Source: http://www.un.int/usa/06_183.htm http://www.un.int/usa/06_183.htm Date: July 24, 2006 USUN PRESS RELEASE #  183(06)   July 24, 2006 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE   Remarks by Ambassador John R. Bolton, U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations, on the straw poll for the next Secretary General, at the UN Security Council Stakeout, July 24, 2006 Ambassador Bolton: OK, why don’t we get started? As you know we’ve just had our first straw ballot for the selection of the next Secretary General and by agreement of the Council members we’re not going to discuss what the votes have been. The candidates will be…the Permanent Representatives of the countries that have endorsed candidates will be told what their candidate got, and they will be told the highest votes in each of the categories, encourage, discourage or no opinion. So that they can then draw whatever conclusions they wish to draw. I think there are two significant aspects of what we did here today. The first is to hold a straw ballot so early in the year, so early in the season. I think this is consistent with what we talked about in February with the U.S. Presidency that we hoped to advance the selection process for Secretary General to begin it as early as was practicable, looking toward making a decision at the end of September early October. So today was the first step. We have made no decision whether there will be additional straw polls. Although, you go back to 1991 and 1996 there certainly were. But to hold the straw ballot this early is very significant. And the second significance I think is that as the various candidates consider what the votes were compared with what they received there may now be decisions either for additional candidates to enter the race or for one or more candidates in the race to drop out. That’s obviously a question for the candidates themselves to decide based on their own assessment of how the vote went. But that I think…those are the two points of real significance today and particularly that we are beginning this process as early as we are. Reporter: Does the U.S. have a clear feeling, a favorite, an idea that this person stands out head and shoulders above the rest. Ambassador Bolton: Well, you know we never discuss our preferences and I think that’s wise because to give an indication really may or may not advantage the candidate or candidates that we most favor. So that’s why it has been the historical position of the United States not to give an indication one way or another. Reporter: If that applies to us that must apply to other Council members and among you. So why would nations necessarily feel compelled to vote honestly in the straw poll. It seems like there might be something to gain to keep these guys beating at each other a little bit and not give them any indication either way. Ambassador Bolton: Well I can’t speak for how any of the other countries voted. We voted according to our preferences, as we understand them at this point. I guess I should say one thing about this straw poll that is not necessarily true for future straw polls there was no differentiation between the votes permanent members and the votes of non-permanent members. One way that’s been done in the past is to have two different color ballots. So that for example if you were actually in a voting situation and a permanent member voted no that would be a veto of a candidate. Now that’s not what we are about at this point…we’re in the encourage/discourage/no opinion mode and we don’t know how the votes were distributed, how the permanent members voted compared to how the non-permanent members voted. Reporter: All these four candidates were Asian candidates; given the results today do you think its time for some people from outside Asia to step forward and into their candidacy now? Ambassador Bolton: I think as we’ve said consistently what we want is the best person from wherever in the world they might come and now its up to candidates whether they are from Asia or from other regions to make a decision whether to have a member government put their name forward. And remember that’s the requirement. Why did we vote among these four because member governments sent a letter to the President of the Security Council, four separate letters, asking that these individuals be considered. Reporter: President Bush indicated that it was Asia’s turn. Can you say that some candidates gained significantly more encouragement than others in this straw poll? Ambassador Bolton: I think as the White House Press guidance, which I’m sure you would check, if asked do to so, said there was no change in our position and that the President meant to indicate, and I think its really not appropriate for me to even give is it bigger than a bread box estimates of what the votes are. We said we’re not going to talk about the votes and the Security Council members are not going to talk about the votes and I think I really should leave it that way. Reporter: Ambassador, President Bush said on the record that we are now looking for Asian candidates. Ambassador Bolton: I think what he said was what the conventional wisdom is but again if you’ll refer to the White House Press Guidance that explains that there is really no change in our position. Question: Without going into detail, do you think this exercise gave a general indication as to the satisfactory nature of the candidates that are out there now? Amb. Bolton: Well, I don’t really want to draw any conclusions one way or the other but I think the reason we decided not to make the results of the straw ballot public was so that the individual candidates could draw their own conclusions. We will see if they draw any conclusions one way or the other once they have had a chance to consider the results. Question: Mr. Ambassador, are you encouraging women to step forward? Would you like to see a woman as Secretary-General? Amb. Bolton: I have said repeatedly that with all this talk of rotation, regional rotation and the rest of it, it is striking there is so little talk of gender rotation. We have had one gender for sixty years, so maybe that would, if you are going to be in that business of rotation, maybe you would want to consider that as well. Question: Did any candidate get a definite “encourage” or “discourage” - without going into any names - and since this process takes place only every five years, less time than the World Cup, can you describe the atmosphere in the room: what happened, what did it look like…it’s interesting to us, we don’t have access… Amb. Bolton: Well, again, I am not going to get into qualitative descriptions of how balloting went. It was the PermReps plus one representative from each country. Ballots were on pieces of paper, which we folded into quarters and, after we marked them up, put them into the ballot box which was carried around by a representative of the French delegation. We picked by lot two scrutinizers which turned out to be China and Slovakia. So that everybody could watch, the ballots were counted. The result was announced ballot-by-ballot and then aggregated. And the mood was professional. The French delegation handed out pens all of the same color so there would be no way to tell among the different ballots. I ascertained that the pens were from the Secretariat so I gave mine back for budget purposes. We have not made any decision on when the next meeting will be. Question: Did you write the first letter of each “favorable,” “ not favorable” or did you just write the whole word? Amb. Bolton: We made check marks on a ballot that was designed for the process. Question: Was it a box…? Amb. Bolton: There were no chads…no dimpled chads, no pregnant chads, no hanging chads, so I had very little work to do except to make my marks. Question: The confirmation process is like going for a job interview. If you were trying to make a table of all of your accomplishments here for the time you have been at the UN, could you sort of give us a kind of list of what you are proudest of being here? Amb. Bolton: I will pleased to address that on Thursday when I appear before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which is exactly the answer you knew I was going to give. Question: Are you looking forward to appearing? Amb. Bolton: Certainly. Question: Are you in favor of the candidacy of Amb. Bolton? Amb. Bolton: Do I favor his candidacy? Yeah, I’m pretty partisan about the guy... Question: On the Iran draft, are the Russians and Chinese still working, are they working on the draft you were working on or do they have their own separate language and how likely do you think anything is going to come of it? Amb. Bolton: As I said earlier, I felt we had made some progress but obviously more work needs to be done. We are going to meet tomorrow morning and see where we are.