[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 42, Number 49 (Monday, December 11, 2006)]
[Pages 2141-2142]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks Following a Meeting With President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa

December 8, 2006

    President Bush. It's been my honor to welcome a man for whom I have 
a great deal of respect, and that is the President of South Africa, 
President Mbeki, here back to the Oval Office. I so very much appreciate 
the time you've given and the great discussion we just had.
    We talked about a wide range of subjects. We talked about Darfur and 
the need for South Africa and the United States and other nations to 
work with the Sudanese Government to enable a peacekeeping force into 
that country to facilitate aid and save lives.

[[Page 2142]]

And I expressed my concerns about the situation with the President. He 
shares my concerns that the situation is dire. And now is the time for 
action. And I appreciate your thoughts, Mr. President.
    We talked about, interestingly enough, the Darfur [Doha] * round. 
The President is concerned about whether or not the World Trade 
Organization round will go forward. He recognizes, like I recognize, 
that trade will lift more people out of poverty than any other 
mechanism. And I told the President, I am committed to the Darfur [Doha] 
* round. I believe in trade, and I believe in the necessity of trade. 
And so we'll work to see if we can't get that issue solved.
    * White House correction.
    We talked about a lot of issues. We talked about Iran; we talked 
about the Middle East; we talked about our bilateral relations and his 
Government's commitment to fighting HIV/AIDS and our willingness to 
provide over $600 million to the folks in South Africa to help deal with 
this terrible pandemic.
    I would call our relations strong and good and necessary. And Mr. 
President, welcome back, and the floor is yours.
    President Mbeki. Thank you very much, President. Well, I was very 
glad, indeed, that we had this opportunity to meet with the President to 
discuss precisely these matters that he has indicated. Of course of 
immediate importance to us is the support we get from the President and 
the U.S. Government with regard to the resolution of these African 
conflicts.
    And indeed, we are, all of us, keenly interested that we must 
increase the troops deployed in Darfur, to address these issues that the 
President mentioned, and hopefully the Security Council will move 
quickly on that to do that larger deployment of troops. It's very 
urgent, very necessary, and we will absolutely do everything to make 
sure that, from the African side, we remove any obstacles that might be 
to such bigger deployment in Darfur. It's very necessary.
    Because also I mentioned, I discussed with the President the impact 
of the situation in Darfur on the neighboring countries, particularly 
Chad and the Central African Republic. But also the difficult situation 
in Somalia----
    President Bush. Yes, sir.
    President Mbeki. ----and the President, together, we are very keen 
that, indeed, something must move there. This was a failed state. It's 
necessary to support transitional government, to restoring a government, 
and to reunify the country and so on. It's an important thing because 
the problem--one of the big problems is that as it is, it provides a 
base for terrorists--find safe haven there and then can spread out to 
the rest of the continent. It's something that is of shared concern.
    But again, of course, I was very, very reassured when the President 
said he is committed to the success of the WTO negotiations. It's a very 
important part, in terms of addressing the agenda of the poor of the 
world. They need these market-access issues addressed, and so on. I was 
very, very pleased, indeed, that President said indeed we must work to 
make sure that WTO negotiating process succeeds.
    We--finally, President, I'd like to say I was very pleased that, 
indeed, you said we shall need to work even--together even more 
intensely than we have in the past, because with effect from the 1st of 
January, South Africa, of course, joins the Security Council as a 
nonpermanent member. As I'm saying, I was very glad that the President 
said that's going to mean we'll need better interaction so that we could 
work together, indeed, to help to find solutions to all these wide range 
of issues that are on the agenda of the Security Council.
    But thank you very much, Mr. President.
    President Bush. Proud you're back. Thank you, sir. Thank you.

Note: The President spoke at 2:12 p.m. in the Oval Office at the White 
House.