United States Department of State (Washington, DC)
5 September 2008
press conference
Washington, DC — Briefing On the History of Libya’s WMD Effort and Dismantlement Program and Libya’s Renunciation of Terrorism
Paula A. DeSutter, Assistant Secretary of State for Verification, Compliance, and Implementation
Washington, DC
September 3, 2008
Additional Speakers:
Dell L. Dailey, Coordinator for Counterterrorism
Donald A. Mahley, Special Negotiator for Non-Proliferation
MR. MCINTURFF: Well, thank you all very much for coming. This is a wonderful turnout for the first day of school. (Laughter.) We have a special briefing this morning on Libya. We’re going to run through our three speakers – each have a few quick opening remarks – and then we will open it up for questions. Our speakers have limited time, so we’ll try and keep to that and let them get back to their workday.
The order in which we’ll do this: We’ll start with Assistant Secretary Paula DeSutter, who is Assistant Secretary for Verification, Compliance, and Implementation. We also have with us Coordinator for Counterterrorism Dell Dailey and Special Negotiator for Non-Proliferation Don Mahley right here.
So, without further ado.
ASSISTANT SECRETARY DESUTTER: Well, thank you. I think probably a lot of you have been around throughout the Libya process. I think I recognize a few faces. The Verification, Compliance, Implementation Bureau was the lead and coordinator for the U.S. effort to assist Libya in their WMD elimination. And I would remind you of just a couple things.
First, Secretary Rice was, at the time this was negotiated and implemented, the National Security Advisor. And so back in the days when no one within the bureaucracy really knew that this deal was forthcoming, the Secretary was leading that effort to try to get them to make the commitment. Secretary Powell at the time was very much involved and had said, at the very beginning, look, verification and elimination comes first, and only following the verification and elimination are we going to start to have the benefits begin rolling.
So we had set up benchmarks. And once the Libyans met those benchmarks, there were a clear set of activities that would flow from it. Early on, it was mostly lifting sanctions. There were – there was a interlocking web of international and national sanctions on Libya that, in some cases, made it very difficult even for us to implement the WMD elimination. What was critical at the time was that – and we didn’t know it at the beginning. And we tried to move fast. We wanted to remove especially the proliferation sensitive materials before anybody could change their mind. But what we discovered over time was that the Libyan Government had indeed made a strategic commitment to eliminate their materials, eliminate their WMD programs. And that decision having been made at the top, it was fully implemented. And there was a very cooperative and transparent program – not always smooth, not always easy, but we were able to work those things out.
Don Mahley, at the time, was our senior WMD rep at the beginning when we were trying to move fast and remove materials. Karin Look, who is my Deputy Assistant Secretary, is here and she was – has been the senior WMD rep for – a year and a half, two years?
MS. LOOK: After that – after Don --
ASSISTANT SECRETARY DESUTTER: After Don was finished. With that, I’ll just say one other thing. We – the Secretary and I chatted about this a little bit this morning. And she was remarking on how important this model was, and it’s true and we’d like to build upon it. It demonstrated that even when there is a country whose leadership we’ve had very difficult challenges with over a long period of time – if that country changes critical behavior that you have a terrible problem with – in this case, terrorism and WMD acquisition – that change in regime behavior can move – remove the necessity for calling for regime changes other administrations had done.
And with that, I’ll stop and turn it over.
AMBASSADOR DAILEY: My name is Dell Dailey. I’m the Coordinator for Counterterrorism. The Secretary’s September visit to Libya really does show a change and a new chapter in our relationships, our bilateral relationships with Libya. It’s the first visit since 1953, John Foster Dulles, almost 50 years or so – 55 years, so it is a heck of a signal.
It’s going to allow us to expand cooperation in a lot of areas: education, culture, commerce, science, technology, human rights, and security. My aspect is, of course, counterterrorism security. I’m pleased to be here with folks who have been part of this process for a heck of a long time. I frankly had just watched it up until a year and a half ago as a concerned citizen; saw it as a success story and now, I’m pleased to be a part of it in the governmental perspective.
Coming off of the state sponsor terrorism list is a pretty powerful tool. And both with the Libyans and with the North Koreans, it was a request on their part for us to extend this if they went through the appropriate WMD and nuclear and denuclearization process. It is a model for other countries to use and I’d like to echo what Paula said. We both took it from the same source: from the Secretary. They’ve been off the list since June 2006. And in that timeframe, there’s been some very close cooperation in virtually all the areas of counterterrorism across the national aspect: diplomatic, military, intelligence services, economics. So it’s been a good move.
Where Libya has really been strong as – they’ve slowed down the movement of foreign fighters from their country through North Africa and ultimately, into Iraq. They’ve been good team members and partners on that. They’ve additionally been good team members on looking inside their own borders for potential foreign fighters that have gone across Northern Africa into Iraq. And now, we see a little bit of a shift possibly even into Afghanistan.
And my final comment is an example of their cooperation not just with the United States, but with there are other countries there, foreign fighters that have moved from Libya into Syria that have been stopped by the Syrians have gone back to Libya. So there is a level of cooperation that’s increased dramatically in this timeframe, too.
With that, I’ll close my comments, turn it over to Don, and I’ll be prepared to field any other questions you have in the future.
AMBASSADOR MAHLEY: Well, thank you. Let me just say that while you heard some sort of overviews up to this point, I’d like to focus for just a minute or so on a vignette which is a specific element of what kind of things we want to talk about concretely from the positive benefits of this kind of cooperation.
I would like to note that we are in the process, with United States financial assistance, of building in Libya a regional nuclear medical center. Now, this is something which is not yet present in Africa and will allow Libya to assume a role of leadership in some of the preventive medical capabilities that go about there. It is something, obviously, that involves nuclear technology and therefore is possible in Libya only after they made their 2003 decision to get rid of their nuclear weapons programs. It will benefit both the Libyan people and the Libyan Government in terms of its regional capabilities and its regional reputation. It is a significant outlay of United States dollars. It is also a significant outlay of Libyan talent and resources.
And so with all of that, I think it’s just an example -- and I want to point out that it’s only an example, of the kinds of things that this kind of behavior change by Libya opens the door for and allows us to go forward with in a very cooperative fashion. We’re doing some other things that we’re working with the Libyans on, but I think this is really a centerpiece that they’ve asked for, that satisfies some needs in terms of the use and employment of some of the people that were previously engaged in things of not such useful behavior with their same technologies, and, at the same, time does indeed advance not only Libyan interests, but also interests within the region.
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