GERMANY: U.S. secretary of State Condoleezza Rice favours Mideast quartet meeting soon and wants to pursue talks with North Korea

Record ID: 574617

  • Title: GERMANY: U.S. secretary of State Condoleezza Rice favours Mideast quartet meeting soon and wants to pursue talks with North Korea
  • Date: 18th January 2007
  • Summary: (W4) BERLIN, GERMANY (JANUARY 17, 2007) (REUTERS) WIDE OF WAITING PRESS ARRIVAL OF U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE CONDOLEEZZA RICE AND GERMAN FOREIGN MINISTER FRANK-WALTER STEINMEIER CAMERAS WIDE OF RICE AND STEINMEIER (SOUNDBITE)(English) U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE CONDOLEEZZA RICE SAYING: "We want to make sure that the next round of the six-party talks is fully prepared so that we can make progress there. The last round of the six-party talks was indeed, I think productive, because a lot of issues came to the table, but we would look for further progress and these discussions that Chris (U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill) is having, the bilateral discussions that he is having with each of the parties to the six-party talks, and that they are having with each other should help to prepare the way for a more favourable atmosphere at the time of the resumption of the six-party talks, which we would hope would be soon." JOURNALISTS (SOUNDBITE)(English) U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE CONDOLEEZZA RICE SAYING: "I expect that that will take still a few weeks and I think that it will be useful to have the meeting with the quartet in advance of that meeting in fact, so that as Minister Steinmeier has said, there are a lot of ideas floating around about how we might get the Israeli-Palestinian peace-process back on track and I think that to get together and actually talk about how those ideas relate to one another is going to be a very useful thing because we want to have a concerted and unified effort, not multiple efforts, and I think the Quartet is a very useful mechanism for the coordination and integration of international efforts." JOURNALISTS RICE AND STEINMEIER AT THE PODIUM (SOUNDBITE)(German) GERMAN FOREIGN MINISTER FRANK-WALTER STEINMEIER SAYING: "But we have to provide impulses and be ready there were they wouldn't get any further without our help. One part of our efforts could be the renewal of the quartet of Middle East negotiators, we have spoke about this often in the last weeks and months. And we are both of the opinion that the time is nigh for a meeting of the quartet, and we both think that the time could be ready for this meeting in early February, which we would then have in Washington." RICE AND STEINMEIER AT THE PODIUM JOURNALISTS RICE AND STEINMEIER LEAVE THE ROOM
  • Embargoed: 2nd February 2007 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Germany
  • Country: Germany
  • Reuters ID: LVAEUNEZD0TR2K2CSSR28KV9JES0
  • Story Text: The quartet of Middle East peace negotiators plans to meet in early February to prepare the ground for talks between Israeli and Palestinian leaders, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Wednesday Rice said on Monday she would bring Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas together for informal talks on how to set up a Palestinian state.
    Preparations for that meeting will need some time, probably a few weeks, said Rice at a joint news conference with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier in the German capital on Wednesday.
    "I do think it will be useful to have a meeting of the quartet in advance of that meeting," she said.
    Several European countries, including Germany, are keen to get the quartet -- the United States, United Nations, Russia and European Union -- more involved in the stalled peace process.
    "There are a lot of ideas floating around about how we might get the Israeli-Palestinian peace process back on track and I think to get together and talk about how those ideas relate to each other will be a very useful thing."
    She emphasised she favoured a concerted, unified approach.
    Meanwhile United States and North Korea held a second day of unprecedented talks on Wednesday, raising hopes of a breakthrough in efforts to curb the communist state's nuclear weapons programme.
    Envoys from the two sides, who met for six hours on Tuesday and another 1-1/2 hours on Wednesday, were planning to hold a third round of discussions in the German capital on Thursday, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill said.
    The bilateral talks were the first outside the framework of six-country negotiations in Beijing which began in 2003 to try to stop North Korea's nuclear weapons ambitions.
    Rice told reporters in Berlin that Hill's discussions were aimed at preparing for the six party talks.
    "We want to make sure that the next round of 6-party talks is fully prepared so that we can make progress there," she said.
    "(This) should help to prepare the way for a more favourable atmosphere at the time of the resumption of the six party talks, which we hope would be soon," she added.
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