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MCCURRY BRIEFING ON CLINTON-PRIMAKOV MEETING

(March 17 meeting held in Clinton's residence) (3480)

Washington -- Russian Foreign Minister Yevgeniy Primakov met with President Clinton in the president's residence at the White House March 17 and the two "went through in a very detailed way those issues that are on the agenda for the two Presidents when they meet in Helsinki," said White House spokesman Mick McCurry.

PRESS BRIEFING BY MIKE MCCURRY
The Briefing Room
4:34 P.M. EST

Q. Did the Russian Foreign Minister link the dispute over NATO expansion to the lagging effort to get the START Treaty resolved or to other arms control measures? Did he suggest that this was having a negative impact on arms control generally?

MR. MCCURRY: Well, I think it's known that they have some views about how issues intersect and relate, but our thinking is quite clear: we consider ratification of START II important. It is vital to the future of arms reduction and continuing arms control efforts, and we certainly have made that clear in our discussions. ...........

Q. Mike, did you make any progress or was there any progress either on CFE or any discussion at all about the outlines of a START III?

MR. MCCURRY: The President mentioned the conventional forces in Europe discussions that have occurred in Geneva and elsewhere and the position advanced by the U.S. side, and talked about the importance of that and said that he hoped the Foreign Minister would relay that to President Yeltsin. And of course, a large part of these discussions over the last several days have been about the ratification of START II and the future of strategic arms reductions beyond that.

Q. But did the President talk in broad outlines about what the United States would like to see or could imagine inside a START III agreement?

MR. MCCURRY: He didn't talk in detail about that, but he referenced some of the detailed discussions that have occurred over the weekend about that. ...................

Q. On ABM, TMD, the Russians care a lot about --

MR. MCCURRY: And we do, too. Resolving those demarkation issues are critical to us.

Q. Do you have any sense they're sort of willing to think more about the world as it is now as opposed to the world as it may be 20 years from now?

MR. MCCURRY: I think there is a great deal of thinking. That's about all I can say at this point -- a great deal of thinking going into their position, and I think the Foreign Minister presented their thinking quite well. But it's clearly an issue that will require further exchanges even perhaps between the two Presidents.

Q. So lots of work still to do on this issue, too?

MR. MCCURRY: Right. When I hinted last week that we were not anticipating major breakthroughs or resolving some of these outstanding efforts, I was not simply lowering expectations.