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06 November 2000 Excerpts: White House Spokesman on Middle East Peace Process (Clinton to meet separately with Arafat, Barak soon) White House spokesman Jake Siewert said President Clinton hopes to advance the Mideast peace progress in separate meetings with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak at the White House in the coming days. Speaking to reporters at the White House November 6, Siewert said Clinton's talks with Arafat November 9 and Barak November 12 are not conditioned on agreements made at the Sharm el-Sheikh summit in Egypt last month. Following are excerpts of the White House briefing: Q: What does he hope to achieve with the meetings on the Middle East? SIEWERT: We are hopeful -- for those of you who weren't on the road yesterday, I'm sure you've all seen or read now that Chairman Arafat has been invited for the 9th, and the Prime Minister has been invited into the White House on the 12th -- that's Thursday and Sunday. They both accepted the invitation. And we'll continue to work with them to end the violence and to discuss with them how best to move forward toward a political dialogue. Q: Jake, jumping back to the Middle East, if I remember correctly, when these meetings between Barak, the President and Arafat were first proposed, they were conditioned on the fact that you would make progress in the Sharm el-Sheikh -- SIEWERT: No, we have talked at great length about the importance of implementing Sharm el-Sheikh. I have never said here that there is one specific set of preconditions before such a meeting would take place. We've said that it's important to continue to take steps to implement Sharm el-Sheikh, to end the violence and to begin to find a way back to some sort of political solution and how best we could do that. But we have said all along that we'll make any judgment about any visits based on an overall assessment of whether they might be useful. Q: Jake, on the Middle East again. Iraq has now begun flying passengers in military aircraft into the no-fly zone. What sort of risk does this present and what do you think they're trying to do? SIEWERT: We have not -- I'm not going to speculate on their motives, but we have never had an objection to civilian flights. But the no-fly zones remain in effect and are designed to protect people on the ground. Q: Jake, is the meeting that are going to be here designed to shore-up Sharm el-Sheikh or move also beyond that, and try to move somewhere back in the peace process, in other words, to get the President in a position where he can do more with the two leaders before leaving office? SIEWERT: They are designed to discuss the current situation on the ground, to find ways to restore calm and lower the level of violence there, and how best to move forward towards a political dialogue. But, ultimately, that's a decision the parties will have to make. Q: What state would you say Sharm is in right now, based on what you're seeing on the ground? SIEWERT: It's not very useful for me to stand up here every day and pretend to assess the situation on the ground. That's best done in the region. We think that Sharm el-Sheikh is the best possible means of reducing the violence and finding a way back to a long-term political solution. That's our policy and that's what we'll be stating and restating as the two parties arrive here. Q: But my question wasn't to ask you what you think of the state of things on the ground. My question was, how do you think Sharm el-Sheikh is going and how do you think the two sides are moving toward implementation -- SIEWERT: I think we've seen some steps -- the Prime Minister said this morning in the region that there have been some steps taken to implement Sharm el-Sheikh, and we certainly share that assessment, there has been some efforts to reduce the violence. But much more needs to be done. There is too much violence still in the streets and that's part of the reason why we're trying to gather both of the parties here, to try to find a way to implement the security measures that were anticipated by the agreement at Sharm el-Sheikh and to begin to restore calm and lower the level of violence. Q: On the Mideast, Jake, the Jerusalem Post is reporting that the United States is testing the waters in Israel on the idea of an international force in the occupied territories. SIEWERT: Yes, I'm not going to discuss what we may or may not be exploring with the parties. Q: Why not? SIEWERT: Because our diplomacy is best conducted, I think, in private there. These are all the final status issues -- (end text)
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