Transcripts
Press Conference with Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher
U.S. Embassy
Astana, Kazakhstan
February 11, 2008
Assistant Secretary Boucher: Hello everybody, good afternoon. I’m very glad to be seeing you today.
I’m very glad to be back in Kazakhstan. I had a very good series of discussions here with leaders in the government, with people in the business community, people in the opposition and experts from various departments or from outside the government.
We’ve had a very dynamic relationship with Kazakhstan, a strategic partnership that deals in many many areas. We’ve seen a lot of new and positive developments over the last few years. I think my goal today is to try to keep that process moving forward and make sure we continue with the forward momentum.
We talked about a lot of issues today. We talked about how governments can work with businesses to expand the opportunities for Kazakhstan. We’ve talked about the process of reform in the economy here or in health care or in the political system in Kazakhstan. We talked about Kazakhstan’s upcoming chairmanship of the OSCE and the kind of steps that Kazakhstan has said it was going to take this year in order to make itself more compatible with chairmanship of the OSCE. My goal is to see how Kazakhstan will implement those commitments and implement them fully this year as the Foreign Minister said they would in Madrid.
I think there are many opportunities now for U.S. cooperation with Kazakhstan in security, economics, political reform, almost every field. Non-proliferation has been a very important field for us. But we also talked about regional issues and the opportunities with other countries in the region.
The United States is trying to develop good relations with all the countries in this region and to try to help the countries in this region help each other and move forward together. We’re all concerned about the situation, for example, for the people in Tajikistan. We talked today a little bit about what countries from the outside could do to help. We’re all concerned about the situation in Afghanistan and I talked quite a bit with people here about how we see the situation there and welcome Kazakhstan’s intention to invest in Afghanistan and help that country develop.
So I think I’ve had very positive discussions here, very interesting discussions, and we have an opportunity in 2008 to really move forward together on the path that Kazakhstan has chosen and on a lot of the work that has to be done both here and internationally that we can do together.
Thank you. I’d be glad to take your questions.
Press: I represent Radio Azattyk. There is an opinion of some politicians, NGOs and some lawyers that the promises made by the Minister of Foreign Affairs are not being accomplished. What do you think?
Assistant Secretary Boucher: The promises made by the Minister of Foreign Affairs were to pass certain legislation of international standards during the year of 2008 and we look forward to seeing that happen. What we talked about today is how that process will unfold.
I think the first thing is to get the legislation right. To make sure it does meet the international standards, that it does use the recommendations of the OSCE or the Office of Democracy and Human Rights.
The second is to actually present the legislation and pass it. That needs to be an open process, a transparent process so the citizens of the country can see how it happens.
We are only two months into the year so far, so we’ll see how this process can unfold, but we certainly look to see it unfold in as open a manner as possible.
Press: You just mentioned at your meeting with President Nazarbayev you discussed reforms in the political area and economy. Can you give us more specifics in those reforms? Whether the political reforms, for example, address any freedoms? Or in the area of economy, were any specific energy projects discussed?
Assistant Secretary Boucher: I think first of all it’s up to the government to describe its reform program in a lot of areas, but you’re familiar with the specific commitments made in Madrid. That is to pass a new election law, a new media law and new rules on the registration of political parties. So those particular areas are things I talked about with everybody, including the President.
There are other areas of reform the government has looked at. Economic investment conditions, competition, and areas like that, but I think I’d leave it to the government to try to talk about those things.
There is an area where both the economic side and the political side come together and that is any modern economy is based on creativity and knowledge, on the open discussion of ideas, on the participation of the citizens, whether it’s economic participation or political participation. So all these things fit together.
We talked a lot about what the President has called the “Path to Europe,” and we very much support that. We want to walk that path to Europe together with Kazakhstan and try to help it along and look at all the aspects of things that can make Kazakhstan a modern economy, a modern society.
Press: Mr. Boucher, we’d like to ask you with who from the opposition leaders you met specifically, and what were the topics of discussion?
Assistant Secretary Boucher: I met with a group of people from opposition parties. I’m not sure it’s for me to talk about everybody that I met. I also met with people from the Human Rights Committee.
I’d just say generally what we talked about was the political atmosphere, was this process of political reform, where they saw the country headed, what kinds of things they would like to see. The same topics, really, that I discussed with government officials. My goal was to get a balanced picture, to get a broad-ranging picture and see how we can help everybody achieve those goals.
Press: I represent Kursiv newspaper. Recently the government of Kazakhstan announced its termination of some minor contracts with contractors who do not meet their responsibilities in good faith. My question is, how do you think it will impact the investment climate in the country? And the second question is whether any United States companies are in the list of the countries and how you will extend support to such companies if it is.
Assistant Secretary Boucher: My simple answer is I don’t know. I’m not familiar with the law or the actual situation in the mining industry so I’d have to let somebody else more expert than me address those questions.
Press: In Southern Kazakhstan a philosopher [inaudible] was put in jail and now he is seeking asylum somewhere abroad. He has sent letters around, his relative sent letters around to different embassies and governments. Has your government received his letter?
Assistant Secretary Boucher: Again, I’m afraid I just don’t know the answer to that. If we had, we probably wouldn’t talk about it so I’m not in a position to answer that question.
Press: Panorama Weekly. According to some media, after the troops were brought into Afghanistan the quantity of drugs produced in that country went up. And representatives of the Army were involved in the export of those illicit drugs. Is any investigation done on those incidents?
Assistant Secretary Boucher: I frankly don’t see that as the drug problem in Afghanistan. I’m sure if anybody from our Army or the Afghan Army or others were found to be trafficking in drugs or involved, they would be severely punished.
The drug problem in Afghanistan is more and more associated with the Taliban. The provinces where the government has control, the government’s been able to establish itself and provide policemen, provide security, provide roads, provide health to the people, those provinces have been reducing their poppy production. We have gone from, last year we went from six provinces that were poppy-free to 13 provinces that are poppy-free. There’s a new UN report that says in provinces where the government has control, the poppy will continue to go down this year.
The explosion of poppy growth has been largely in the southern part of the country in areas where the Taliban has control or where they operate. Places where the Taliban are providing protection for drugs or taxing drugs or where there are strong local factions controlling the area. That’s where we have to concentrate our resources in fighting the insurgency and fighting narcotics at the same time.
Anybody else? Doesn’t cost anything. (laughter)
Press: Whenever we have elections, they are held unfairly with lots of violations. But the United States response is always that everything was okay. Why is that? And in Georgia, for example, they recently had elections and Saakashvili was elected again President with a lot of violations, but the assessment of the United States government was that those were good elections.
Assistant Secretary Boucher: I think we’ve always based our standards on international standards. We’ve based our standards on the OSCE standards. We’re always looking for an open election environment, an open media environment, transparent counting so that the ballots get counted properly. And whether we’re looking at Kazakhstan’s elections last year or Pakistan’s elections this weekend, we apply the same standards. We apply the international standards to make sure -- Fundamentally what has to happen in an election, people have to have a right to choose and their choices need to be properly counted. That’s our standard wherever we go in talking about elections. But particularly in Europe we always based our conclusions on what the OSCE observers tell us because we think they are the most objective and they do apply the same standard everywhere they go.
Press: What is expected from Kazakhstan’s OSCE chairmanship? What is the United States approach to it?
Assistant Secretary Boucher: Our approach is to try to work constructively with Kazakhstan as it prepares for chairmanship of the OSCE. Our approach is to look to Kazakhstan to implement fully and concretely its statements about what it would do to prepare for chairmanship including the political reforms and the laws that have been discussed, have been announced
We’re also interested in working with Kazakhstan in all three baskets of the OSCE -- the security, the economics, and the political side so that Kazakhstan is prepared to work like any chairman to uphold the highest standards in all of these areas.
The OSCE chairmanship, in some ways it’s not just one year, it’s three years. The first year you’re part of the troika, the three countries; the second year you’re the chairman; and the third year you’re still part of the troika. So this year is really the important one to get ready, to really do the preparations, before you start participating in the troika. So there’s a lot of work to do to get ready.
At the end of those three years you start entering into a new political cycle in Kazakhstan so that what Kazakhstan accomplishes for itself and then for the chairmanship will be very important to the long term future and stability of Kazakhstan and for Kazakh society.
Press: As we know in 2006 the United States did not support the candidacy of Kazakhstan for the OSCE chairmanship. Then one year later in Madrid, in December, you voted for Kazakhstan. What changed during that year? What influenced your decision?
Assistant Secretary Boucher: I think we had some very intense discussions with Kazakhstan during that period, particularly in Madrid. During that process we heard specifically from Kazakhstan what Kazakhstan would do to prepare for the chairmanship. We also heard from Kazakhstan about what Kazakhstan would do to uphold the integrity of the OSCE in all its areas. After reviewing those commitments we felt that if Kazakhstan fully implements those commitments, Kazakhstan could be a good chairman for the OSCE. So we made the choice to support the chairmanship. But implicit in that is we made the choice to stay involved with Kazakhstan, to help Kazakhstan prepare, and to help Kazakhstan fully implement those choices, those commitments that it has made.
Thank you all. It’s good to see you. See you next time.
