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James P. Rubin, Department Spokesman Excerpt from daily press briefing Washington, DC, November 6, 1997 U.S. Department of State

QUESTION: Actually, this has to do with North Korea. The food assessment team, I believe, is back. Do you have any read-out of their trip? And will any of the members of the team be willing to speak to the press about what they observed?

MR. RUBIN: Yes, we have a preliminary report. The team successfully completed its mission, and we are pleased with the results. This trip improved our understanding of the food crisis in North Korea. The team visited several sites that were not previously open to international relief workers.

The team traveled through North Korea and examined assistance needs and the transparency of aid distribution. It visited sites in Pyongyang and several provinces. It also visited a province which had never before been visited by the World Food Program. The DPRK authorities were cooperative. The team had useful discussions with government officials in health, agriculture and foreign affairs.

In brief, we believe this visit was a step forward in the process of assuring greater transparency, although more can be done. We regret that there are still some areas of the DPRK that are not currently accessible. There are no current plans for a second team to visit. We are waiting for the return of this team.

We understand there is significant interest, and we will certainly be doing what we can, when they return this weekend, to try to arrange some way in which they can communicate their findings to the media.

QUESTION: Follow up on that, on the food assessment team. Do you know why they are staying there for - I mean, the mission is completed, right, so why are they taking these extra days?

MR. RUBIN: I don't know where -- it may be that's how long it takes to get back here, where they are staying overnight. I don't have that level of detail.

QUESTION: Any movement on the four-party talks?

MR. RUBIN: We're always hopeful that we can get an agreement on beginning the discussions. We're still hopeful, but nothing concrete for you yet.

QUESTION: Can you give any sort of assessment, with the food team, as to whether things were as bad as you thought, worse than your thought, or does that need to wait till --

MR. RUBIN: Well, let's see what we can do by tomorrow. We're in contact with them. They gave us this preliminary report about where they went, what kind of access they got, and said we could communicate this. But we'll try to get some more for tomorrow.

QUESTION: The name of the region they went to that was - hadn't been visited before?

MR. RUBIN: I'm going to spell it, if you don't mind. R-y-a-n-g-a-n-g, Ryangang.

Link to rest of day's briefing . . .

[end of document]

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