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Real Audio of Briefing
MR. PRINCE: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Washington Foreign Press Center. We are pleased to present a briefing by Ambassador John Maisto, United States Permanent Representative to the Organization of American States.
Ambassador Maisto will discuss the next general assembly meeting of the Organization of American States in Quito, where the focus will be on the fight against corruption. Ambassador Maisto, I believe, will have an opening statement. Please go ahead and then we'll take the questions.
MR. MAISTO: Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here.
We are on the verge of the annual Organization of American States' General Assembly, this year to be held from June 6th to 8th in Quito, Ecuador. And you all know what the Organization of American States is. I don't have to give you a briefing on that, I hope.
It goes back to 1890. It's the oldest regional international organization in the world. And for the United States, the OAS has become our principal venue for multilateral engagement with other nations of the hemisphere as we seek to advance in multi-national fora, a variety of issues, some of which have bilateral importance as well, and our effort is constantly to look for practical solutions to tough problems.
The General Assembly in Quito is going to take on one similar tough problem because the Ecuadorian hosts have determined that the primary topic of discussion by the ministers will be the impact of corruption on social development and democracy. It's a good theme. It was one of the main themes of the Summit of the Americas in Monterrey, Mexico, back in January under the rubric of democratic governance and the fight against corruption.
We do know that corruption and the effects of corruption is something that causes immense harm to democracies in the Americas. It -- corruption, of course, distorts the administration of justice. It fuels criminality and bribery and influence peddling. Narcotics, trafficking, money is caught up in corruption, as is money laundering and extortion.
The World Bank estimates that one percent of the GDP in the developing world is lost each year due to corruption. And if you do the arithmetic, you will know that that is a lot -- a lot of money that could be much better utilized. The U.S. Department of Commerce estimates that more than 80 billion annually is spent to bribe public officials worldwide.
The United States has a variety of bilateral programs to assist in the fight against corruption, technical assistance to update criminal codes and develop codes of ethics and to form specialized money laundering task forces. And as a result, leading up to the summit in Monterrey, we, the United States have put into final, an agreement with the Government of Peru to return to the Government of Peru upwards of $20 million that the Montecinos operation in Peru during the Fujimori government had hidden in the United States. And that's just the tip of the iceberg, because at the Summit of the Americas, the leaders agreed to deny safe haven to corrupt officials, to those who corrupt them, and to their assets.
And in Quito, we will see an advancing of this theme in practical ways. We are looking for ways to strengthen the Inter-American Anti-Corruption Convention that has existed since 1995. There are -- the Quito meeting will help focus the political will of the hemisphere's foreign ministers on the subject to lead to a meeting in Managua later this summer on the convention and how to put teeth into the convention.
One thing is to decry corruption -- another is to make the convention applicable in measurable ways. And next year there's going to be another Summit of the Americas in Argentina, and the corruption theme will be brought to yet another level.
We must remember that the United Nations has an anti-corruption convention that it just completed in December, so there are some good things to be derived from that one as well, but the inter-American system has moved the corruption agenda forward, and we welcome the opportunity to put even more emphasis on practical ways to deal with corruption in Quito.
Of course, there will be a host of other issues that will be taken up at the general assembly: resolutions are being put into final now over at the Permanent Council. As a matter of fact, when I leave this meeting, I will go back to the Permanent Council to work on a resolution about Haiti. That's one of the current issues. But there are issues that have to do with fighting terrorism, issues that have to do with supporting trade.
Over at the OAS, the CAFTA, the Central America Free Trade Agreement, was signed with the United States. The OAS has a very valuable technical arm that helps countries to modernize and to give more perfection to their trade capacity negotiation skills.
It is very technical. It's modern. It is state of the art; and it is one of the pieces of the trade infrastructure that is needed as we move in the direction of our Free Trade Area of the Americas agenda, which key countries are working very hard on. The United States and Brazil, as you know, have the key. So the OAS provides infrastructure for that.
We have the work of the OAS Human Rights Commission that issues hard-hitting reports on human rights situations in individual countries. We have the organization of the OAS's Commission -- the Anti-Drug Commission, which has established something called the Multilateral Evaluation Mechanism. And the Multilateral Evaluation Mechanism looks at the record of each country's compliance with its international agreements to fight drug trafficking and money laundering, and measures the compliance, and states regularly in reports what countries are accomplishing and what they're not accomplishing.
So you have the Organization of American States, if it didn't exist, we would have had to invent it. It is composed of democratic countries, and perhaps the jewel in the crown of the Inter-American instruments came out of the summit process. The meeting in Quebec in 2001 produced a charge to the OAS member-countries to produce a Democratic Charter, and Inter-American Democratic Charter, and this is it. The Inter-American Democratic Charter was approved in Lima, Peru on September the 11th, 2001.
This charter is what member-states, through the OAS, bring to help get through very difficult political issues: one of them is Haiti; another is in Venezuela, where the Organization of American States has a mission on the ground in Venezuela, has existed for about a year and a half in Venezuela to help Venezuelans work through their political crisis in a way which is consonant with a resolution of the OAS, Resolution 833 of last year, that calls for a solution that is peaceful and democratic and constitutional and electoral.
So the OAS is working very hard. The United States supports these multilateral efforts and will continue to do so as we move ahead, and this General Assembly will give -- will give our foreign affairs leaders the opportunity to look at the realities of the hemisphere, to take stock of what has been accomplished, to take stock of what has not been accomplished, to set the agenda for forward movement and, as I stated at the beginning, this particular year, to keep a focus on practical ways to fight corruption, which, of course, has an impact on both democracy and social development.
With that, I will take your questions.
MR. PRINCE: Thank you very much. Please state your name and news organization. Go ahead.
QUESTION: Ambassador Maisto, my name is Betty Brannan -- excuse me. My name is Betty Brannan from La Prensa of Panama.
Meaning no disrespect to you, personally, Ambassador Maisto, but you'll forgive my skepticism because in Panama, we worry a lot about corruption in the government and we see that all these conventions exist on paper, but not in practice. And to ask the Panamanian Government to clean itself up is asking -- a classic example of asking the hen to -- the wolf to guard the henhouse.
In this case, we have an Ecuadorian minister who, accused of corruption in his own country, has fled to Panama to avoid prosecution in his own country, and Panama has given him safe haven -- the very thing that you just say has been one of the accomplishments of the OAS. So, and we see no change in corruption levels in Panama; and we can't even find out which Panamanian officials have had their visas retired, withdrawn, by the United States because of alleged corruption, so how can you address those concerns if the Panamanian people feel that there is a lot of talk but nothing really happens?
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: I think you have put your finger on one of the real problems of dealing with corruption in democratic societies. There will be -- there will be forward movement on fighting corruption and promoting transparency to the degree that the political will exists in each individual state to follow through on its political commitments and its legal commitments. That's number one, so it's a question of political will.
And in democratic systems, people have the opportunity to review the political will of elected governments regularly through something called elections. And usually, issues of corruption are big election issues. Now, I do know that Panama has just gone through an election, and there's going to be a new Panamanian Government. The new Panamanian Government will have the opportunity, as does the existing Panamanian Government, to live up to its obligations. And if it does not, it's going to have to respond to its own people.
Now, within the international framework, within the international framework, these commitments: for example, the commitment to deny safe haven to corrupt officials, to those who corrupt them and to their assets has to be accompanied by a rule of law approach to the event in question.
Let me give you the example of Peru. The Government of Peru, working with the Government of the United States, the two justice ministries, in accordance with the appropriate laws and procedures of Peru and of the United States, worked very expeditiously. There was a good deal of political will in Peru to do this and a good deal of political will in the United States, which is now the situation. It is not enough simply to declare that someone is corrupt; it has to be accompanied by proof and working through procedure, working through rule of law. Sometimes it takes a while. In the case of the United States and Peru, it didn't take too long. But there are ways to do this if there is political will.
Now, in democratic societies, the media speak out regularly about these subjects and political leaders do as well. So those efforts must continue, and then it will be up to the leadership to follow through or not. If the leadership does not, then the leaders are going to go to meetings, international meetings where these subjects are taken up, and they're going to have to explain themselves. I would assume that all of you would cover those proceedings very closely.
There are even efforts -- as a matter of fact, my government pushed in Mexico, at the Summit of the Americas, an effort to make adherence to fighting corruption in a practical way, in other words, forward movement -- proof that countries are doing what they have to do to be a requisite for participation in the Inter-American system such as: being a democracy is a requisite for participation in the Inter-American system. This is a theme that is -- continues to be discussed. We trust it is a theme that will be taken up at the next Summit of the Americas to be held next year in Argentina.
So this is a moving subject, and little by little we're making progress. But whether or not progress is made in Country X depends upon the political will of the leaders.
MR. PRINCE: Right here, please.
QUESTION: Yes, Ambassador. Pablo Bachelet with the Reuters News Agency. I'm the Latin American correspondent.
I have a question regarding -- first a question on corruption. How many officials have had their visas revoked from Latin America? I was wondering if you had a number and also a breakdown, a rough breakdown by regions or countries.
And the second question is, I was wondering, there is a resolution before the OAS. You mentioned the Democratic Charter. There is a resolution before the OAS to invoke the Democratic Charter in the case of Haiti. What's your position on that, specifically to invoke Article 20 of the Democratic Charter, as presented by CARICOM?
And second, are you prepared, or under what circumstance would you be prepared to invoke the Democratic Charter in the case of Venezuela, and if you have a reaction to Venezuela's demand that the U.S. abandon the Group of Friends?
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: With regard to your question about corruption and U.S. visa policy, U.S. visa policy is decided on a case-by-case basis, and we don't make public announcements that Fulano or Mengano or Sutano no longer has a visa. That is not something we do.
With regard to statistics, I just don't know if we give out global statistics or statistics by country or region. I would have to check that out and get back to you on that. I just -- that's a legitimate question. I don't know the answer to it.
With regard to the Inter-American Democratic Charter, you asked a question about Haiti.
QUESTION: Invoking the Democratic Charter.
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: Okay. As a matter of fact, as we speak, there's a meeting of the Permanent Council on this very subject, so I don't want to gainsay what is being discussed in the Permanent Council. But I can tell you that the Prime Minister of Haiti came to the Organization of American States to the Permanent Council, and asked that this charter be invoked.
He asked that it be invoked specifically with regard to Articles 23 and 24. And Articles 23 and 24 call upon the Organization to help individual countries with advisory services or assistance in strengthening and developing their electoral institutions and processes, including sending preliminary missions for that purpose, that's Article 23. And Article 24 talks about how these missions will be carried out.
So the interim government of Haiti is asking for the invocation of the Democratic Charter and that is being considered. We think that is positive because the interim government has stated very clearly that its main purpose is to get from where Haiti is now to a scheduled election, or scheduled elections, in the shortest possible time so that Haiti can -- Haiti's democracy can be strengthened and all the political elements in Haiti can be represented and the Haitian people can make their selection with regard -- of their new leadership.
With regard to -- you mentioned Article 20. Article 20 says, "in the event of an unconstitutional alteration of the constitutional regime that seriously impairs the democratic order," well, in Haiti, if you check the UN resolution on Haiti, the UN resolution on Haiti talked about a constitutional succession in Haiti. So, from the point of view of the United States, Article 20, talking about an unconstitutional alteration, Article 20 does not apply because there was a change in Haiti, to be sure, and there was a passage per the Haitian constitution of power from the departing president, who issued a letter of resignation and then departed, per the Haitian constitution, to the president of the Haitian supreme court.
And the president of the Haitian Supreme Court became the president, according to the Haitian constitution. Now that was reported by -- that was the report of the Assistant Secretary General of the OAS to the Permanent Council that was embodied in the UN resolution, as a matter of fact in two UN -- well, the first UN resolution, and then referred to in the second UN resolution.
So we have constitutional government in Haiti. We don't have very strong government in Haiti. We have a crisis in Haiti that continues. And the most important thing that we have is the will of the United States and other countries to move forward with Haiti.
As a matter of fact, our -- we just announced earlier this week that in addition to the $55 million or so of aid to Haiti, that we are increasing that amount by over $100 million. We have U.S. troops on the ground in Haiti as part of a multinational force, and there are troops from other countries as well. We are preparing for the second phase of the multinational force in Haiti per the UN resolution. So there is forward movement in Haiti to help the Haitian people, the 8 million Haitian people, have an opportunity to -- in peace and in security, to move their country ahead. That's the United States policy.
QUESTION: What about in Venezuela?
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: In Venezuela, we'll have to see what happens. I think the Secretary of State made a very good statement. Have you all seen the Secretary's statement yesterday? Okay. That speaks for itself. That very much speaks for itself.
But it's always good to --
QUESTION: (Inaudible.)
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: Well, it's -- the Group of Friends is the Group of Friends of the Secretary General of the Organization of American States.
QUESTION: (Inaudible.)
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: I really have nothing to say about that. The Government of Venezuela says so many things. The Government of Venezuela has really spoken very badly of U.S. officials -- the President, the National Security Advisor, the National Endowment for Democracy, whose co-chairs are Senator McCain and Secretary of State Albright. And then, just yesterday at the Permanent Council, I heard a barrage against Roger Noriega and against the Electoral Observation Mission of the OAS.
So there are a lot of words that come out of Venezuela. Our policy is very simple and very straightforward. Our policy is to support a resolution by Venezuelans, as the Secretary of State says -- said.
The Secretary of State talked about the process that's ongoing to help Venezuelans resolve their differences and build a better, stronger future for their nation. The Secretary said that he urged the Venezuelan Government to honor the wishes of its people by supporting a fair and credible process that produces prompt results in an atmosphere free of fear and intimidation.
The Secretary also called on all Venezuelans to reject violence as incompatible with the exercise of democracy. The Secretary said that the presence of the Organization of American States and the Carter Center observation missions will promote greater transparency and credibility, and he went on to say that the United States supports a peaceful, democratic, constitutional, electoral solution to Venezuela's political impasse as called for in OAS Resolution 833 of May 29th, 2003, and the May 29th, 2003 agreement between the Government of Venezuela and the democratic opposition.
The recent statement of the Friends of the Secretary General, the Secretary of State noted, of the OAS for Venezuela, calls for just such a democratic solution. And the United States will continue working with the international community to help the people of Venezuela achieve their democratic aspirations.
Our policy is one of solidarity with the Venezuelan people as the Venezuelan people attempt to resolve their own problems in a way that is democratic and peaceful and constitutional and electoral -- free, without intimidation, without fear. That is our policy.
MR. PRINCE: Let's go right back here, and then we'll come back up to you.
QUESTION: Mr. Ambassador, I'm Pin Liu of China Times.
The spokesperson of State Department said yesterday that U.S. strongly supported Taiwan's participation in this organization. My question is, did Mr. Ambassador or other U.S. delegates say something in the previous Permanent Council meeting on May 26th, I think, which came to a conclusion that allowed -- approved China's permanent observership? Thank you.
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: The Permanent Council meeting that you referred to, by unanimous consent, approved the observer status of the People's Republic of China. That was a result of an OAS Permanent Council resolution.
At the same Permanent Council meeting, there was discussion of what role Taiwan could have in the organization. And that subject, it was agreed, will be taken up at a future Permanent Council meeting.
QUESTION: Just to follow up. What will U.S. do as a next step? Will U.S. introduce a resolution, and is there consensus among U.S. and other state members? Thank you.
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: The subject of Taiwan is one that will be taken up at a future Permanent Council meeting. The United States supports, as the State Department representative said, as I said; the United States supports a role for Taiwan in the Organization and we will discuss the appropriate role.
MR. PRINCE: Right here.
QUESTION: Nestor Ikeda. I'm Associated Press reporter for Latin America. Thank you, Mr. Ambassador.
As you know, in the OAS meeting in Quito, there is going to be a change in the OAS leader. My question is, what is the U.S. Administration assessment of the work made by Mr. Gaviria? Are you frustrated? Are you, perhaps, happy with Mr. Gaviria's work?
And the second question is, what would the Administration expect of the next leader’s work, too?
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: Well, former-President of Colombia and current Secretary General Cesar Gaviria will be completing two five-year terms as Secretary General of the OAS this year. His term will end on September the 15th.
You're asking for an evaluation of Secretary Gaviria's stewardship as Secretary General of the OAS. My response to you would be that we think he has been a strong and effective Security General. He has been hard working. He has taken on very difficult issues, he has been creative, and the position of Secretary General has become even more important with a stronger Organization of American States, and Organization of American States that is called upon by the leaders through the summit process to carry out mandates of a leader. One of the manifestations of mandates is the -- is the Inter-American Democratic Charter. So we think that history will treat the Secretary General well. We will have more formal statements at the time that the transition takes place.
In Quito, there will be election for a new Secretary General, and the qualities that the United States looks for in a new Secretary General are, essentially: a flow from leadership, creativity, respect, because the new Secretary General will have to deal with the host of issues that I have described today and then some.
There will be, of course, democratic -- issues of democracy and the application of the Democratic Charter. We need to do more work with the application of the Democratic Charter looking ahead, looking at countries that are going through democratic -- going through difficulties in their democratic institutions in applying the Charter.
But we must remember one thing about the Organization of American States, and it is this: That what the Organization does or doesn't do depends upon the will of the member-states. The Organization of American States is and always will be what the individual member-states want it to be. It's one country, one vote. And the tradition in the OAS has been to come to agreement by consensus. And many times, that's difficult to do.
So -- but, but what is really, really singular about the Organization of American States is that outside of the European Union, it is the only entity that has being a functioning democracy as a requirement for membership. That makes the OAS unique, but it also makes it an entity that, through the process of exploration and negotiation, brings us to positions to help countries get through difficult situations, such as Haiti and Venezuela, to observe elections.
The Organization of American States is the entity that really does tremendous work on election observation. Look at all the election observe missions that it has managed. And this is, this is one area where Cesar Gaviria gets a very high grade on the management of the whole election observation process. So those are all -- those are some of the challenges ahead and some of the things we are looking for in a new Secretary General, and we'll see who wins the election.
MR. PRINCE: Yes. Right here, please.
QUESTION: Thank you. Ruben Barrera with the Mexican News Agency Notimex.
Mr. Ambassador, as you may know, President Chavez, Hugo Chavez from Venezuela, he published an article a couple of days ago in a U.S. newspaper. Among other things, he referred to the present crisis in his country, and also, he referred to fact that the opposition is asking for a referendum to withdraw him -- or to put him out of the office.
In one part of the -- his article, Mr. Chavez say that he's happy, that he was expecting to have this referendum because he is pretty sure that if that's the case, the Venezuelan people will be -- back his government. And he also says something about that he hoped that after that -- after -- if the referendum took place, the U.S. will recognize the result of this referendum. So basically, my question is, if -- regardless of the result, if that referendum took place, will that be the end of this tug-of-war between U.S. and Venezuela?
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: Yeah, I read President Chavez's article and I did note that he said, and I have a copy of it here, "To be frank, I hope that my opponents have gathered enough signatures to trigger a referendum, because I relish the opportunity to, once again, win the people's mandate."
Well, that's what elections are all about. The OAS resolution calls for a solution to the crisis that is peaceful, democratic, constitutional and electoral. And that's what everybody wants. But in order for that to happen, it has to be conducted fairly. And I do recall that President Jimmy Carter, way back in February said that -- and this is a quote from the Carter Center, "As President Carter said two weeks ago, 'The sovereign expression of the citizen must be privileged over excessive technicalities in the vote in the signature collection process.'"
So the Venezuelans, whose job it is to resolve their own internal situation, are attempting to do that, and our position is one of solidarity with the Venezuelan people, in accordance with this Democratic Charter, as they go about the business of attempting to do that. So I think it would be premature to make any judgments as to exactly what's going to happen. We don't know.
What we do know is what all the member-states of the Organization of American States have called for and what the United States expects is a solution that is peaceful, democratic, constitutional and electoral, because that is the right of the Venezuelan people according to their own constitution. And the role of the international community is to observe, to monitor and to give the Venezuelans and the world their judgment as to how it was conducted, because the media will be there; the international organizations will be there; other observers will be there; and they will report what they see. When that is completed, we see the results, then, we will see where we are in Venezuela.
MR. PRINCE: If you'd -- right here again.
QUESTION: Ron Scheman, the dir-- who, until recently, was director of the Inter-American Agency for Cooperation and Development, and an American citizen, has resigned recently amid many criticisms of the Bush policy towards Latin America. Mr. Scheman says that the policy is adrift, and he told me yesterday in an interview that one of the problems is that the Bush officials seem to only believe in democracy when the elected leaders are ones that they agree with. I wonder if you have any comments on that, Ambassador.
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: Yes, Betty, I noticed your article and wanted to point out one thing.
Mr. Scheman is -- served in his position, but was not an appointee of the Bush Administration. Mr. Scheman was appointed to that position during the previous Administration and had a term of office, which ended. And now, he is a private citizen and he can say whatever he wants, which is his privilege.
I don't happen to agree with him, but the remark that you just made I think does not hold water whatsoever. The United States position is that it is the sovereign right of people to choose their own leaders through free and fair election. And we, as members of the international community and as members of the Organization of American States, have the obligation to support such processes, to be witnesses to them, to help when need be -- I have read to you Articles 23 and 24 of the Inter-American Democratic Charter. The Prime Minister of Haiti asked for assistance to strengthen their electoral system and to help monitor it.
The United States believes in free and fair elections. What the United States does not believe in is, the power of state or individual democratically-elected leaders to, through institutions -- electoral institutions, juridical institutions, legislature institutions, the military, the intelligence community, the tax system or whatever way, exert pressure on individual citizens and on electoral processes. That's not acceptable.
And you know; the Inter-American Democratic Charter deals with that. The very first Article of the Inter-American Democratic Charter says, and I quote, "The peoples of the Americas have a right to democracy. And their governments have an obligation to promote and to defend it." Turn that around. Governments have an obligation to their people to promote and to defend their people's right to democracy. So there are responsibilities that governments have. And in the next Article -- an enumeration of some of those obligations on the part of government are enumerated.
Article 2 says, "The effective exercise of representative democracy is the basis for the rule of law and of the constitutional regimes of the member-states of the OAS. Representative democracy is strengthened and deepened by permanent, ethical and responsible participation of the citizenry, within a legal framework conforming to the respective constitutional order." So governments have to provide the basic atmosphere and the basic mechanisms and the basic guarantees for their citizens. What happens if they don't? You have conflict.
And we look to democratic systems to resolve those conflicts: independent judiciary, independent legislative systems, electoral institutions that enjoy the credibility of their people, a free press that is not importuned by the government, free political party and political leadership activity -- those are all the attributes -- respect for human rights.
We find it very difficult to understand why any country in this hemisphere would condemn the Inter-American Human Rights Commission for a human rights report. They can take issue, they can say, "You said this, but the situation isn't that." But to suggest that the Inter-American Human Rights Commission is absolutely against the particular government is -- in today's age, it's, you know, not acceptable.
QUESTION: Are you thinking of Haiti when you make those comments?
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: I'm thinking of any government that you want to -- you want to apply it to. I'm thinking of any government you want to apply it to.
QUESTION: Mr. Ambassador, --
MR. PRINCE: Please wait for the microphone.
QUESTION: Mr. Ambassador, but don't you think that a lot of people would find this position, you know, hard to believe, when, for example, U.S. is a very close partner with Pakistan, with the leader of Pakistan, who deposed a democratic government and, you know, there is not -- there is not any sign that Pakistan would have elections in the short time, same case with Mr. Mubarak in Egypt. And just a couple of days ago, I think, President Bush met with this President from Africa who has been in office for, I don't know, 20 years, so I mean, how can you make people understand your position when you have these examples of not very democratic countries or leaders?
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: First of all, I'm here today as Ambassador to the Organization of American States, and I was talking to you today about the Inter-American Democratic Charter. I'm talking about this hemisphere. Can you give me any examples from this hemisphere?
QUESTION: Well, I mean, since you were talking about the -- you seemed to be talking in general about democratic government. That's why I asked the question.
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: Yeah, I'm talking about the values of democratic government. We understand that there are -- as I pointed out previously, there are -- there is no other area of the world, which has democracy as the basis for its regional organizations other than the European Union and the Organization of American States.
I'm not here to talk about the, the realities and the problems with each country on the face of the earth. Each case, in that instance, has its own realities and situations that we must contend with. I'm here to talk about this hemisphere, this Charter and this organization. And I ask you -- can you think of any instances in this hemisphere in this Administration where there is a double standard about democracy on the part of the United States?
I'm sorry. Haiti, under the former president, was a country that we were all attempting to support. And the OAS was very much involved in Haiti. There are three OAS resolutions on Haiti. Unfortunately, the previous president of Haiti failed to comply with any one of those resolutions in any part.
Haitian institutions, under that president, fell apart. There were no elections; therefore there was no congress. The police force became corrupted and politicized. That was the situation as we moved into, into this year. Haiti is now -- has an interim government and Haiti is on the way to an election in which Haitians will select their new leadership. And in the meantime, there are a lot of countries in this hemisphere and beyond who are doing their best to help Haiti.
MR. PRINCE: No more questions? Is everybody done? Thank you very much. Thank you, Ambassador Maisto.
AMBASSADOR MAISTO: Thank you.
