about to start. But in
principle, we've had that position, and still do.
Q There was some reporting out of Japan before the Prime
Minister's visit from some interviews he did with foreign press there
that he believed that the North Koreans were prepared to do a deal, and
I was just wondering, how optimistic was he? Why did he think there
had been this change? And did he at all raise the prospect of some
benefit in bilaterals between the U.S. and North Korea?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: I'm sorry, I didn't catch the last
--
Q Did he suggest it may be a good thing to have bilateral talks
between the United States and North Korea --to further this optimistic
view of North Korea's position at the moment?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Kim Jong-il said in September a
year ago, some slightly different formulations about nuclear weapons
than he did this time. This time he apparently said that North Korea
didn't want nuclear weapons, a formulation that from time to time comes
out of Pyongyang, usually accompanied by a statement saying, but we
have to because of the Americans hostile policy. In this case, the
fact that it was Kim Jong-il was significant. And the two leaders
agreed that these upcoming six-party talks are a real opportunity to
test that.
The President's view, and the Prime Minister agreed, is that if we
get in a bilateral negotiating process with the North Koreans, we'd
throw away all the leverage we have on them, because what the U.S.
brings is a military option, which is not a good option. But North
Korea's neighbors bring a different kind of leverage, which is the
negative leverage of being able to hold down their economic
development, and then the positive leverage of providing some
incentives if they give up nuclear weapons. So that the key was to
keep everybody in this equally, and not have a U.S.-DPRK negotiation
with sort of endorsements from the other parties, but keep it
six-party.
And the Prime Minister agreed, and agreed that we would, in the
six-party talks, approach this, and that the six-party talks are a good
chance to test the North Koreans' -- what the Japanese call "honne",
their true intentions. We do that in the talks in plenary session.
There are opportunities in the past for the U.S. delegation in
bilateral contact to answer questions or ask questions. So there is
bilateral contact of an informal, unofficial nature that allows that,
as well. But the main discussion, they agreed, and the main
opportunity to test the North Koreans and whether this is something new
is in the six-party -- is the six-party format.
Q I'm simply wondering if Prime Minister Koizumi asked President
Bush for amnesty for Sergeant Jenkins. And I'm also interested in the
discussion on the side round of the six-party talks, based on Koizumi's
trip to Pyongyang. Is there anything like advice from Mr. Koizumi to
President Bush? Thank you very much.
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: On Jenkins, the two leaders
compared notes. Nobody -- neither leader asked the other leader to do
something, they compared notes. The situation and the sympathetic
humanitarian situation of Ms. Soga, the legal situation surrounding
Jenkins; no conclusions, no requests from one side or the other, but an
understanding of the situation and a promise to keep in touch on this.
The Prime Minister did give advice on North Korea. And every time
the two leaders meet, the President welcomes Prime Minister Koizumi's
advice on North Korea. That's been true in every meeting I've been in,
and I've been in pretty much every one. The President respects Prime
Minister Koizumi's assessment of the security situation in Northeast
Asia, considers Japan a very solid ally in this effort. The main
advice the Prime Minister gave was that we should continue telling the
North Koreans they can have some benefit from giving up their nuclear
weapons. They can have economic aid, they can have energy support from
the international community, they can have security assurances. These
are all things that we have, in one way or another, put on the table in
these talks, the six-party talks. And the Prime Minister's advice was,
we need to keep forcing North Korea to think about the advantages it
could get, and to realize that it won't have any of that if it tries to
maintain its nuclear weapons option. So they often compare notes and
strategy, and they did this time, too.
Thank you very much.
END 2:30 P.M. EDT
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