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PRIME MINISTER PERES: Ladies and gentlemen, I welcome the Secretary upon his return from Damascus. We just had a meeting and we got the impressions of the Secretary and the information concerning the peace negotiations. I can say in one word, to summarize my own impression, and that is, things are moving ahead. We know that we have an important agenda. You cannot achieve everything in one jump but my general impression is of a positive nature. May I suggest that the Secretary speak directly to you.
SECRETARY CHRISTOPHER: Thank you, Mr. Prime Minister. As he has said, we discussed our meetings in Damascus with President Assad. We also discussed the upcoming round of negotiations at the conference center in Maryland where we will be adding security experts, military experts, to the discussions and in which the agenda will be broadened to discuss, to consider other issues as well. This new mechanism for negotiations with discussions there at the conference center in Maryland, interspersed with my visits to the region, is I think, a very promising approach.
Israel and Syria are now engaged in a more meaningful dialogue than they have been at any time in these negotiations and that is all to the good. As I said yesterday, I am convinced that we have crossed a threshold in negotiations; an important threshold has been crossed in the last few days. The challenges that remain certainly cannot be minimized but I leave the region more convinced than ever before that both the Prime Minister and President Assad are determined to do the hard work that is necessary to reach a comprehensive peace this year. President Clinton and I will do everything we can to help the parties succeed. I will be personally involved in the negotiations at the conference center in Maryland and participate at key points, where necessary. Shortly after the talks adjourn there I plan to return to the region.
Mr. Prime Minister, I believe that Israel and Syria have made very good progress since you described a new beginning when I was last here in the region and I feel confident that we can succeed.
PRIME MINISTER PERES: I would like just to say another word. We clearly agreed that our delegation will go to the Wye plantation on the 24th of this month to continue the negotiations in response to the proposal introduced by the Secretary. And then a general remark: from our experience we know that in the negotiations you have to keep the right air for a dialogue. It is not less important than the different plans introduced on the table and I feel to this very day that we have established a dialogue that may lead all of us to a real peace negotiation.
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, Shlomi Adar from Israeli Television. Before your meeting in Damascus with President Assad you said that your wish is to accelerate the negotiation between Israel and Syria. Are you disappointed this day?
SECRETARY CHRISTOPHER: Not at all. Really, the words in my statement are what I meant. I think we have crossed a threshold. We have a more meaningful dialogue than before. We have added security experts -- that is something that we have been striving to do for six months. I am just the opposite of disappointed. I am pleased with the results and I look forward to intense negotiations at the conference center at Maryland and progress.
QUESTION: Can I ask both of you gentlemen to address a confusing issue for those of us who were in Damascus yesterday. We had the impression after public and private briefings with American officials that there is a good deal of optimism about the next phase, that a threshold had indeed been crossed. But today, Israeli officials and the Israeli press have indicated something between moderate optimism to moderate disappointment. Can you help explain the discrepancy?
PRIME MINISTER PERES: I am not aware of any moderate disappointment. I don't think this is an Israeli expression. I think we got the feeling that things are moving ahead, as I have said. I know it is very difficult because the press would like us to say: 'was it a breakthrough or a breakdown.' Well, when you negotiate you are not engaging yourself in breakthroughs or breakdowns but in really moving ahead and my impression is that the visit of the Secretary to Damascus moved things ahead and things are moving ahead.
QUESTION: Let me follow up then. Is your optimism only moderate?
PRIME MINISTER PERES: No, moderate belongs to our character, but when it comes to the peace, no, I think it is a very important progress.
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary?
SECRETARY CHRISTOPHER: Well, as I said in my statement, there are some difficult challenges ahead. Nevertheless, I am hopeful, indeed, I am optimistic, and the optimism is based upon what I regard as a new atmosphere -- a more meaningful set of negotiations. It is very hard to calibrate things on a scale of moderation or something higher than that but, let me simply say that I am hopeful and optimistic that we are making good progress. I think this was a valuable set of discussions here and they achieved what I had hoped to achieve when I came back to the region.
QUESTION (in Hebrew*): Mr. Prime Minister, we heard this week conflicting opinions among the Israelis on perhaps the central question: do we have a partner in Damascus for a full peace, peace as you intend it, meaning peace between Israel and Syria? Can you now give an answer to that question?
PRIME MINISTER PERES (in Hebrew*): We have a partner. But we still have a long series of weighty issues before us. I think that it is my duty to say to the Israeli public: our principal consideration is not the speed of the negotiations but the correct content to build a relationship that will stand up to the test of reality. Therefore, everything must be checked carefully, and I must say that all together, in the last few weeks, we feel that dialogue is being established and advanced between Damascus and Jerusalem, between President Assad and us, which we value. And I hope that with time they will progress and deepen and will gather greater strength.
QUESTION: Mr. Prime Minister, are you impressed, as some of the American spinmeisters are, that President Assad has developed a sort of more informal approach. In Damascus, we were told, he sat at the table; members of hi steam asked questions. Does that suggest to you some easing of authoritarian rule; some trend that you would encourage; and does it mean something so far as an Israeli/Syrian agreement or is it just atmospherics?
PRIME MINISTER PERES: I think that our impression is really that the President of Syria has adopted a more informal approach and that is extremely important, because if you come with hard stones to create a negotiation, you will be all the time frightened and worried. It is only when you come with soft ideas that everybody can introduce freely without trying to make any conditions. And we feel that this the spirit today in Damascus too. I don't have to comment anything about the system of government in Syria. That is not my job. I am talking about the peace negotiations. And I feel very much encouraged by it because it is not the first time that we are negotiating and I compare it with our other negotiations so, what you call atmospheric is necessary to breathe the negotiation.
But there are also some issues that I feel that we made progress on. I would give, for example, an issue which is very important to President Assad and to us, and that is the comprehensive of the peace. You know, for the first time we sensed that an option was introduced to bring an end to all the wars in the Middle East and that Syria can play a leading role in it. And I am encouraged by the fact that the Syrian president is ready both to provide leadership and support to it. I mean, if we can really bring the message to all the people in the Middle East, gentlemen, maybe, we are nearing then the end of the war. It is a real message. It has nothing to do with atmospheres.
QUESTION (in Hebrew*): Mr. Prime Minister, from the beginning in Israel, there was an expectation that the Syrians would agree to extend the delegations to economists and water experts. Here they have agreed to something that was already agreed upon, to add a senior officer, a general in this case.
PRIME MINISTER PERES (in Hebrew*): That's not right. First of all they didn't agree up to now to add a military person. It's already five months that the Syrians did not agree to add someone from the military. This time they agreed. Now also on the economic side, it is agreed to talk about economic issues within the current framework, and a situation has been created that both delegations have a common language and the ability to dialogue on that subject too. Therefore I believe that there is a change -- a change for the better.
QUESTION (in Hebrew*): And do the changes answer your expectations from this round of talks with Secretary Christopher?
PRIME MINISTER PERES (in Hebrew*): Again, the expectations are that we need to add subjects to those that were discussed at Wye Plantation, and I think that an opportunity like that has been created. I want to be careful. I don't want to create the impression that all the problems have been solved. No. I say, there is progress, and certainly worthwhile progress. We will continue to proceed on this path.
SECRETARY CHRISTOPHER: It's rather bold of me to comment on an exchange that took place in a language I don't understand, but, let me emphasize, from the translator, that I am quite satisfied with the addition of experts, and that experts will be added where necessary. It is necessary now to add experts of a military character. Nothing in the discussions yesterday indicated to me that we won't be able to add experts where the teams themselves feel that they would be benefited by having somebody with more expertise.
QUESTION: Yesterday in Damascus the Secretary of State suggested a target date of the end of the year for a Syrian-Israeli agreement. That would seem to suggest that the negotiations will be running through the election campaigns in both countries. I'd like to ask both of you gentlemen if you think the election campaigns and the elections themselves will have an inhibiting affect, or any affect at all, on the negotiating process.
PRIME MINISTER PERES: We are now negotiating without any reference to the elections. For us the elections clearly means the end of the mandate of this government. I mean by the 29th of October, by law, we have to go to the people and ask for a renewal of the mandate. We shall go to the people with clear information where we stand. The Israeli public knows exactly very well that we are negotiating, negotiating seriously. And my own hope is that if the Israeli people will have to decide either to take the option of ending the war in the Middle East or postponing it, I do believe we shall get a renewed mandate. Anyway, we are not going to play politics in the negotiations.
SECRETARY CHRISTOPHER: I couldn't do better than the Prime Minister has done. These negotiations are I think of great importance. President Clinton attaches great importance to them, as obviously does the Prime Minister. Clearly the election calendar will affect the time available as we get closer to the elections, and I think that's why we must intensify and accelerate the process at the present time. But this is a tremendously important goal for the Prime Minister and for the United States and I'm sure we will continue to work and find ways to deal with the election calendar at the same time.
QUESTION: Mr. Prime Minister and Mr. Secretary, I was wondering, a week ago yesterday, at the end of the Wye talks, Israeli diplomats in Washington were saying that what had been decided in those talks, among other things, was that the talks would resume at the Wye Plantation on January 22. For us looking from the outside in, what we now know has happened is that there has been the trip by the Secretary here and the resumption of the talks is two days later than we had heard at that time. I am wondering what has happened here in this latest round of talks between all of you gentlemen, and in Damascus, that leads to your words of optimism -- beyond the resumption of these talks.
SECRETARY CHRISTOPHER: Several things have happened. First, the addition of the military experts which came quite naturally. Second, the understanding of both parties as to the definition of comprehensiveness and the understanding of both parties that if there is an agreement between Israel and Syria it will widen the circle of peace to include many, many countries in the Arab world. A common understanding on some other issues. The improvement of the atmosphere and a widened mandate to the negotiators as would be appropriate for the new issues that they'll be discussing. So that whole group of ideas, I think, lead us to feel that the net result of this trip out here, against the background of the meetings at the Conference Center, crosses a new threshold as I said. The delay of two days, Steve, is simply a technical matter and has no significance at all substantively.
PRIME MINISTER PERES: May I add that some points that were considered at the Wye Plantation as proposals became after the trip of the Secretary: understandings. I am referring to the comprehensiveness of the peace. In the Wye Plantation it was introduced, a suggestion, and now we feel that we have reached an agreement that can really become a new reality in the Middle East. The same goes, I believe, about the seriousness of the economic side. I want here to make a point which is important I believe also to the ears of our Syrian party, Israel does not want to have any advantages because of the economic understanding between Syria and ourselves. What we would like is really to see a general improvement of the economic situation in the Middle East because this may support peace. And we would like to really enable our countries to enter a new age, like many other nations. We are not looking for any particular advantage. Then I think we have also agreed on the continuation of the negotiations, the agenda, the place, the participation. All these were open-ended questions when the Wye Plantation meeting was over and after the trip this has become both an understanding and an agenda. I think that would be in addition to what the Secretary said my understanding of his visit.
QUESTION (in Hebrew*): Mr. Prime Minister, in light of the progress in the discussions at the Wye Plantation and the good atmosphere, there is disappointment in this round of the Christopher trip...
PRIME MINISTER PERES (in Hebrew*): Disappointment where?
QUESTION (in Hebrew*): ...here in the country, among the public, and there's feeling that Israel is dancing to Assad's flute, and that he is feeding us with teaspoons. Doesn't this weaken Israel's position?
PRIME MINISTER PERES (in Hebrew*): Listen, I don't like the description of flutes and teaspoons. I think he has a flute and we have a flute. What we are trying to do is to make a concert, and not that one dances to the other's tune. Secondly, it is better to eat with teaspoons than to stay hungry. If it is possible to advance the peace process by teaspoons, that's fine. All these descriptions are a bit literary. I know that negotiations take time; that they need an appropriate atmosphere; and that they need to advance progressively. And that's what is happening. I just want to be cautious and not to create the impression in the eyes of the Israeli public that all the problems are solved. They aren't solved, yet, because we are at the beginning of the negotiations. But up to now there are negotiations and there are two sides willing to conduct negotiations.
Thank you.
[end of document]
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