Middle East Digest: June 12, 2008

Bureau of Public Affairs
June 12, 2008

The Middle East Digest provides text and audio from the Daily Press Briefing. For the full briefings, please visit http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/.

From the Daily Press Briefing of June 12, 2008:

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QUESTION:  Gonzo, the Islamic School in Northern Virginia, they’re again promoting or putting out questionable materials for terror, hate and incitement. Have you spoken with the school administrators and are you reviewing a curriculum and textbooks? 

MR. GALLEGOS:  Let’s see – yeah. You’re speaking specifically about the Islamic School and the textbooks that they have there? You know, we don’t believe any government should produce materials that are intolerant of other religious, racial or ethnic groups, or teach such intolerance as part of its educational curriculum. For several years, we’ve engaged the Saudi Government on the need to eliminate intolerant references toward other religious groups in textbooks and other educational materials used in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere.

As a result, in 2006, July of 2006, the Saudi Government acknowledged the need to revise and update its textbooks, to remove all intolerant passages that disparage or promote hatred toward other religious groups or religions. And to that end, the Saudi Government said it would make such a process -- it would – excuse me, it would undertake such a process to be completed in time for the start of the 2008 school year. And we’ll continue to work with the Saudi Government on efforts to revise the textbooks.

Yes.

QUESTION: On Iraq, and we asked Mr. Sean McCormack about this on Monday in terms of a long-term agreement between the U.S. and Iraq. Now, the AP today quoted an anonymous source that’s close to the negotiations in Baghdad as saying that the deal may not be signed by next month, as Ambassador David Satterfield had stated. And that same source also stated that the UN mandate may have to be extended, and that is obviously due in December. Do you still maintain your confidence that a deal might be signed next month, maybe?

MR. GALLEGOS: Well, I think that the UN mandate does run through the end of the year, we’ve got about six more months to get to that point. I believe that we had Ambassador Crocker up here last week. He spoke very clearly about his concerns that this be done – more important to him, this be done right, be done correctly than quickly. There’s time left. We’re continuing with our discussions with the Government of Iraq. It’s important to us that this be done correctly and we will see where we go with that. 

We’ve stated before that we’re not going to really go into the discussions in public. However, when we’re through, this will be a transparent document that we will share with all those who are interested in seeing it. The process continues and we’re serious about it and we’ll continue – see where we get.

QUESTION: Do you see, perhaps if negotiations do extend beyond what Ambassador David Satterfield had said, is that sort of not achieving your aims? Or do you aim to have more complete, or, I guess, more complete of an agreement rather than finishing on (inaudible)?

MR. GALLEGOS: Well, I think we have a hard deadline of the end of the year, a lot of “ifs” in your question there. I think the biggest “if” is: Will we be done at the end of the year. We have six months to get there. We’re going to continue working. We would like to finish this as quickly as we can. However, we do understand that this is a negotiation. There’s a lot of give and take. But in the end, we plan on having a document that both governments are satisfied with.

QUESTION: A question on Afghanistan and the donors conference. Is the U.S. disappointed that not more money was pledged? I think it was a little under $20 million and 10 of it, or half of it, essentially, came from the United States. 

MR. GALLEGOS: $10 billion.

QUESTION:  Sorry.

MR. GALLEGOS: $10 billion. Well, I – we do think it’s important for countries to come to the conference to provide support for the development and economic – the economic development portion of aid to Afghanistan. Richard, when he spoke to you all about this, was pretty clear that, you know, there was a – that we would have a substantial contribution and that we believed that other governments would come through as well. I think that there has been substantial contribution by other countries. We’re looking forward to their support in Afghanistan, the continued development of Afghanistan, and we believe that although this conference was held during this one day that there will be – countries will continue to support Afghanistan in the future.

QUESTION: Is the U.S. disappointed that there was only 20 million – 20 billion?

MR. GALLEGOS: I think in anybody’s – by anybody’s book, 20 billion is a lot of money. And like I said, we see – we look to continued support throughout the coming days, months and years for a developing Afghanistan. 

Yes.

QUESTION: Just again – sorry. And you said the Multinational Force’s mandate in Iraq ends at the end of the year, but can you just clarify if you’re still confident on at least meeting the deadline that Ambassador Satterfield had stated of reaching agreement by next month?

MR. GALLEGOS: Well, I – Ambassador Satterfield said what Ambassador Satterfield said. I’m not going to be one to parse his words. I think Ambassador Crocker, the Ambassador in the country, has been very specific about this idea that we – our goal is to get this done. That is our goal, to get it done. I don’t have a specific date for that, but we do know that there is a date out there looming at the end of the year. It’s still six months away. The Government of Iraq and we are working together on this, continue to discuss this issue, and I believe that this will be accomplished. I’m just not going to give you a date on it.