Source: http://www.un.int/usa/06_068.htm http://www.un.int/usa/06_068.htm
Date: April 6, 2006

United States Mission to the United Nations
USUN PRESS RELEASE # 68 (06)   
April 6, 2006
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE	 	 
Remarks by Ambassador Bolton on the Human Rights Council, Sudan and the Capital Master Plan, at the Security Council Stakeout, April 6, 2006
Reporter:  Ambassador, the $100 million plan, you’ve proposed $23 million, obviously with a view toward the American taxpayer, what’s your view of this and the amount that has been requested or is being considered? 
Ambassador Bolton:  Well, we’re looking at exactly what the final American position will be on the Capital Master Plan.  And until we have a decision and have consulted appropriately with Congress, we don’t want to be locked into what that decision is or any particular variable of that decision.  So what we’re saying is before we commit American’s taxpayer dollars in the form of our share of this plan, we want to make sure we’ve got a fully considered position within the US government, that Congress is aware of it and we’re prepared to proceed.  Right now we’re not at that point.  We don’t think there’s a great deal to be lost by making a more modest commitment and having the Secretariat come back to us later in the year, that’s fairly standard and we’re looking at ways we can try and accommodate this and that’s the process we’re going through now. 
Reporter:  Now (inaudible) is that a question of the whole plan? 
Ambassador Bolton:  No, it’s a question of $100 million roughly of commitment authority that they want that would have implications for various aspects of the future decision.  What we’re trying to do is decouple a whole series of steps representing about $23 million, which we’re prepared to commit to that will allow work on the Capital Master Plan to continue.  What we don’t want is to get locked into granting commitment authority on another roughly $77 million that implies decisions about the shape of the project that we’re not prepared to make.  So we’re still in discussions.  This is not a matter saying we’re for or against the plan or anything else.  What we’re saying is let’s do this in a responsible, prudent, graduated fashion so we’re trying to work that out. 
Reporter:  On the Human Rights Council, there’s a lot of speculation that the reason the United States decided not to run this year because of Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, etc.  I wondered if you could address that.  
Ambassador Bolton:  Sorry, I’m fighting a cold.  The decision, I believe as Sean McCormack explained in Washington earlier today, was that we’re not going to run this year.  In voting against the resolution creating the Human Rights Council, I think we expressed our view that there were fundamental flaws in the nature of the new body – that meant to us that it was not likely to be materially better than its predecessor the Human Rights Commission.  Now we have also said because of our commitment to human rights we’re going to try and work with other member governments to try and make it a success. But we concluded that this year, given the basic reasons why we voted no in the first place, that we’re not prepared to run.  We want to see what other countries present themselves.  We’ll work to elect countries that share our values on human rights.  But we’re not prepared at this point to offer our own candidacy.  And those were the factors that went into our decision.  
Reporter:  (inaudible) that you might not get 96 votes, did that come into it? 
Ambassador Bolton:  I think that the concern is based more on the importance for us on other priorities in the management area.  There’s a question of how much attention you can devote to any one particular area at any given time.  And the fact that, for example, as of today, if I’m correct, there are already nine candidates for seven western group seats. And it’s a historical fact for us that in 2001 the United States was defeated, even for the old commission because there were too many western group candidates.  So I think that what we’d like to do is work to get the best possible start for this flawed body and then see who does get elected to it.  
Reporter:  We’ve heard reports that despite voting no – that you had actually split with the State Department – 
Ambassador Bolton:  I’m from the State Department.  How can I split with the State Department?
Reporter:  With your colleagues in the State Department – 
Ambassador Bolton: That’s better.
Reporter:  Thank you very much.  
Ambassador Bolton: I do what I can. 
Reporter:  split with colleagues in the State Department and advocated that the United States join the Human Rights Council this year, but had been overruled.  What’s your reaction? 
Ambassador Bolton:  I’m sorry I got lost in that question. Did I get overruled or did they get overruled?  
Reporter:  You had advocated joining the Council and had been overruled.  
Ambassador Bolton:  Well, I’m not going to comment on internal, pre-decisional conversations within the State Department.  I mean the decision is made and I think it’s the right decision.  And we’re all going to support it. 
Reporter:  I don’t quite understand the decision.  I mean we joined the discredited Human Rights Commission on the belief that we could change things a bit by being there, which we’re not going to be able to do on this one. 
Ambassador Bolton:  Well, I don’t think that’s right in a sense.  I think that if you ask many governments I think they would say that in the year 2002, when we were not serving on the Commission, that they came to realize in a more profound way how important it was for the US to be there and that our views, even as a non-member of the Commission in 2002 actually carried more weight than when we were on the Commission.  So I think there’s something to be said for the proposition, as Sean articulated it, that we stand back from the new Council this year and we work hard as we can do even as a non-member in terms of procedures for the new body and how it will operate.  And then looking at the impact of this concerted action, run next year, if that’s the decision to be made.  So in a way I think our leverage this year, in terms of trying to get the right kind of Council, flawed as we think it is, is greater by not running.  
Reporter:  Ambassador, some of the decisions about the Human Rights Council, the shape of it, are not yet made, and some of them are going to be made the first year. So isn’t the mere fact that you’re not joining the first year, isn’t that a vote of no confidence in the whole? 
Ambassador Bolton:  I think, as I just explained, the fact of our not running gives us the ability in Geneva, where much of this activity will take place in terms of how to structure the new organization, to increase our leverage, to have the Council pointed in the right direction.  In fact if we had run this year people would have said “business as usual” that would have had a negative effect.
Reporter:  How does it increase it?  I mean you’re not a member.  
Ambassador Bolton:  Because I think in Geneva I think decisions will not be made without our participation. And I think a lot of non-members will be participating through their regional group memberships.  But I think those that want us to join eventually will pay particular attention to our views now.  And as I say, it may seem counter-intuitive, but in fact our leverage is greater, not joining, not seeking to run this year, but considering it next year.
Reporter:  On Sudan sanctions, are we likely to see a European-US (inaudible)?  Speaking of counterintuitive, doesn’t it seem likely that the (inaudible) Security Council would sanction some but not others?
Ambassador Bolton:  Now let’s be clear here what’s going on.  I know we’ve all had leaks from our British counterparts to a number of representatives here and I’m not going to go into where you actually got it from, but I have my own feelings about this subject.  The United States is not resisting or opposing putting anybody on the sanctions list at this point.  What we have to do as a matter of our own domestic procedure is be sure that we are in a position, once the sanctions decision is made, that we can act simultaneously to put in place the necessary executive order that would create these sanctions as a matter of our domestic law.  We are not like other countries – some other countries that support a sanctions decision in the Security Council, but then don’t implement it in their own domestic context.  It’s very important for us that when we support a sanctions decision here – we have effectively, simultaneously the ability to propose sanctions as a matter of our domestic law so we can take steps within the United States to carry the sanctions into effect.  To do that as a matter of domestic law, we have to go through our internal processes largely in Departments other than the State Department that make these decisions that have the fact-finding ability to look at these individuals and to come to the conclusion that the sanctions are warranted.  So the only thing that we are saying now, and we are ahead of the game even in this sense, but because of some of the stories that have appeared in some publications represented here, I want to be sure that you have all the facts and not just the partial facts that were reported.  We will come to the decisions when we have a sufficient basis to do so.  So that it is wrong to say that we have come to any conclusion not the sanction or not to support the sanction of certain people, we are still accumulating evidence, looking for more facts and that sort of thing.  Now it is certainly true that a long period of time has gone by and we are moving as rapidly as we can to come to a decision because we have been pushing the sanctions as a tool in the Security Council over the opposition of a lot of other countries in the Council.  But we do have an obligation, which we take seriously to follow our own domestic procedures and that is what we are doing now.  So the point is we are still at the, in terms of naming some of these individuals, we are still at an early stage and we will be prepared when we are in a position to do so to support these additional sanctions.  It is not a question of us opposing something that somebody else is supporting.  Another country has come to the conclusion about individual X that they think sanctions are warranted, we respect that and we are looking at those kinds of individuals very seriously ourselves.  But we have to come to the conclusion that we can support sanctions so that when the decision is made here, we will instantaneously put those people under our procedures.   
Reporter:  Ambassador to follow up on the (inaudible) question.  Who was the major convincing voice in Washington that convinced the Administration?     
Ambassador Bolton:  Well, I would not want to speculate on that, that is another pre-decisional point that I just – we have made a decision as an Administration and that is what we are now implementing.  
Reporter:  Are we, then, not opposed to Sudanese government officials on the list?  Because this has been going on for quite a while-
Ambassador Bolton:  It is one thing to know with a high degree of certainty that the Sudanese government has been involved in, and indeed, directing things like gross abuses of Human Rights and participation in the genocide in Darfur.  It is another to be able to state with particularity that this individual in the government or that individual in the government should be brought under sanctions.  We think this is an important step; we want to undertake this, when we have got the evidence.  The relatively small amount of disagreement we have now is basically over one individual.  But I don’t view that as really all that significant a decision, because it could well be that if the evidence is there that an unlimited amount, an unlimited number, of individuals in the Sudanese government could be brought under sanctions.  We don’t have an upper limit or a lower limit, we want to do it responsibly; we want to do it expeditiously.  And within the government, within the U.S. Government, there is a lot of emphasis being put on the authorities that have to make these determinations to move expeditiously.  I can assure you of that personally. 
Reporter:  When you say expeditiously?
Ambassador Bolton:  As soon as possible is the timeframe we are working on.  We would like – 
Reporter:  (Inaudible) 
Ambassador Bolton: Of course not.  That is the whole point here, that we undertake when sanctions decisions are made in the Security Council, the U.S. moves automatically at that point.  And we want to be in a position, if a decision is made by the Council that in terms of our national authority, that is to say, the steps that really have impact in the U.S. to implement the sanctions, can be put in place immediately. 
Reporter:  (Inaudible) Are you saying the U.S. government recognizes the genocide, we just can’t figure out who is conducting the genocide?
Ambassador Bolton:  I think the issue we are considering here is the imposition of individual sanctions, which we think is an important tool; and we have supported and we intend to follow through on it.  When we name the people though, we want to be in a position to make sure that the sanctions stick and if they don’t come in later and if some mistake has been made or there is some technicality that gets them off that undercuts the decision to oppose the sanctions in the first place.  Now we would like to move more quickly, there is no doubt about that, but we are going to move in a way that is not challengeable.  And I think that is important for the credibility of the Council and for the credibility for the United States when we go after named officials within the Sudanese government, which we are perfectly prepared to do.
Reporter: I have a question about the Human Rights Commission if I could.  Do you believe it is appropriate for Iran and Cuba, for example, to be candidates as they are?

Ambassador Bolton:  Well it is hard to say they cannot be candidates.  It would be a very bad sign, a very bad sign, that this is business as usual, if countries like Iran and Cuba get elected to the Human Rights Council. 
Reporter: (Inaudible) we have over one billion (inaudible) 
Ambassador Bolton:  Well, in the case if Sudan, the sanctions we are talking about are very targeted sanctions that are aimed at the people responsible for the genocide in Darfur.  That is what we’re after. 
Reporter:  (Inaudible)  a touch of flu, but I was expecting you to be a little bit more forceful on swatting down these claims that the United States was not seeking a seat because of fear it could not get enough votes, especially because you had pushed so hard for a 2/3 majority during negotiations.  So as explicitly as possible, how much credence is there to these claims that the United States feared it could not get enough votes to be on the Council?
Ambassador Bolton:  I don’t think it is a question of fearing that we could not get enough votes, I think it is a reality that a number of countries in the western group already exceeding the quota that was set up by the resolution.  And by the way, we didn’t like the geographical distribution of seats on the Council because of the reduction in the number of western group seats is that we take into account what happened in 2001 when there was a greater number of candidates than there were seats for the western group and the United States was defeated.  And I think that the decision by us to run, had to be a decision that we were going to win and that would mean either defeating other western group candidates but getting some of the rest of them to withdraw, which was something at this point that taking into account everything else that was going on, we just didn’t think it was worth it.  I think, and I believe this rather strongly, that our leverage in terms of the performance of the new Council is greater by the U.S. not running.  Sending the signal that this is not business as usual this year, then if we were to run.  Now next year we will see but that will depend and our hope that at some point that we could run, depends on performance this year.  And so in that sense I am frank to say our leverage is greater by not running. Okay, thanks a lot.