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CNN Live Saturday
Bush Plans Trip to Azores Summit
Aired March 15, 2003 - 15:14 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.
RENAY SAN MIGUEL, ANCHOR: President Bush plans a one day trip to the Azores in the Atlantic tomorrow to meet with the leaders of Britain and Spain. Both countries support a military invasion of Iraq. Few others do without new authorization from the United Nations.
CNN's Dana Bash will be traveling with the president. She has the latest now from the White House -- Dana.
DANA BASH, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Renay, as we speak, preparations are under way on the island of Tasara. That is in the Azores in the middle of the Atlantic. They are the Portuguese Azores, and that is where the summit will take place tomorrow between President Bush, Prime Minister Tony Blair of Great Britain and the Spanish prime minister, Jose Maria Aznar.
As you mentioned, they are all allies, co-sponsors of a resolution at the United Nations to give Saddam Hussein a deadline to disarm or face military action.
So what they are going to talk about, with prospects for that resolution looking very bleak right now. They are going to discuss what to do next, plot their next move.
The president, for his part, today is at Camp David. He made some phone calls in advance of tomorrow's summit. He spoke earlier with Tony Blair, comparing notes before tomorrow. He also spoke with Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, and saying, according to an aide, that he does intend to go the last mile diplomatically.
But in the president's weekly radio address today, he made it pretty clear that America should brace itself for war.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There is little reason to hope that Saddam Hussein will disarm. If force is required to disarm him, the American people can know that our armed forces have been given every tool and every resource to achieve victory.
The people of Iraq can know that every effort will be made to spare innocent life and to help Iraq recover from three decades of totalitarian rule.
(END AUDIO CLIP) BASH: So what the president and his allies must discuss in the one day summit tomorrow is what to do next? Will they possibly come up with language that could get through the U.N. Security Council, could get those nine votes at least the majority of the Security Council members that they have been unable to convince so far?
Or will they decide not to have a resolution, not to have a vote at the United Nations at all and not go through the U.N. once again. And if that is the case, what to do, how many members of their so- called coalition of the willing will there be, how to proceed next.
And the president again making it pretty clear that that decision will come very soon, perhaps within days -- Renay.
SAN MIGUEL: Dana, I know you've had a very busy morning and afternoon there. But I've got to ask you if there's any reaction from the White House on two of the events, that are -- you know, the underlying motive is apparently to forestall any kind of U.S. coalition action.
One, Baghdad calling on Blix and ElBaradei to return as soon as possible to Baghdad; and two, Germany, France and Russia calling for a Security Council ministerial meeting on Tuesday.
Any kind of reaction at all to those?
BASH: So far no reaction yet on either of those fronts.
However, on the issue of inviting Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei back to Iraq, what the White House has said when Iraq has made moves such as this before is that they expect things like this from Saddam Hussein, that what he is trying to do is to deceive the world by making last minute moves in order to avert some kind of military action.
That is what they have said in the past and it is likely what they would say with this particular move but no specific reaction to that quite yet. We're going to get -- try to get a reaction soon.
SAN MIGUEL: OK. We'll let you get on with that. Dana Bash at the White House. Thank you very much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired March 15, 2003 - 15:14 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RENAY SAN MIGUEL, ANCHOR: President Bush plans a one day trip to the Azores in the Atlantic tomorrow to meet with the leaders of Britain and Spain. Both countries support a military invasion of Iraq. Few others do without new authorization from the United Nations.
CNN's Dana Bash will be traveling with the president. She has the latest now from the White House -- Dana.
DANA BASH, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Renay, as we speak, preparations are under way on the island of Tasara. That is in the Azores in the middle of the Atlantic. They are the Portuguese Azores, and that is where the summit will take place tomorrow between President Bush, Prime Minister Tony Blair of Great Britain and the Spanish prime minister, Jose Maria Aznar.
As you mentioned, they are all allies, co-sponsors of a resolution at the United Nations to give Saddam Hussein a deadline to disarm or face military action.
So what they are going to talk about, with prospects for that resolution looking very bleak right now. They are going to discuss what to do next, plot their next move.
The president, for his part, today is at Camp David. He made some phone calls in advance of tomorrow's summit. He spoke earlier with Tony Blair, comparing notes before tomorrow. He also spoke with Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, and saying, according to an aide, that he does intend to go the last mile diplomatically.
But in the president's weekly radio address today, he made it pretty clear that America should brace itself for war.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There is little reason to hope that Saddam Hussein will disarm. If force is required to disarm him, the American people can know that our armed forces have been given every tool and every resource to achieve victory.
The people of Iraq can know that every effort will be made to spare innocent life and to help Iraq recover from three decades of totalitarian rule.
(END AUDIO CLIP) BASH: So what the president and his allies must discuss in the one day summit tomorrow is what to do next? Will they possibly come up with language that could get through the U.N. Security Council, could get those nine votes at least the majority of the Security Council members that they have been unable to convince so far?
Or will they decide not to have a resolution, not to have a vote at the United Nations at all and not go through the U.N. once again. And if that is the case, what to do, how many members of their so- called coalition of the willing will there be, how to proceed next.
And the president again making it pretty clear that that decision will come very soon, perhaps within days -- Renay.
SAN MIGUEL: Dana, I know you've had a very busy morning and afternoon there. But I've got to ask you if there's any reaction from the White House on two of the events, that are -- you know, the underlying motive is apparently to forestall any kind of U.S. coalition action.
One, Baghdad calling on Blix and ElBaradei to return as soon as possible to Baghdad; and two, Germany, France and Russia calling for a Security Council ministerial meeting on Tuesday.
Any kind of reaction at all to those?
BASH: So far no reaction yet on either of those fronts.
However, on the issue of inviting Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei back to Iraq, what the White House has said when Iraq has made moves such as this before is that they expect things like this from Saddam Hussein, that what he is trying to do is to deceive the world by making last minute moves in order to avert some kind of military action.
That is what they have said in the past and it is likely what they would say with this particular move but no specific reaction to that quite yet. We're going to get -- try to get a reaction soon.
SAN MIGUEL: OK. We'll let you get on with that. Dana Bash at the White House. Thank you very much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
