克里国务卿同潘基文秘书长双边会议前的讲话

Remarks with United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon before Their Meeting<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

Treaty Room, Washington, DC

February 14, 2013

SECRETARY KERRY: Happy Valentine’s Day, everybody, and greetings. Good to see you all. It’s a huge pleasure for me to welcome Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon back to Washington and here to the State Department. We are about to meet. We haven’t met yet. We’re going to have a chance to be able to talk through a number of topics.

But we know above all that the enormous array of the world’s challenges that we face requires huge cooperation between all countries and the United Nations, and the United Nations plays the vital role in that collaboration. So I’m really glad that the Secretary-General is one of my very first guests here at the State Department, and we have a great deal to discuss this morning.

Let me just outline a few of my chief concerns that we hope to discuss today with the Secretary-General. First of all, with respect to North Korea, this week’s test was an enormously provocative act that warrants a strong, a swift, and a credible response from the global community. And I want to echo the Security Council’s statement that this test is a clear threat to peace and security in the world. In the days ahead, Mr. Secretary-General, we’re going to ramp up our coordination with the Six-Party partners, with the Security Council and other UN members, and other allies and partners in order to guarantee that we respond appropriately.

We will, of course, in a few moments discuss the challenges of Syria. As President Obama said very clearly on Tuesday, we have to keep the pressure up on the Assad regime and we have to support opposition leaders who respect the rights of the Syrian people. As I have been doing in all of my first meetings, I intend to look forward to hear the Secretary-General’s ideas. He is deeply invested in the diplomatic process now with Lakhdar Brahimi’s initiative, and I want to learn from the Secretary-General what he thinks we can do to best assist in the effort to try to change President Assad’s calculations, to stop the bloodshed and begin a peaceful political transition towards a democratic future for all of the people of Syria.

We will also consult on the desperate humanitarian situation. I had occasion, Mr. Secretary-General, to speak this morning with the Foreign Minister of Saudi Arabia. The first thing he mentioned to me was, in his estimate, perhaps as many as 90,000 people who have been killed in Syria, vast numbers of refugees, which creates enormous dislocation and burdens on the countries that are prepared to receive them. So we will consult shortly on this dangerous humanitarian situation, and recognizing that President Assad has the ability to be able to make the difference here by deciding to engage in a legitimate diplomatic process. He must end this killing.

We need to rally the international community in response to the UN’s appeal for more funds in order to deal with the humanitarian assistance for those suffering inside Syria as well as those people who have been dislocated.

We will also talk about Iran. The talks between the P-5+1 and Iran will resume in Kazakhstan later this month. I want to reiterate that these talks can only make progress if the Iranians come to the table determined to make and discuss real offers and engage in a real dialogue. It is important that we do that. And I have said before and I will repeat again: Countries that have peaceful programs do not have problems proving to people that they are peaceful. So we are not going to get trapped into a delay-after-delay process here. It’s important to engage, and I think it is incumbent on the Iranians to prove that they are prepared to meet our willingness, President Obama’s willingness, again and again stated by the President, to be open to a diplomatic resolution here.

I also plan to discuss a topic which the Secretary-General and I have talked about many times together. It’s something that he is passionate about and I am passionate about, and that’s the subject that President Obama raised in his second inaugural address and then again in his State of the Union message in which he issued a call to deal with climate change. And it was a call that he expressed in renewed and urgent terms, which I think the world heard. He has urged all of us to tackle this challenge head on, as he said, for the sake of our children and our future.

I know from many conversations with the Secretary-General – we’ve been at events together, at negotiations together, we’ve spoken at events together – this is a major priority for the United Nations, and we appreciate his leadership.

And finally, I’d also like to discuss today the next steps in Mali in light of the successful French intervention there. We urge the government to continue the political transition process towards elections and to step up negotiations with the non-extremist groups in the north.

So in addition to that, we have a very full agenda, which is why we’re not going to take questions, and I hope you’ll forgive us for that. We haven’t yet engaged in the discussions, so we wanted to let you know what we’re doing, but we’re also going to be discussing Somalia and the Middle East peace process and a number of other issues as well. So suffice it to say the United States and the United Nations share all of these concerns. They’re global concerns. If we didn’t have a United Nations, we’d have to invent one. So we’re grateful for the leadership that is exhibited by the Secretary-General, and I am committed on behalf of President Obama to make certain that we strengthen our relationship with the UN even further in the years ahead. And I want to thank the Secretary-General for being here today and for his leadership. Thank you, sir.