Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, March 15, 1991 TAG: 9103150363
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A/1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: TROIS-ILETS, MARTINIQUE LENGTH: Medium
In a related development, Newsday reported that U.S. officials have begun direct talks with some of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's exiled opponents.
At a news conference with French President Francois Mitterrand, Bush also said a Palestinian state "is not the answer" to the Arab-Israeli dispute that underlies many Mideast problems. But he said diplomacy following the Persian Gulf War is "going to have to address . . . the homeland question."
While the leaders took pains to show at least general agreement on major Middle East questions, Mitterrand said French forces have completed their mission in the Gulf War. Bush said U.S. troops have a role to play, including in Iraq. "Clearly those troops are not going to be - all of them - out of there until there's a cease-fire, a formalized cease-fire," Bush said.
For the second straight day, Bush cautioned Iraq against using combat helicopters to crush internal unrest. Such action, he said, "makes it very, very complicated" to arrange a permanent cease-fire.
According to the Newsday report, diplomatic sources said the United States has, with the approval of its Arab allies, begun talking about the future of Iraq with opposition leaders in exile.
The official U.S. policy, reiterated in Damascus, Syria, Thursday by Secretary of State James Baker, is to stay out of Iraq's internal affairs and leave the shape of its government to the people. But as Baker met this week with the eight major Arab members of the coalition that defeated Iraq, it became clear that they unanimously favor action to depose of the Iraqi president.
As a result, a Western diplomat close to the situation told Newsday, the United States is "now fully engaged" with the leaders of several of the 23 opposition parties and groups that Thursday ended a three-day meeting in Beirut, Lebanon, to plan efforts to force Saddam's ouster and replace him with a democratic government.
Bush has said he will attempt to forge a lasting Middle East peace from the postwar period in the region.
"Peace has avoided us for far too long out there," Bush said. He added he was "not discouraged" by reports from Baker, who visited Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Syria before leaving the region earlier in the day for the Soviet Union.
Bush last week suggested that Israel trade territory for peace - returning occupied land in exchange for Arab recognition - and he told reporters he hopes the Jewish state "will be forthcoming" in the diplomatic maneuvering.
He summed up the goal of arranging peace among Israel and the Arab world thus:
"Let us find ways now where we can kind of help guarantee their [Israel's] security requirements and encourage those who have been unwilling to talk with them, to say nothing of ending a state of war, to do both."
Mitterrand, asked whether he continues to believe that Arafat is the leader of Palestinians, said it was a question "for the Palestinians to answer." He added, "There are doubtless other forces, too, and I think they should make themselves known."
However, Mitterrand said Arafat "remains, to my knowledge, the leader of the PLO, and to my knowledge, the PLO still appears as the representative organization."
Bush was unsparing in his rejection of Arafat, whom he said "aligned himself far more than he needed to to protect his flanks with Saddam Hussein" during the Persian Gulf crisis.
"We are not writing off anything but we don't have any intention for example of resuming our dialogue" with Arafat's PLO, he said.
by CNB