[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1994, Book I)]
[April 19, 1994]
[Pages 726-727]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks and an Exchange With Reporters on Bosnia
April 19, 1994

    The President. Good afternoon. This morning I met for an hour and a 
half with our national security team to discuss what our options were to 
regain the momentum in Bosnia for a peaceful settlement. Several options 
were presented to me, and we discussed some others. When we adjourned 
the meeting, I asked the team to refine three points and to work on some 
of the options and to come back and meet with me again at 3:30 this 
afternoon. So we will meet again.
    In the meanwhile, as I'm sure you know, President Yeltsin has issued 
a statement, which I very much appreciate and which I think is very 
helpful, calling on the Serbs to honor their commitments to the Russians 
to withdraw from Gorazde, to allow U.N. personnel back in Gorazde, and 
to resume the negotiations toward a peaceful settlement.
    We are working closely on this. And I believe that we have a chance 
to build on what has been done in the last several weeks in and around 
Sarajevo and with the agreement between the Croatians and the Bosnian 
Muslims. And we will just keep working on it.
    As I said, I meet again at 3:30 p.m., and I'm hopeful that we'll be 
able to make some constructive moves over the next couple of days.

[[Page 727]]

    Q. Mr. President, Mr. Yeltsin is also asking for a summit of all of 
the major powers to try to find some sort of solution. How do you feel 
about that?
    The President. Well, he and I have discussed that on the telephone 
at least once, maybe twice, and I think it has some merit. We both 
agreed the last time we talked, before this development in Gorazde, that 
we were making progress doing what each of us was doing and that it 
might be a little premature, and that that sort of thing, in effect, can 
only be done once, and it might be better to save it for a time when, 
hopefully, the negotiations between the Serbs on the one hand and the 
Croatians and the Muslims on the other were coming down to an end point.
    I presume from his statement today that he's sufficiently concerned 
about what's happened in the last couple of days, that he thinks maybe 
we ought to go ahead and do it now. I think it deserves serious 
consideration, and I want to discuss it with him and with the other 
nations that would be involved. But I think in the context of the 
statement President Yeltsin made today, it has to be considered 
seriously because it was a very important, positive statement that he 
made.
    Q. What about Boutros-Ghali's proposal to expand air strikes to the 
other five safe areas in Bosnia? Would the U.S. and NATO be willing to 
go along with that?
    The President. That's what we're discussing today. And we're 
discussing exactly how that would be done and, of course, whether the 
other NATO allies would be willing to do it and what the ups and downs 
of it would be and what else we could do to get this thing going. But 
again, I want to have my meeting at 3:30 p.m. You should know we're 
discussing all these options, but I reserve the right to announce a 
clear policy on where we go on the specifics until after the next 
meeting, because I did have some questions after our meeting this 
morning that the security team will answer for me later today.
    Q. How concerned are you about empty threats----
    The President. I think that there must not be any. When we had the 
NATO meeting in January, the one thing I implored our allies to do was 
not to reaffirm our position unless we were willing to see it through. I 
still feel that way. The possibility of misunderstanding in this area is 
so great anyway, because of the shared responsibility and the contingent 
responsibility of NATO--contingent on what the U.N. does--and the 
difficulty in getting all the parties together, that we simply must not 
be on record in favor of any policy we are not prepared to follow 
through on.
    Thank you.

Note: The President spoke at 1:45 p.m. in the Rose Garden at the White 
House.