Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)

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QUESTION: On Iraq, sir, the Saudi Crown Prince Abdallah is coming for a chance to our countries to talk to Iraq leaders regarding the problem of the disarmament there and to avoid any possible war in that country. How do you look to such plan?

MR. BOUCHER: I don't have anything specific to say about what Saudi leaders might plan, but we've made clear that for any leaders in the region who may or may not be talking to Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi leadership, it's important that everybody make clear to Iraq that this can be solved peacefully if Iraq disarms peacefully, and that those choices are ones that Iraq should make: to disarm peacefully and cooperate with the United Nations.

Over here.

QUESTION: The UN experts' meeting, Hans Blix and the IAEA, have said they need about another year to fully conduct their weapons inspections in Iraq. And over the weekend there have been some talks with the Turkish Government about using some of the bases if we were to go to war against Iraq. Is -- and I know for, I guess, a year or more you've been hearing about the ongoing talks in Cyprus. Is any of this being tied together with the Turks by the whole ending of the Cyprus problem?

MR. BOUCHER: These are all issues we've discussed with the Turkish Government, but I'm not aware that they're all being tied together, no.

QUESTION: Going back to the first question, can you comment on the one-year statement?

MR. BOUCHER: Yes, the issue is not some arbitrary period of time. The issue is Iraq's disarmament. And what the UN resolution required was active cooperation. And so these reports that are being provided by the inspectors as we go forward are to indicate whether or not Iraq is cooperating. You saw what they said in a preliminary fashion on January 9th, that while there's been superficial cooperation, essentially, Iraq was not coming clean. And they will report again to us in a slightly more formal way on January 27th. That's an important date for the report. We will look at it and we'll decide what the appropriate steps are after that.

But the point is that Iraq was given a final opportunity to cooperate, and it's cooperation that matters.

QUESTION: Richard, next week, actually a week from today, which is a week before the 27th, this -- well, first of all, can you confirm that the Secretary is going to go to this UN meeting?

MR. BOUCHER: I did last week.

QUESTION: Well, you said he expected to go. He's definitely going to go?

MR. BOUCHER: January 20th, yes.

QUESTION: How much --

MR. BOUCHER: Terrorism meeting.

QUESTION: It's not your meeting. It's a French meeting, and recognizing that the subject is broadly counterterrorism, does the Secretary expect to have any talks about Iraq either during that meeting or separate bilats while he's up at the UN?

MR. BOUCHER: I would imagine that foreign ministers in one place all at the same time, or many of them at the same time, would take the opportunity to meet with each other and talk about issues like Iraq and North Korea and anything else that's going on.

Yes.

QUESTION: Is the Department going to announce a list of Iraqi war criminals, including the President?

MR. BOUCHER: I have not heard of any such plans right now.

QUESTION: There are reports about the administration drawing up a list of potential war criminals.

MR. BOUCHER: I have seen things like that from time-to-time. I'm not aware of anything new, but I'll double check again if you want me to.

QUESTION: Can I follow-up?

MR. BOUCHER: Please.

QUESTION: Is it in the working that you will categorize Mr. Saddam Hussein as a war criminal?

MR. BOUCHER: I wouldn't make any particular assumptions at this point on what we might categorize, but certainly we've been aware of his many crimes, and we've been collecting information on his many crimes for a number of years.

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