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Skriven 2006-11-29 23:31:10 av Whitehouse Press (1:3634/12.0)
Ärende: Press Release (0611295) for Wed, 2006 Nov 29
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Press Gaggle by Dan Bartlett
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For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
November 29, 2006

Press Gaggle by Dan Bartlett
Raghadan Palace
Amman, Jordan



7:46 P.M. (Local)

MR. BARTLETT: The President is going to have a bilateral and dinner with
the King of Jordan. Since the King of Jordan and Prime Minister Maliki had
a bilateral themselves, earlier today, everybody believed that negated the
purpose for the three of them to meet tonight, together, in a trilateral
setting. So the plan, according to -- since they had such a good,
productive bilateral discussion, was just for the President to deal with
bilateral issues and other issues with the King this evening in a dinner
setting, and then the meetings set for tomorrow will still take place as
scheduled.

Q So the dinner is off, the three-way.

MR. BARTLETT: Right.

Q Well if Maliki -- he was never going to the dinner anyway, right? It was
just supposed to be a meeting.

MR. BARTLETT: There was going to be a trilateral meeting, and then the
dinner with the King. Now, since they already had a bilateral themselves,
the King of Jordan and the Prime Minister, everybody felt, well, there's no
reason for them to do a trilateral meeting beforehand, because matters had
been discussed.

Q So the scheduled trilateral is scrapped.

MR. BARTLETT: Right.

Q But the dinner -- all three of them are still going to be at the dinner?

MR. BARTLETT: No.

Q Okay so Maliki is not doing anything?

MR. BARTLETT: The President will see Prime Minister Maliki in the morning.

Q In the morning, okay.

Q So there's no three-way forum.

MR. BARTLETT: Correct.

Q I came in late. Where is Maliki?

MR. BARTLETT: I assume he's at his hotel -- he's having dinner with
somebody else tonight.

Q Why didn't he come here?

MR. BARTLETT: I just said that he had a meeting -- he had a bilateral
earlier today with the King; they had a very good conversation, and
afterwards they felt, well, since we had good conversations, we addressed
issues, there was not an agenda for the three for a trilateral that they
felt was necessary.

Q But don't you risk sending a political message that the three were
supposed to get together tonight and now they're not, after the memo by
Hadley and all? This wasn't a snub, or anything like that.

MR. BARTLETT: Absolutely not. And I think that will be demonstrated
tomorrow, as well as the fact that the King and the Prime Minister had a
good meeting themselves, today. The King is being a gracious host, allowing
for the two leaders to meet tomorrow morning. No one should read too much
into this, except for the fact that they had a good meeting. This gives an
opportunity for the King and the President to catch up on issues that are
in the interests of Jordan and the United States, as well as the broader
region. The issue -- a discussion specifically about Iraq will be had
tomorrow by the two leaders, by themselves.

Q No connection to the memo, whatsoever?

MR. BARTLETT: No.

Q The King and the Prime Minister had a meeting, but the Prime Minister
hasn't seen the President since he got here, and the President changed his
schedule to come here for this meeting.

MR. BARTLETT: The President requested the meeting. This was the President
requesting the meeting with the Prime Minister. And the substantive
meetings on Iraq -- look, they were not going to be doing a full detail
discussion in a trilateral setting about Iraq and the future of Iraq and
the strategy anyway, that just wouldn't be appropriate. So it was going to
be more of a social meeting anyways. But the fact that they had already had
a good meeting together, felt like it negated the purpose to doing so. And
the President and Prime Minister Maliki will have a very robust and lengthy
dialogue tomorrow morning.

Q Dan, what are your hopes for the meeting tomorrow morning?

MR. BARTLETT: Well, as we stated, clearly is that the Prime Minister has
prescribed many different elements of his strategy over the past months.
It's an opportunity for the two to sit down again, for the President to
hear first hand from him about additional steps he would like to take when
it comes to gaining control of the security situation in his country, the
political reconciliation process. It gives an opportunity for the President
to share his views. We are at a time of well-known assessment in our
strategy in Iraq; it gives the opportunity for these two leaders to speak
about it directly. So expect it to be, on both parts, a lot of give and
take, a lot of listening, and a lot of talking.

And particularly, as we have stated before, there was a tasking out of the
last time they met via videoconference for the two governments, high-level
ranking with the MFNI, as well as in the Iraqi government, to work on ways
to help accelerate and expand the capacity for Prime Minister Maliki to
gain control of his security forces. This gives them an opportunity to get
a detailed update on where they are in that progress, and hopefully make
some decisions about the way forward, in some respects. As Steve Hadley has
said in the past, don't expect any bombshells, or things like that, but
they do expect this to be a very productive, substantive meeting.

Q Is there going to be a readout afterwards?

MR. BARTLETT: Tomorrow?

Q No, tonight.

MR. BARTLETT: There's not a meeting tonight.

Q There's not a readout for us?

MR. BARTLETT: For the King of Jordan?

Q Has it changed because Maliki is not part of the meeting?

MR. BARTLETT: I'll need to check on that, whether you want a readout of the
bilateral conversation between the King and the President?

Q Originally we were told it would be a readout by Elliott Abrams
afterwards, but then it was a three-way meeting.

MR. BARTLETT: We'll look into it, we'll look into the need for that.

Q They're having a two-way meeting now, and then they're having dinner.

MR. BARTLETT: Correct.

Q Two events.

MR. BARTLETT: Both with just the President and the King, and their
respective staffs.

Q Are they just meeting right now, just between the President and the King,
or are there other people?

MR. BARTLETT: Secretary Rice and Steve Hadley are the two representatives
from the United States government, and then two representatives to the King
are there. And then the dinner will be a little bit -- a few more people
will be added to that dinner.

Q Are you going to dinner?

MR. BARTLETT: I didn't make the cut.

END 7:52 P.M. (Local)
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