U.S. and Hong Kong (2002)

State Department Noon Briefing Transcript

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QUESTION: Richard, the Deputy Director of the Taiwan Affairs Office from China was here yesterday. Is there anything you can tell us about his meeting with Secretary Armitage?

MR. BOUCHER: He is having a number of meetings, and I think in fact his meetings are continuing today. This is Mr. Zhou Mingwei from China. I don't have a readout at this point of our discussions, but let me see if we can get you something when it's over.

QUESTION: -- who are involved in the meetings at all?

MR. BOUCHER: Assistant Secretary Kelly from our Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs. As you note, he did meet yesterday with Deputy Secretary Armitage. And so these are a series of consultations on where they stand, where we stand, and reaffirmation from our part of our One China policy.

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QUESTION: You mentioned the reaffirmation of the One China policy. In these meetings with the Chinese official, did people here also reaffirm that the United States will do what it takes to defend Taiwan?

MR. BOUCHER: We have -- whenever I mention the One China policy, I usually remember to mention the three communiqus and the Taiwan Relations Act, which are all part of that policy for us. And in the Taiwan Relations Act you'll see the -- not only policy pledge but the legal requirement to continue to provide for the legal -- legitimate defensive needs of the people on Taiwan. That is something we actually discussed yesterday as well.

Let me go back here for a second, and then we'll --

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QUESTION: About two weeks ago when Chinese President Jiang Zemin visited Iceland, under his pressure groups of U.S. citizens who are also Falun Gong practitioners were blocked to board the airplane headed to Iceland. And earlier this week, a 68-years-old American woman who is also a practitioner of Falun Gong was refused to enter Hong Kong. And obviously there is a blacklist of Falun Gong practitioners in the US.

My question is what action the U.S. Government will take to prevent this kind of human rights violation more effectively?

MR. BOUCHER: I would just say we've always supported the freedom of travel of our citizens, and when we become aware of these cases we always raise them with foreign governments. That's about as far as I can go on that.

QUESTION: Can I go back to the UN?

MR. BOUCHER: Sure.

QUESTION: A couple weeks ago -- I don't think four weeks ago yet -- but a couple of weeks ago, you guys said that you were expelling an Iraqi diplomat for activities incompatible with his diplomatic status. I understand that under the terms of your host agreement the Iraqis had a right to challenge that or to dispute it. I am wondering: (a) if you know if they did; and if they didn't, if this person has now left.

MR. BOUCHER: I'll have to check. I hadn't checked up on that.

QUESTION: Same kind of issue as the Chinese woman. Are you aware that Louis Farrakhan plans to go to Israel on the 5th of July, and Israel has said it won't let him in?

MR. BOUCHER: I'm not aware of his specific travel dates or prospects. I think he did make us aware that he intended to travel, and some of our experts talked to him about that trip.

QUESTION: Is that something you've complained to Israel about, then, if he's not allowed to enter that country?

MR. BOUCHER: I'll have to see. In the end, all these decisions, whether it's Iceland or Israel or Hong Kong, are made by the authorities based on their own laws. We always think it's better to let people travel and let people in, and we make that point, but we recognize that nations and governments have authority.

QUESTION: I think you spoke earlier about this before, but this coming Monday there's a -- the first -- the world's first permanent war crimes court is going to open at The Hague. And there is stiff opposition to this by the US, Russia and China.

Is it a case that we're waiting for Russia and China to make -- to drop their opposition, or what --

MR. BOUCHER: No, we're opposed. This is the International Criminal Court that we've been discussing. We think this court operates on the basis of prosecutions without higher authority. And the last administration signed it but said they didn't seek ratification. This administration has said, like them, that we didn't seek ratification and therefore has taken the action that we took a couple months ago at the United Nations to say that we didn't feel we were bound by the terms and conditions, we didn't feel we were bound by the signature.

The principle involved is one that is very important to us, because we have global commitments, global commitments that support international security and international peacekeeping. We are all over the world as Americans trying to protect international security. We have many more people in that role than any other nation on earth.

We also have very strong codes of conduct and very strong rules for our own soldiers, and we think that they should be accountable to us and that they should not be accountable to a prosecutor internationally who himself or herself is not accountable to some higher authority like the UN Security Council.

QUESTION: In other words, you'll be waiting to -- once this gets underway, for some type of liaison to the UN or to other organizations?

MR. BOUCHER: Well, what we're trying to do is to avoid having the entry into force of this court impede our ability to carry out the very important role that we have carried out to help maintain international peace and security. So if it's in the UN authorized forces in East Timor or Bosnia or wherever else, we will try to make sure that U.S. personnel who participate in those things are given this immunity from prosecution by the Court.

And in other cases, as one of your colleagues pointed out, we will sign agreements with governments where U.S. peacekeepers might be to ensure that our national authority over our own people -- which is very careful, which is very judicious and which is very strict -- that that national authority can apply.

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(The briefing was concluded at 1:20 p.m. EDT.)

(end State Department transcript)