Great Seal The State Department web site below is a permanent electronic archive of information released prior to January 20, 2001.  Please see www.state.gov for material released since President George W. Bush took office on that date.  This site is not updated so external links may no longer function.  Contact us with any questions about finding information.

NOTE: External links to other Internet sites should not be construed as an endorsement of the views contained therein.

Department Seal Philip T. Reeker, Acting Spokesman
Excerpt from the Daily Press Briefing
Department of State Press Briefing Room
Washington, DC, June 5, 2000

National Commission on Terrorism Report
U.S. Not Considering Sanctions Against Greece and Pakistan
Issue of Tracking International Students in U.S.

Question: On the Hill today, the terrorism report was released by the blue ribbon congressional panel, and talked about monitoring students, foreign students; it talked about dropping the restriction on hiring as intelligence assets people who are themselves criminals, suspect; and also affected Greece and Pakistan.

Do you have a reaction to that?

Mr. Reeker: I will refer you first to what the Secretary said yesterday on a nationwide--or, actually, international Sunday morning show on which she spoke from Moscow. The National Commission on Terrorism did submit, as you noted, its report to Congress today. We haven't seen the final report or haven't had a chance, at least, to go through it fully. I will note that various departments and U.S. embassy officials met with members of that commission during the 6-month review of U.S. counter-terrorism policy, and we certainly tried to facilitate their work.

Under Secretary Pickering met with the Commission. Ambassador Sheehan, our Coordinator for Counterterrorism met several times with the Commission's Chairman, former Ambassador Bremer. And we believe that report, as the Secretary said, deserves very careful study. But I'm not going to have a lot of specific response at this time to specific recommendations.

With that said, the Secretary did note yesterday that the Administration is not considering sanctions against Greece or Pakistan, and we also continue to support Greece's full participation in the visa waiver program once Greece has satisfied remaining conditions, which the Attorney General laid out last year.

I think the Secretary underscored the fact again that terrorism is a very serious problem. We certainly take it very seriously. President Clinton and Secretary Albright raised that issue in Greece when they visited last year. We cooperate closely with the Simitis Government and the Greek police to support their counter-terrorism efforts, and support Greek sovereignty and authority over that.

I think it's important that you note that we've been concerned for over 2 decades about the numerous terrorist attacks that have occurred against American interests in Greece. Five embassy employees have been assassinated in Athens since 1975; there have been numerous other attacks on U.S. officials and facilities; 24 American businesses were bombed in Athens during the last two and a half years.

No one has been arrested or charged for these murders, and we are continuing to work with the Greek authorities to promote a more effective defense against terrorism, and that will go on. Ambassador Burns has a very effective working relationship with the Minister of Public Order in Greece and the Greek police as they continue to address these issues, and we're going to continue our efforts in that direction.

Question: Not on Greece, though; on the students, since this Department does have a role--

Mr. Reeker: Right. You did raise the students. Again, we haven't looked at that fully. It was released, I think, as you know, at 10 o'clock this morning so I can't get into the specifics of that.

But, in general, our policy is to encourage more international students to attend U.S. schools. There was an April 19th Presidential memorandum on international education policy which pointed out that nearly half a million, nearly 500,000 international students now study in the United States at the post-secondary level. They contribute some $9 billion annually to our economy, but make a tremendous effort at enriching our communities with their cultures and, of course, developing really a life-long appreciation for our culture by studying here. The goodwill that these students bear will, I think, in the future constitute one of our greatest foreign policy assets, and we've supported that.

Question: Could I ask you what the Department does in terms of issuing visas to students to safeguard the fact that those people coming here are, indeed, students and what do they do to track them once they are in the United States?

Mr. Reeker: Well, visas, as you know from lots of other cases that we discuss, are issued on an individual basis without any prejudgment. There are applications for student visas; there are appropriate forms that involve information provided by the institution, the educational institution here in the country. The oversight of foreign nationals in the United States is the responsibility of the Immigration and Naturalization Service and they are required by Congress to employ a system that provides for a database on holders of the various student visas in the J, M and F categories for statistical purposes and immigration purposes. And any details on that, I would refer to the INS, Justice Department.

Question: Could you repeat that number of students again, please?

Mr. Reeker: It's about 500,000. That's the number that are currently studying in the United States, approximately.

Question: While we are on numbers, could you repeat the number of American diplomats killed in Greece, please? You had a couple numbers in that.

Question: (Inaudible).

Mr. Reeker: Charlie, you do this to me--24. That was in the last two-and-a-half years. Let's be specific here. There have been five embassy employees assassinated in Athens since 1975 and numerous other attacks on U.S. officials and facilities.

Question: Thank you. One of the recommendations by this commission was also that the State Department give more information about countries that are cooperating fully or are not cooperating fully. But I looked back in Patterns of Global Terrorism and that's been a law since 1996. So how does that square up? Do they feel that the State Department is not giving them enough information or none?

Mr. Reeker: You would have to ask them and I would have to look at the report more fully, which I haven't, because it was released at 10:00 a.m. this morning.

Question: Has that been a complaint before?

Mr. Reeker: So I have not reviewed that fully. I think that Patterns of Global Terrorism, which we put out annually, addresses that. Certainly we have tremendous discussion of that at the time it comes out and we continue to bring it up from this podium often.

So in terms of specifics of the report released today, I just can't go into it. We will be looking at that very closely.

Question: Separate from the report, have there been reports from Congress, for example, to the State Department that they haven't been getting enough information on countries and their cooperation?

Mr. Reeker: I am not aware of that at all, no.

Let me go to Ben.

Question: Are you saying that The Washington Post obtained this report 2 days before the State Department did?

Mr. Reeker: I am saying that the report was released this morning on Capitol Hill. We worked with them appropriately throughout the 6 months that they were preparing this report. I have not seen this report yet. I am sure I could get a copy, but I was busy coming in here and unable to fully analyze that report or ask anybody else to do that for you at this juncture this morning.

Question: So you have no response to all of the specifics in the report?

Mr. Reeker: Exactly.

Question: You have no response then to whether or not Greece or Pakistan ought to be sanctioned?

Mr. Reeker: I think the Secretary addressed that, and I stated that here already quite clearly. The Administration is not considering sanctions against Greece or Pakistan.

Full transcript of Daily Press Briefing on 6/5/00

[end of document]

Statements | Counterterrorism | Department of State | Secretary of State