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American Morning

Interview With Jamie Rubin, Former Assistant Secretary of State

Aired August 20, 2003 - 07:07   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: There is global condemnation this morning for the suicide attack on the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad. At least 17 people, as you mentioned, were killed, including the U.N.'s chief envoy in Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello.
Jamie Rubin, a former U.S. assistant secretary of state, knew the senior U.N. diplomat well, and he joins us this morning from London.

Jamie, nice to see you. Good morning. And thanks for joining us. We appreciate it.

JAMIE RUBIN, FORMER ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE: Good morning to you.

O'BRIEN: It seems by all accounts that Sergio Vieira de Mello was a man who was truly committed to helping people, not only the people of Iraq, but also the people in the Balkans, the people in East Timor, around the world. You knew him well. Is it fair to describe him as a man who was very passionate about his cause?

RUBIN: Well, absolutely. I knew him first well in Kosovo, when he quickly took over the U.N. role there to help rebuild Kosovo after the war there, and he established very quickly a reputation for being somebody who wanted to get the job done, who was idealistic, but also with a strong dose of realism. He then moved on to East Timor, where he helped transform that troubled place into an independent country.

And I think of all of the top U.N. diplomats that are around right now, Sergio de Mello was at the top of the list for everybody in terms of a combination of a commitment to human rights, a commitment to the U.N. system, but also a commitment to the realism of American power and the world the way it is. And he wasn't one of those U.N. workers who dreams. He was someone who got things done.

O'BRIEN: He was very well-regarded and respected by his boss, Kofi Annan. And here is what Kofi Annan had to say about him through his spokesman, Fred Eckhard. Let's listen first.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FRED ECKHARD, U.N. SECRETARY-GENERAL SPOKESMAN: The loss of Sergio Vieira de Mello is a bitter blow for the United Nations and for me personally. The death of any colleague is hard to bear, but I can think of no one we could less afford to spare or who would be more acutely missed throughout the U.N. system than Sergio.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'BRIEN: Jamie, just how big a setback is not only the overall bombing of the U.N. headquarters, but this specific loss of Sergio Vieira de Mello?

RUBIN: Well, I think it is a major setback to the U.N. efforts in Iraq, and particularly because Sergio de Mello had been so successful in convincing the American ambassador, Paul Bremer, and others to try to move faster rather than slower to hand power back to the Iraqis. It's really a tragedy for the Iraqi people who had, in Sergio de Mello, an ally, someone who cared about them, someone who had the ear of the secretary-general, who had the ear of the United States and others.

So, the U.N. effort -- and let's remember what this effort was -- to support human rights in Iraq, to provide humanitarian assistance and to do all of the do-gooder things that people forget about but that every day U.N. workers all over the world are doing. So, it's a setback for the Iraqi people, for the U.N. effort. And, frankly, yesterday's attack is a major setback for the war on terrorism.

We went into Iraq. One of the risks that everyone knew existed was that if we went to war there, the totalitarian state of Saddam Hussein would collapse, and chaos and instability would develop, and that could be a magnet -- a magnet for the jihadists, the extremists, the terrorists in the region that hadn't previously been in Iraq. So, a new front in the war on terrorism has been opened in Iraq. It's a setback for our efforts.

O'BRIEN: So then are you saying that the U.S. military, which certainly has a number of hard targets there in Iraq, was avoided in this particular case, and they went for a soft target -- the U.N. not protected by a number of military folks outside -- because it was easy, or because it would send an especially insidious message?

RUBIN: Well, I think both, really. In the recent weeks, what we've seen is less of the attacks on American soldiers and more of these kind of pure acts of terrorism, where you kill innocent men, women and children indiscriminately. It happened at the Jordanian embassy several weeks ago, it now happened at the U.N. headquarters there, cutting the water supply, cutting the electricity, trying to send a message of chaos, instability. And that is the hope of the terrorists.

So, the terrorists, whether they're members of Saddam Hussein's regime or jihadists who have come in from Saudi Arabia or from other parts of the Middle East, they have launched a new front in the war on terror right inside Iraq. And it doesn't mean that it's not important that we liberated Iraq from the tyranny of Saddam Hussein, but we brought on new and perhaps equally serious dangers there.

O'BRIEN: Jamie Rubin, a former U.S. assistant secretary of state, thanks for joining us. Jamie, nice to see you as always. Appreciate it.

RUBIN: Thank you. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.





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Aired August 20, 2003 - 07:07   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: There is global condemnation this morning for the suicide attack on the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad. At least 17 people, as you mentioned, were killed, including the U.N.'s chief envoy in Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello.
Jamie Rubin, a former U.S. assistant secretary of state, knew the senior U.N. diplomat well, and he joins us this morning from London.

Jamie, nice to see you. Good morning. And thanks for joining us. We appreciate it.

JAMIE RUBIN, FORMER ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE: Good morning to you.

O'BRIEN: It seems by all accounts that Sergio Vieira de Mello was a man who was truly committed to helping people, not only the people of Iraq, but also the people in the Balkans, the people in East Timor, around the world. You knew him well. Is it fair to describe him as a man who was very passionate about his cause?

RUBIN: Well, absolutely. I knew him first well in Kosovo, when he quickly took over the U.N. role there to help rebuild Kosovo after the war there, and he established very quickly a reputation for being somebody who wanted to get the job done, who was idealistic, but also with a strong dose of realism. He then moved on to East Timor, where he helped transform that troubled place into an independent country.

And I think of all of the top U.N. diplomats that are around right now, Sergio de Mello was at the top of the list for everybody in terms of a combination of a commitment to human rights, a commitment to the U.N. system, but also a commitment to the realism of American power and the world the way it is. And he wasn't one of those U.N. workers who dreams. He was someone who got things done.

O'BRIEN: He was very well-regarded and respected by his boss, Kofi Annan. And here is what Kofi Annan had to say about him through his spokesman, Fred Eckhard. Let's listen first.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FRED ECKHARD, U.N. SECRETARY-GENERAL SPOKESMAN: The loss of Sergio Vieira de Mello is a bitter blow for the United Nations and for me personally. The death of any colleague is hard to bear, but I can think of no one we could less afford to spare or who would be more acutely missed throughout the U.N. system than Sergio.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'BRIEN: Jamie, just how big a setback is not only the overall bombing of the U.N. headquarters, but this specific loss of Sergio Vieira de Mello?

RUBIN: Well, I think it is a major setback to the U.N. efforts in Iraq, and particularly because Sergio de Mello had been so successful in convincing the American ambassador, Paul Bremer, and others to try to move faster rather than slower to hand power back to the Iraqis. It's really a tragedy for the Iraqi people who had, in Sergio de Mello, an ally, someone who cared about them, someone who had the ear of the secretary-general, who had the ear of the United States and others.

So, the U.N. effort -- and let's remember what this effort was -- to support human rights in Iraq, to provide humanitarian assistance and to do all of the do-gooder things that people forget about but that every day U.N. workers all over the world are doing. So, it's a setback for the Iraqi people, for the U.N. effort. And, frankly, yesterday's attack is a major setback for the war on terrorism.

We went into Iraq. One of the risks that everyone knew existed was that if we went to war there, the totalitarian state of Saddam Hussein would collapse, and chaos and instability would develop, and that could be a magnet -- a magnet for the jihadists, the extremists, the terrorists in the region that hadn't previously been in Iraq. So, a new front in the war on terrorism has been opened in Iraq. It's a setback for our efforts.

O'BRIEN: So then are you saying that the U.S. military, which certainly has a number of hard targets there in Iraq, was avoided in this particular case, and they went for a soft target -- the U.N. not protected by a number of military folks outside -- because it was easy, or because it would send an especially insidious message?

RUBIN: Well, I think both, really. In the recent weeks, what we've seen is less of the attacks on American soldiers and more of these kind of pure acts of terrorism, where you kill innocent men, women and children indiscriminately. It happened at the Jordanian embassy several weeks ago, it now happened at the U.N. headquarters there, cutting the water supply, cutting the electricity, trying to send a message of chaos, instability. And that is the hope of the terrorists.

So, the terrorists, whether they're members of Saddam Hussein's regime or jihadists who have come in from Saudi Arabia or from other parts of the Middle East, they have launched a new front in the war on terror right inside Iraq. And it doesn't mean that it's not important that we liberated Iraq from the tyranny of Saddam Hussein, but we brought on new and perhaps equally serious dangers there.

O'BRIEN: Jamie Rubin, a former U.S. assistant secretary of state, thanks for joining us. Jamie, nice to see you as always. Appreciate it.

RUBIN: Thank you. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.





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