24 January 2005
Powell in Ukraine Tells Yushchenko U.S. Wants to Help
Powell, President-elect Yushchenko at the beginning of their meeting
Secretary of State Colin Powell reiterated President Bush’s pledge to Ukrainian President-elect Victor Yushchenko that the United States would do “everything we can to help you meet the expectations that the Ukrainian people now have.”
Powell spoke January 23 in Kiev, Ukraine, prior to attending Yushchenko’s inauguration. He praised “this magnificent success on your part to prevail in open, free and fair elections and now to become President.”
The day before, Powell told reporters en route to Kiev that “there are many things we could do to help them. We have experience in reform efforts; we have experience in the development of civil society, political institutions."
Although Powell submitted his resignation as Secretary of State in November, he is continuing in the job until the U.S. Senate confirms his successor.
Following is the State Department transcript:
(begin transcript)
U.S. Department of State
Office of the Spokesman
January 24, 2005
REMARKS BY SECRETARY OF STATE COLIN L. POWELL AND UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT-ELECT VICTOR YUSHCHENKO AT THE BEGINNING OF THEIR MEETING
January 23, 2005
Kiev, Ukraine
PRESIDENT-ELECT YUSHCHENKO (in Ukrainian): First of all, it's my pleasure to welcome you to Ukraine again. You are living in a very special time here - what you are going to see at the Maidan [Independence Square] and the whole of the Ukrainian public and the great expectations we are having. I'm sure you're going to see hundreds of thousands of people with bright, sparkling eyes. And this is the result of really tremendous work which has been done for the past six months and I'm extremely happy that my team has been able to plan a concept that would be so appealing to people. But this would not have happened if we didn't have the partners we had that are advocating democratic principles and shared democratic values, and I certainly include in this list the United States of America and your personal contribution.
SECRETARY POWELL: Thank you very much, Mr. President-Elect. I can't tell you how honored I am to be here today with my delegation representing President Bush and the American people. As the President said to you yesterday in the phone call that you had, the United States wants to do everything we can to help you meet the expectations that the Ukrainian people now have as a result of the turmoil that you have been through, which has now resulted in this magnificent success on your part to prevail in open, free and fair elections, and now to become President.
(end transcript)
(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
This page printed from: http://usinfo.state.gov/xarchives/display.html?p=washfile-english&y=2005&m=January&x=200501241331041CJsamohT0.3497278&t=livefeeds/wf-latest.html
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