'A Resort To Force Would Not Be The Appropriate Solution'

Colin Powell: It's a great pleasure to be here at the Press Center, and especially to also be available to the Press Centerin New York, and I hope to come back here on a more frequent basis in the months ahead.

Today is an important day. Not only are we are watching coalition forces bring the military part of thiscampaign to an end, we entered a new phase of the history of Iraq at the ziggurat of Ur, a famous place whereperhaps civilization started. And at that location earlier today, dozens and dozens, up to a hundred, Iraqirepresentatives came together representing every part of Iraq, and they began a discussion about their future,a future that will be free of tyranny, a future that will be free of dictators, a future that will be based ondemocracy, a future that will be in the hands of a government, that will be committed to values that the Iraqipeople hold dear as human beings who want to live in freedom and who want to live under representativegovernment.

The United States is pleased that as a result of the work of American armed forces, as well as the armedforces of so many other coalition members, we were able to bring this day to the people of Iraq.

In the weeks ahead, more such meetings will be held and, as a result of these meetings, leadership will beidentified, an interim authority will be created, and that interim authority will grow into a new governmentfor the people of Iraq.

And so this is a day of hope. It is also a day where coalition forces, while battling remaining remnants ofthe Iraqi regime, are also focusing their attention on humanitarian aid, putting hospitals back in workingorder. A number of our coalition partners plan to bring in field hospitals into Iraq in the next -- over thenext several days to take care of the people of Iraq, where General Jay Garner and his people are preparing todeploy into Iraq and begin the process of rebuilding ministries.

And so as one phase of this operation starts to wind down, another phase begins, a phase that really is theimportant phase, the phase that will put in place a government of a nation that intends in the future to livein peace with its neighbors, to use the wealth of that nation for the benefit of the people of that nation,and a nation that will no longer be pursuing terrorism, and no longer be putting people in prison, will nolonger be raping, will no longer be threatening its neighbors, weapons of mass destruction gone.

I think it is a moment of hope for not only the people of Iraq, but for the people of the region and thepeople of the world. And I would be delighted to take your questions.

Question: Thank you. Mr. Secretary, the international community, clearly and unfortunately, was unable to resolve theIraqi crisis through the UN. We generated a lot of talks about how important and relevant the UN actually is.Richard Perle, for example, says that the organization will sink with Saddam Hussein's regime.

As the chief foreign policy advisor to U.S. President, do you think the UN is still relevant and importantfrom the point of view of prevention of military conflicts, not only humanitarian assistance, and do you thinkthe organization needs to be reformed?

Colin Powell: The UN remains an important organization. The President and other leaders in the coalition -- Prime MinisterBlair, President Aznar, Prime Minister Berlusconi and many others, Prime Minister Howard of Australia -- haveall indicated that they believe the UN has a role to play as we go forward in the reconstruction and therebuilding of Iraq.

The UN did come together last fall when it passed Resolution 1441 by a unanimous vote. It took seven weeksof hard negotiations to do that, from the President's speech on the 12th of September to 1441 on the 8th ofNovember. So it could come together.

Where we were unable to go forward, however, is that when it was clear that Saddam Hussein was notcomplying with his obligations under 1441 and other resolutions, many other resolutions over a 12-year period,the Security Council could not agree to come together on a second resolution that would have led to seriousconsequences.

Nevertheless, we believe that the authority that the UN had provided in 1441 and earlier resolutions gave awilling coalition more than adequate authority to impose those serious consequences, and you know the rest ofthe story.

So the UN cannot deal with every situation that comes along when there were strongly held points of view,different points of view. We've seen this before. We saw it in Kosovo a few years ago. The UN cannot solveevery problem that is brought before it. And I would hope that the Security Council and the UN leadershipwould examine perhaps other ways of dealing with situations like this as they come along.

But the UN will remain relevant. It does many important things around the world every day. The UnitedNations has paid its -- the United States has paid its arrears to the United Nations. We have put in place oureffort to rejoin UNESCO, and we believe the UN has an important role to play in the future.

Question: And, Mr. Secretary, the rhetoric seems to be ratcheted up against Syria, and accusing it of maintainingweapons of mass destruction, chemical weapons. The Syrians responded by saying that let's make the Middle Easta WMD-free zone. Do you welcome such a proposition, and can you see a situation where Israel will accede tosuch a proposition?

And on the roadmap, sir, do you believe that Sharon's response will help the roadmap or will hinder it? Isit designed to circumvent it?

Colin Powell: On the second question, with respect to the roadmap, as the President has said clearly, now that we have anew Israeli Government in place, and now that we are close to having a Prime Minister of the PalestinianAuthority appointed and confirmed by the PLC -- and we hope that will happen some time in the next week or so.When Abu Mazen is confirmed by a vote of confidence by the PLC, we will release the roadmap as it was writtenlast November, as it was finalized last -- excuse me -- last December.

And we hope that both parties will use this roadmap as a way of reaching the vision that the President laidout in his speech of 24 June last year. And that also is the vision that was laid out by the Arab Leaguenations following on the initiative of Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia.

With respect to Syria, the issues that we have raised in recent days with respect to Syria's development ofweapons of mass destruction--and you specifically mentioned chemical weapons--are issues we have raised withSyria repeatedly over the years. We are concerned about Syria's development of these kinds of weapons. We areconcerned about Syria's continuing support of terrorist organizations. And, in recent weeks, we have beenconcerned about the flow of material across the Syrian border into Iraq, as well as the flow of individualsback and forth across the Syrian-Iraq border. Some of these individuals went from Syria into Iraq to opposecoalition forces.

And we also have concerns, which we have expressed rather directly and forcefully to the Syrians, over thefact that some Iraqi officials who are guilty of crimes, or at least strongly suspected of crimes, may beseeking haven in Syria.

We don't believe Syria should find this in their interest to give refuge, to give haven to these sorts ofindividuals, who should be returned to Iraq to face the justice that will be meted out by the Iraqi people.And we will make these points to Syria strongly.

We hope that Syria understands now that there is a new environment in the region with the end of the regimeof Saddam Hussein, and that Syria will reconsider its policies of past years and understand that there arebetter choices it can make than the choices it has made in the past.

With respect to weapons of mass destruction, it has always been U.S. policy that we would like to see thatwhole region free of weapons of mass destruction.

Question: And the roadmap? Can I follow up on the roadmap?

Colin Powell: Follow up on the roadmap. Yes.

Question: Thank you. Sir, the Israelis said that they presented to you their modification on the roadmap. Have youreceived anything from the other side, from the Palestinians? And is it still open for change? You have toldus before that it is not negotiable.

And now on the settlements, on the settlements, as part of the roadmap, eh?

Colin Powell: The what?

Question: On the settlements, which is part of the roadmap, we see the Israelis are --the activities of buildingsettlements is really very high. We saw it on television. We saw reports. So what is your remarks on thesettlements?

Colin Powell: With respect to the roadmap, as I said a moment or two ago, the roadmap will be released to the parties afterMr. Abu Mazen is confirmed, and it will be the roadmap draft that was finished last December.

The Israelis have provided us some preliminary comments to the roadmap. And we expect that after theroadmap has been formally released we will receive additional comments from the Israeli side, and we alsoexpect at that time to receive comments from the Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority.

These are comments that will come in. They will be considered by the Quartet. But, really, these arecomments that both sides have to begin to discuss with each other and share with each other.

This is going to be a very difficult process, but I believe progress can be made if both sides enter thisroadmap process with an understanding of the needs of the other side and with a good faith effort to use thenew situation in the Palestinian Authority, a new leadership under the direction of Mr. Abu Mazen, and with anewly elected Government of Israel, we have a new opportunity, an opportunity, I think, that is enhanced bywhat has happened by the removal of the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein.

So we have a real chance now to get some progress. And part of that progress and part of the roadmap, anessential part of the roadmap, will be to deal with the issue of settlements. We understand that and we knowthat the Israeli Government understands that. And we will see how that works itself out.

Our position with respect to settlements is quite clear: That has to come to an end.

Question: Mr. Secretary, what kind of a role, or roles, do you envision for Turkey, your coalition partner, inpolitical restructuring of Iraq?

Colin Powell: First of all, I'd like to say that in recent weeks we've been very pleased at the cooperation we havereceived from Turkey with respect to allowing humanitarian supplies and allowing supplies for our troops tomove across Turkey and over the border in a very expeditious manner. I discussed this with the Turkishleadership when I was in Ankara two weeks ago, and I have had almost daily conversations with Foreign MinisterGul to make sure that our cooperation is solid. And that also paid off in that we were able to satisfy Turkishconcerns about Northern Iraq, thereby not requiring any incursion on the part of Turkish forces.

We will keep in very close touch with Turkish authorities as to political developments in Iraq, and I thinkas this process of meetings continues, with the first one today, there will be an opportunity for all ofIraq's neighbors to provide suggestions and input to that process. I won't prejudge now who might play a moreactive or less active role. At the meeting today, there were about five coalition countries that wererepresented at the meeting at Ur, and I expect that other coalition countries will have an opportunity to playin the development of the new government of Iraq.

Question: Mr. Secretary, could you clarify, once and for all, whether the war against terrorism affects not onlyterrorism in the United States, but also against the largest democracy, India. Because I know India hasalready introduced a dialogue. Now, dialogue has been tried for 50 years. The reason it failed is that thereare two fundamental ideas of how the state should be run. And also, when one side wants to annex the territorythat belongs to another state, with an integral part of India, and dialogue is not -- I mean, what purpose isthe dialogue?

Colin Powell: We believe that terrorism is terrorism. And it is not just an American phenomenon; it is a curse on the faceof civilization and it affects nations throughout the world. We have condemned terrorist attacks across theline of control on the subcontinent, and we will continue to do so.

We will continue to work with the Government of Pakistan and the Government of India as we move forward,and we will continue to do everything we can to lower the temperature in that part of the world, and to seewhether or not opportunities can be created for the two sides to enter into a dialogue.

Dialogue has been difficult over the years. But to solve this kind of a problem, I think dialogue is theright solution, and a resort to force would not be the appropriate solution.

Question: Mr. Secretary, on North Korea?

Colin Powell: North Korea?

Question: I talk Egypt.

Colin Powell: Okay. We'll come to you next.

Question: Mr. Secretary, a lot of fears have been made about who is next. And some people believed to be close with theadministration said that the regimes backing Cairo and in Saudi Arabia should be nervous right now. How do youaddress that point? And does the U.S. has a plan to spread a set of values at gunpoint, in your view, at thispoint?

Colin Powell: No, of course not. The President has spoken clearly about this, as recently as two days ago, over theweekend. We have concerns about Syria. We have let Syria let know of our concerns. We also have concerns aboutsome of the policies of Iran. We have made the Iranians fully aware of our concerns.

But there is no list. There is no war plan right now to go attack someone else, either for the purpose ofoverthrowing their leadership or for the purpose of imposing democratic values.

Democratic values have to ultimately come from within a society and within a nation because they believethat's the best way for them to move forward. But, you know, we will see how this develops in the variouscountries of the Middle East and the Persian Gulf in the months and years ahead.

I hope that with the example of Turkey as a democratic nation, and with a new example now of Iraq as ademocratic nation -- two strong Muslim nations -- showing that democracy is not something that has to be aliento Muslims and can work for Muslims, I hope that people throughout that part of the world will realize thebenefits that come when you have a democratic form of government that is responsive to the needs of thepeople, uses the wealth of the country to benefit the people, I hope that that will become a more and moreattractive political system throughout the region, as it is in many other parts of the world.

There should be no reason that we should be fearful of democracy in the Middle East or in the Gulf region,but each nation will have to find its own way. And Iraq was a unique case where it wasn't just a matter of adictator being there; it was a dictator terrorizing his people, raping and pillaging his own people, wastinghis treasure; but, beyond that, invading his neighbors and threatening the whole world with weapons of massdestruction and supporting terrorists activities and creating a nexus between weapons of mass destruction andterrorism, and totally ignoring the role of the international community that told him to get rid of theseweapons for a period of 12 years. And that's what led us to this point. But from this point on, the people ofIraq have a much more hopeful future to look forward to.

Question: Mr. Secretary, there seems to be some hopeful sounds coming out of your administration and North Korea on asettlement there. Do you think that there is likely to be a meeting soon between the administration and NorthKorea? And what sort of forum do you expect to attend? And how much do you think this is a flow-on from whathappened in Iraq?

Colin Powell: Very good. You're trying to get it all at once, aren't you? (Laughter.)

As you noticed from weekend commentary, there has been some overall improvement, I think, in the prospectsfor a dialogue with North Korea. We have made it clear from the very beginning of this situation that webelieve that this was a problem not just between the North Koreans and the United States, but between theNorth Koreans, the United States and its neighbors, and we wanted to approach this in a multilateral way.

The North Koreans indicated last Friday, I think it was, that forum was not as important as a dialoguebeginning. And so we are -- we are following up on that statement in diplomatic channels. And I think, as manyof you know, long before that statement we were pursuing ways of moving forward on a multilateral -- on amultilateral basis.

The Russians also made a statement last week that I think was helpful. And I think, obviously, with the endof the conflict in Iraq, people might have taken note of that as well. So I think a lot of pieces have cometogether.

But we will be following all of these ideas through diplomatic channels. And I am not prepared to announceanything today with respect to meetings, attendance levels, what is multilateral, and how best to get started,and at what level. All of these are issues we are going to be discussing with our friends.