Interview on ABC This Week With George Stephanopoulos
Secretary Condoleezza Rice
Washington, DC
April 30, 2006
QUESTION: Good morning, everyone. We begin today with the Secretary of State and she's just back from another whirlwind
tour. If it's Sunday, it must be Washington.
SECRETARY RICE: Good morning. It must be Washington, finally.
QUESTION: Let's begin with Iran. Since the IAEA, International Atomic Energy Agency, filed their report on Friday
against Iran's nuclear program, they've made two moves over the weekend, at least two announcements. So one spokesperson
said they're willing to accept spot inspections of their facilities. Another said they're willing to talk about this
proposal that the Russians have put on the table about having enrichment of uranium take place in Russia, not Iran.
Are these substantive proposals or stalling tactics?
SECRETARY RICE: Well, we have heard from Iran every time they get close to a Security Council decision; there's some
effort to say, oh no, we really were, in fact, interested in that proposal that we rejected just a few weeks ago, or no,
now the IAEA can come. They've had plenty of time to cooperate.
QUESTION: So they're playing games?
SECRETARY RICE: I think they're playing games. But obviously, if they're not playing games, they should come clean, they
should stop the enrichment, suspend the enrichment. They should answer the list of demands that were in the IAEA Board
of Governors resolution and in the presidential statement of the Security Council, and then they can get back to
negotiations. So the path for Iran is very clear and the path by which they could get civil nuclear energy is also very
clear.
QUESTION: Meanwhile, the United States is going to start on the path toward sanctions in the UN Security Council this
week, start talking to the allies. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell was in London this morning talking about that
and he said there's very limited sanctions that are really possible right now. And he went on to say this:
"The Iranians have looked at this very carefully and they have examined their situation and they have decided to go
forward even in the face of potential sanctions, which suggests to me that they have pretty much decided that they can
accept whatever sanctions are coming their way."
Is he right?
SECRETARY RICE: Well, we'll see. Because I do know also that the Iranians are doing everything that they can to get this
out of the Security Council. One of the things that they said is let's put this back in the IAEA, this really doesn't
belong in the Security Council, which suggests to me that they are indeed somewhat concerned that the Security Council
might move to the kinds of measures that could further isolate Iran.
QUESTION: But Russia and China still aren't there.
SECRETARY RICE: Well, we're going to take this one step at a time. The Under Secretary for Political Affairs Nick Burns
will be traveling this week to talk with the political directors about how we move forward. We can't just go back and
have another presidential statement, so it's likely that we will try to move to a Chapter 7 resolution, which is a
resolution in the UN that compels behavior from a member-state.
At that point, we can then look to see what measures might be taken. But the international community's credibility is at
stake here and we have a choice, too: We can either mean what we say when we say that Iran must comply or we can
continue to allow Iran to defy.
QUESTION: In that interview, Secretary Powell also said that before the Iraq war he advised the President and his
military advisors to put more troops on the ground. And when you were in Britain a couple of week ago, you were speaking
figuratively but you said we've made a thousand mistakes before. Was that one of them, not following Secretary Powell's
advice?
SECRETARY RICE: The President listened to the advice of his advisors and ultimately he listened to the advice of his
commanders, the people who actually had to execute the war plan. And he listened to them several times. When the war
plan was put together, it was put together also with consideration of what would happen after Saddam Hussein was
actually overthrown, and General Tommy Franks, of course through Secretary Rumsfeld, made a proposal to the President
for the right number of troops for the plan, and that's what he followed.
QUESTION: You were in Iraq this week with Secretary Rumsfeld and there's talk now of troop reductions, troop
withdrawals. After you left, the Iraqi National Security advisor Muwafaq al-Rubaie actually laid out a conditional
timetable for withdrawal. I want to show you what he said:
"By the end of this year the number of multinational forces or the coalition forces probably would be less than 100,000,
by the end of next year the overwhelming majority of the coalition would have left the country, and probably by middle
of 2008 there will be no foreign soldier in the country."
No foreign soldiers in 2008. I know you've said and the President has said that any withdrawals are going to be based on
security conditions, but how realistic is that timetable?
SECRETARY RICE: Well, we talked with the Iraqi leadership during this recent trip last week and they want to be able to
take responsibility for their own security and we want them to be able to take responsibility. They recognize, though,
that their security forces are not quite ready. Their security forces are --
QUESTION: So that's a little too optimistic?
SECRETARY RICE: Well, I don't know if it's optimistic. Let's get their security forces ready, let's see what they're
capable of doing. They are taking more territory themselves. They are taking on more responsibility, for instance, for
the highway between the airport and the international zone, which they've done in some ways better than we did. They've
been able to secure it better than we did.
So we will take this a step at a time. The President has made very clear that he's going to listen to his commanders for
what troop levels are needed. We're going to train Iraqi security forces as rapidly as possible. And most importantly,
we're going to continue to put this in a political context in which the Iraqi Government drains support for insurgency
by the fact that they are indeed a national unity government. And those elements together should allow more
responsibility to Iraqis and less responsibility to coalition forces over the next several months.
QUESTION: What is going to trigger, though, the first reductions, this next plan of 30- or 40,000 troops? What's it
going to take? Will simply forming a government be enough?
SECRETARY RICE: Oh, I think forming a government is an important step but we also have to look at the security situation
on the ground. Now, we're doing different kinds of things than we were doing earlier in this conflict. The training of
security forces is one of the most important things that our forces are doing on the ground. We are still doing some, as
we would call it, kinetic or active military operations against the terrorists, as we did just this last couple of days
in Ramadi. But more and more, Iraqis are taking a lot more responsibility for patrols, taking a lot more responsibility
for security in places like Baghdad. When I actually had to travel the road during my previous trip to Iraq because of
weather, you notice that there are Iraqi forces, Iraqi soldiers, along those roads. And so I think that everybody wants
to make sure that what we're doing is matching the forces to the conditions and to the demands on the ground.
QUESTION: Let's talk about the situation in Darfur, the Sudan. You and the President described it as a genocide. The UN
reported this week there had been 200,000 more refugees just in the last couple months. Rallies all across the United
States today to focus more attention on this issue and there's a deadline for the peace talks.
I know that you and the entire government have been frustrated for some time that you haven't been able to get agreement
on a peacekeeping force. The Sudanese Government hasn't agreed to that. Is it time to take more forceful action?
SECRETARY RICE: Well, we are taking forceful action in really pressing the case now that UN forces, a UN blue-hatted
mission, is going to have to be put together which could then support -- be supported by NATO, which might be willing --
will be willing, I think, to give logistical support and intelligence support and perhaps mobility support. Everybody
understands that we're not talking about Western forces on the ground. The political dynamic, I think, would not allow
that.
QUESTION: But those forces still require the acceptance of the Sudanese Government. They have been stalling. At what
point does the United States, does the international community, say we don't care if they're going to accept it anymore,
we have to go in and stop this genocide.
SECRETARY RICE: Well, we are going to continue to press the Sudanese Government and we're continuing to not just talk to
them but, of course, we're taking some actions against those in the Sudanese Government who are responsible for this.
Just last week --
QUESTION: Only four individuals.
SECRETARY RICE: Well, but it's four individuals who now know that their role in this terrible crisis is being noted by
the international community and, if necessary, we will do more. We also do need more support, frankly, from other
members of the international community, from China, from Russia, which abstained on this resolution.
And I was at NATO on Thursday and Friday. We had a talk about getting more support from the African Union, which has
said that they want to see a UN force. I might just also note that I've been discussing -- talked on the phone this
morning with people who have been following the Abuja talks and there is some progress being made in the Abuja talks.
Obviously --
QUESTION: So will they extend the deadline?
SECRETARY RICE: Well, obviously, a peace agreement would be a very important step forward in getting this done. I don't
know if they will extend, but there clearly has been some progress and the United States has been one of the most active
states in doing this.
But, George, let me just say, the President has passion about this issue. You can see it when he talks about it. We
cannot be in a situation in which we don't react to this, and the United States has been at the lead in humanitarian
relief, we've been at the lead in pushing for -- with Kofi Annan for a UN force, we've been at the lead at trying to get
NATO to be responsive to what the AU may need, and we've been in the lead in helping the existing AU forces on the
ground. We will continue to be very active in our diplomacy in Abuja and very active in our diplomacy with the
international community.
QUESTION: Finally, while you were overseas, the issue of gas prices exploded here at home this week, and several
senators say that part of the reason for the high prices is that the oil-producing nations in OPEC are basically an
illegal cartel and they've asked the President to take action against those nations through the World Trade
Organization. Are you for that?
SECRETARY RICE: Well, what we're for is getting and keeping production up. And the countries that are oil producers have
pretty good incentive at this point to produce, given the high prices.
QUESTION: The high prices.
SECRETARY RICE: And they also have an incentive recognizing that if there's a slowdown in the international economy that
there will be less need eventually for oil. But we have both a long-term problem and a short-term problem. The
short-term problem we are seeing, we're seeing at the gas pump. The President outlined some measures to try to deal with
that. He's obviously attentive to whether or not there is any manipulation or gouging through processes that are
available to examine that.
But he also has talked about the long-term needs. We need to reduce our reliance on oil. We need to diversify the basis
of our energy economy. We need to deal with the long-term promise of technologies that may get us out of this trap. But
I can tell that if anything has surprised me as Secretary of State, it is the degree to which the kind of search for
hydrocarbons is distorting international politics. That means that the quicker we get about the business of reducing our
reliance on oil, the better we're going to be.
QUESTION: Madame Secretary, thank you very much.
SECRETARY RICE: Thank you.
2006/432
ENDS