Washington, DC — In an Oval office meeting with President George W. Bush, Monday, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan continued pressing for U.S. troop deployment in Liberia but got no definite answer. Bush told Annan that he was still waiting on the findings of a military team that has been in Liberia for a week before making a decision.
"We want to help Ecowas [Economic Community of West African States] -- it may require troops, but we don't know how many yet. And therefore, it's hard for me to make a determination until I've seen all the facts," Bush told reporters following the meeting.
Annan has been a strong advocate of sending U.S. troops to Liberia: "I hope... that in the not-too-distant future the president will take a decision, which I hope will bring happiness to lots of people in the region," Annan told reporters at the State Department where he met with Secretary of State Colin Powell and other officials.
Meanwhile, as Liberia's shaky ceasefire threatens to unravel, the Pentagon has announced that it has sent three helicopters to Sierra Leone and a special operations transport plane to Senegal, along with 100 support staff, with the mission of providing a rapid exit for the military assessment team now in Liberia, should it prove necessary.
In his brief remarks, Bush seemed to suggest that he was willing to send at least some U.S. troops into Liberia if Liberian president Charles Taylor leaves. "We want to enable Ecowas to get in and help create the conditions necessary for the cease-fire to hold; that [Liberian President Charles] Taylor must leave; that we'll participate with the troops. We're in the process still of determining what is necessary," Bush said.
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At the State Department, Annan told reporters that following Taylor's departure from Liberia he envisaged the introduction of an Ecowas force which would reinforced by U.S. troops who would in turn leave and be replaced by a United Nations multinational force. "President Taylor will leave Liberia, then the force will be strengthened, hopefully with U.S. participation and additional troops from the West African region," Mr Annan said.
On this, Annan and Bush seemed to be in sync. "I think everybody understands any commitment we had would be limited in size and limited in tenure. Our job would be to help facilitate an Ecowas presence, which would then be converted into a UN peacekeeping mission," Bush said.
"We would be there to facilitate and then to -- and then to leave," said Bush, who also characterized the meeting as having achieved "a meeting of the minds."
Monday's meeting was the first face-to-face meeting between Bush and Annan since a contentious January UN Security Council debate over a failed resolution that would have authorized U.S. military action in Iraq.
