Remarks to the First Group of Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) U.S. Business Internship Program for Young Middle Eastern Women

SECRETARY POWELL: I am so pleased to join Assistant Secretary Harrison, Under Secretary Dobriansky, Deputy Assistant Secretary Romanowski and Assistant Secretary Bill Burns in welcoming all of you to the State Department. You have our warmest congratulations on being selected as the very first participants in the MEPI U.S. Business Internship Program for Young Middle Eastern Women.

The U.S.-Middle East Partnership Initiative is an important bridge between America and the Middle East and between our governments and our peoples. Meaningful international partnerships such as this begin with mutual understanding. We want you to learn more about us. We want you to learn more about the United States, more about how we work, more about our entrepreneurial spirit, how our businesses work. And the Americans you will be meeting, the ones you will be working with during this program will learn about you. They want to learn about you, and they want to learn about the wonderful diversity that you represent, a diversity that is contained as you heard from Pat a moment ago, in sixteen nations from Morocco to Oman, and from Yemen to Iraq.

As some of you may know, I have just returned overnight from a trip -- in fact, I returned at 4:30 this morning overnight -- from a trip that took me to Hungary, Bosnia, Poland, also to Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Kuwait -- and not to mention Bosnia Herzegovenia, I should say, rather than just Bosnia. And in Kuwait I met one of my new friends now, Sumaya Aljasem. She is here I hope. Where are you? Ah, you are as jet lagged as I am then, if you are here today.

But every place I went, in addition to meeting with government officials, I made a point of talking to young people. I made a point of working with civil society and learning about what is really going on inside of these countries and getting a better understanding of what's going on in the countries from just talking to the officials of those countries. Wonderful people like these young women helped to educate me and give me a better understanding of the needs, aspirations, hope and desires of these people, and more importantly, how they plan to contribute to the development of their nations as time passes, we get deeper into the 21st century.

In my official meetings, I discussed with our close friends the situation in Iraq and how best we can work together to support Iraq’s reconstruction. We also discussed in all of these countries that I visited our cooperation in the war on terror, Gaza disengagement and ways to support reform in the Broader Middle East and North Africa.

Indeed, through MEPI, Middle East Partnership Initiative, the United States is putting our support behind programs that prepare young people for a new world, a new world that we're helping to create in that part of our world, a new world based more and more on democracy and freedom and reform and modernization. We need pioneers such as these, who are already working to widen economic opportunity. They're hard at work expanding political participation and doing everything they can to improve education for men and for women alike.

As their presence here today attests, MEPI is dedicated to reaching out to women all across the region, helping to advance their efforts to fully and equally contribute to the economic, social and political life of their countries.

The State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs and the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs have developed what I think you will find to be a highly useful program. The program is designed to deepen and strengthen your already impressive talents in the fields of business and law. The program will also help you forge relationships with leading entrepreneurs here in the United States and within the international community as well. These relationships, I am quite sure, will serve all of you well and serve your countries well in the years ahead.

We have enlisted the help of two of our finest business schools -- Duke University and Emory University. Their courses will acquaint you with our business culture and provide you with skills that will be valuable to you in your internships and ultimately to your careers back at home.

The response of major American companies to this initiative has been very enthusiastic and I've been so satisifed and pleased at the way in which American business has come forward. Our businesses and our law firms who will participate in this program will welcome you, welcome you with open arms and they will help you hone your skills through direct experience, on-the-job experience.

One of your colleagues, Hend El Moughni has said that she looks forward to learning how businesses operate in a global economy and then using that understanding to start her own business in Qatar.

We applaud her goals and agree with her that the real value of the MEPI U.S. Business Internship Program will be realized when each of you finishes your internship, goes back home, puts your knowledge and experience to work for yourselves, for your communities and for your countries.

We wish each of you a productive and enjoyable internship and every success during the time that you spend in this program here in the United States, but above all, we wish you every success when you take this experience, this training, this mentoring that you're going to receive back to your countries and prepare a brighter future for the people of your nation.

So thank you all for being here. Thank you for participating in the program and I wish you the best of luck. Thank you.

(Applause.)