Building on the foundation set by the President in his May 1st speech and the discussions in Moscow last week between US and Russian officials, we had a very useful exchange of views on missile defense and the US vision for transforming deterrence, and we agreed to continue these consultations on the entire strategic framework that exists between our two nations.

The discussions of regional issues were detailed and wide-ranging. We reviewed the effort to promote a peace settlement between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh. We agreed that the third meeting of the US-Russia Working Group in Afghanistan will take place here in Washington on May 24th and 25th, co-chaired by our two deputies, Deputy Secretary Armitage and Deputy Foreign Minister Trubnikov.

Regarding recent events in the Middle East, we shared our deep concern over the mounting violence seen again today, violence which has plagued efforts to find a peaceful, just, and lasting solution to this troubled region and the problems of this troubled region. We also discussed ways in which the Mitchell Committee report might be used to promote new diplomatic efforts designed to end the violence and promote confidence and dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians.

We also discussed Iraq and how our two countries can best work together to strengthen UN efforts to provide for the legitimate needs of the people and civilian economy of Iraq, while preventing Iraq from reconstituting weapons of mass destruction and missile programs, and helping them to comply with UN resolutions.

We exchanged views on the Balkans, where both of our countries have peacekeeping troops on the ground. The Foreign Minister and I also had a substantial exchange of views about the ongoing conflict in Chechnya. I stressed to him our conviction that Russia must make an intensified effort to reach a political settlement there, with full accountability provided for past and ongoing human rights and humanitarian concerns and abuses. I was encouraged to hear the Foreign Minister state that he expects it to be possible for the OSCE Assistance Group to return to Chechnya in the very near future.

Regarding Russian domestic developments, I emphasized our interest in Russia's advancement along a path of democracy, rule of law, and economic reform. These changes are vital to ensure Russia's prosperity and stability over the long term. In this regard, we also discussed the strong support we have for the independent media in Russia.

Finally, as the White House has announced already, President Bush will meet with President Putin in Slovenia at the end of the President's visit to Europe in June. The meeting will take place in Slovenia on the afternoon of the 16th of June. That is now firm: the 16th of June in the afternoon.

Much of the work we have done today is aimed at ensuring a good, productive first meeting between our two presidents. I look forward to seeing the Foreign Minister again in Budapest at the end of this month during the meeting of the Russia-NATO Permanent Joint Council.

Mr. Minister, it has been a great pleasure to have you here, and I look forward to our conversations this evening.

FOREIGN MINISTER IVANOV: Ladies and gentlemen, we are closing the primary portion of our negotiations here in Washington. Today I met with the President of the United States, Mr. Bush, and we held talks also with the National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice and with Members of the Congress. We had several rounds of very substantive and full discussions with Secretary Powell.

At the end of this phase of discussions we are trying to reach accord on the dates of the first personal face-to-face meeting of our two presidents, about which Secretary Powell just spoke. We are convinced that the upcoming summit will become a major threshold in the relations between our two countries and will assist our bilateral dialogue, will serve as a factor for strengthening international security and stability, and the precedents for this are available.

As far as Russia is concerned, we attach a high priority to the constructive and pragmatic development of relations with the United States of America. The President and the Secretary of State of the United States have also confirmed that, in terms of relations with Russia, they hold the same analogous approach.

We are going to be developing an active, constructive dialogue on all of the topics and issues with which Russia and the United States are faced, and the international community as a whole. Today, we reviewed practically the whole range of issues on the agenda between the US and Russia. At the very center of this was, of course, the set of issues having to do with strategic stability which requires, in our mind, the most detailed and careful review with the consideration of a whole variety of different factors. We will continue the consultations on all of these issues.

We, in very great detail, have also discussed some of the key regional issues. We noted something which Secretary Powell already said, noted a very positive example of the constructive relationship and cooperation between our two countries on the ways of finding a solution to the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh issue, and we are prepared in the future as well to undertake all of the energetic efforts to prevent any crisis situations in the Middle East, cooperate in the Balkans, to continue the dialogue on other regional issues, including a very complex issue such as the settlement of the business in Iraq.

We have exchanged opinions on the prospects of developing trade and economic and scientific and technical ties. What we need here are some additional efforts in order to have the potential of our two countries be used to the fullest extent possible by our two countries.

In general, I would like to stress that I am very satisfied by the tone and the substance of our discussions here in Washington, which were held in a very open, frank, and constructive atmosphere. We agreed to continue our very close dialogue in the next couple of weeks and months.

It is my hope that in the very nearest future the Secretary of State of the United States will find the time to come and pay a visit to Russia, and I will be very happy to greet him there. Thank you.

Q: Mr. Secretary, (inaudible) again today. You, you know, put emphasis on the Mitchell Commission report a propos the violence. I wonder if I could pursue this with you a a little bit.

Hamas, which is not part of any dialogue, which is an irregular organization, claims responsibility. How, I ask, can using the Mitchell Commission report as a basis for better understanding between Israel and the regular Palestinians -- Palestinian Authority, for instance -- have any bearing on Hamas' terrorist operations which exist outside the normal dialogue and always have?

SECRETARY POWELL: It would be my hope that all violence could be brought down to zero, whether it is under the control of somebody or whether it is completely disorganized, whether it is a deliberate act of a state or a terrorist act. But as a minimum, I think, we can see a significant reduction of the level of violence if the leaders in the region would take action to speak out against violence more directly, to do everything to control the passions and to give instructions to those forces that are under their control to stop violent acts and get off this cycle of provocation and then response, and then we go up to a higher level.

The Mitchell Commission will say very clearly, when the report is released on Monday, that the very first step that has to be taken, the only way to start to move toward confidence-building measures and to move toward a resumption of negotiations, toward a final status, is for there to be unconditional -- unconditional -- cessation of violence by all.

And it's not clear one can control every terrorist out there. It's not clear that we can get it down to zero. But I think we have to start with that proposition. It is something that is being said by all world leaders at this time. I've been in contact with the Secretary General of the United Nations, with the leaders of the European Union. The Minister and I have spoken about it. I've spoken to the leaders all over the region.

And what we need now, more than anything else, is unconditional cessation of violence on the part of all. Then things can start to happen. Then we can start to put in place security coordination, methods and mechanisms to keep it down and to get it going down and down and down. Then we begin the confidence-building measures and the building of connections once again, so a level of trust is built up.

And when that level of trust starts to take hold again and there is a ceasefire for some period of time, a cooling off period, then we can get back to negotiations. But the one thing I'm absolutely sure of, working this problem day in and day out, speaking to the leaders in the region, speaking to people who have been the region, is that it has to begin with the unconditional cessation of violence.

And I stand here today and call on behalf of the United States for all leaders in the region to speak out and call immediately and to execute immediately and to do everything in their power immediately to bring into being an unconditional cessation of violence.

Q: Mr. Secretary, what is your attitude toward the idea of having joint assessments of threats to international stability to avoid unilateral steps, unilateral measures? Thank you. This is regarding ABM and strategic stability. Thank you.

SECRETARY POWELL: It was a major subject of discussion during the course of the day at almost every one of our meetings, and we are exploring ways to talk to one another at a variety of levels. The Minister had a suggestion of two working groups. We're examining that suggestion to see how that might be structured, or other means of structuring dialogue, so that we can get to the heart of the issue with respect to the threat as we see it, the threat as the Russian side sees it, and the role that the various arms agreements of the last 30 years play in the current strategic framework and what might be appropriate as we move forward into the 21st century.

So we are looking at the proper ways of handling this, but the one thing that I assured the Minister of -- and he assured me -- is that we are going to have a very, very vigorous exchange of views at all the appropriate levels between our two sides. In fact, we started. I mean, they're in the room now, or they will be as soon as this press conference is over.

Q: Welcome Minister. A question for you and a question for the Secretary, if I may. Your government is opposed to the anti-ballistic missile system, the national missile defense that the President has ordered researched and deployed eventually. What are you concerned about? It doesn't work, and it could be years, if ever, before a system does work. And would you be willing, as it now stands, to have any kind of abridgement or revision of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty?

And, Mr. Secretary, slightly different for you but a target of opportunity. A few years ago when you were at your place of prior employment, you and Secretary Aspin worked out something called a bottom-up review of the Pentagon. And one of the tenets of that was to be able to fight two regional wars at almost the same time.

In retrospect, was that a sound and realistic policy, and is it so today?

FOREIGN MINISTER IVANOV: In order to support something or not support something, it's necessary to know what we're talking about. And it's precisely with this aim in mind that we are holding very active consultations in order to be able to assess the capabilities or what kind of ABM system we're talking about. What is the content? What is it aimed at? This is really the substance of the consultation.

Naturally, today the world is not the world that existed 30 years ago. And naturally, today we are up against -- the international community up against new threats which have appeared. And naturally, it's only that together, complementing each other, the international community can find solutions.

What we're trying to do is together to define what kinds of threats we're talking about, what kind of challenges, and what kinds of means and measures we have at our disposal to find a solution. This is really what we're talking about today.

SECRETARY POWELL: When I was working for then-Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney, who is now the Vice President, and we were watching the end of the Cold War come about, the Berlin Wall went down and we could see what the future was starting to look like. And so we revised our strategy to move away from the Cold War strategy with respect to our conventional needs around the world, and we made a judgment at that time that we still had to be able to project presence, influence, and also, if necessary, fight a conflict in different parts of the world, and they might come about near simultaneously. And we never wanted to be in the position where, if we were so preoccupied with a conflict in one place, somebody else might wish to take advantage of us in another place.

It was a sound strategy, but that was 12 years ago. It's been through a few iterations since then. And as part of Secretary Rumsfeld's work and as part of my work as Secretary of State and working with the National Security Council, we are reviewing all of our strategic assumptions, our needs for presence around the world, the nature of the new missions that have come along, the peacekeeping missions, and trying to find the proper strategic framework in which to put that. And right now we're waiting for the results of Secretary Rumsfeld's review to incorporate those results into our broader national strategy.

Q: Why was Ljubljana chosen as the place for holding this summit, and did you review any other options?

And second question, Mr. Secretary of State, Mr. Powell, this evening you will have an opportunity to also continue talking with your colleague in a very informal setting. Can you discuss other issues other than foreign policy issues; in other words, just be human beings and sit around and have a good time?

Thank you.

FOREIGN MINISTER IVANOV: The Secretary of State and I discussed how the routes of our presidents and their plans and their schedules intersect, and we hit this one spot, Ljubljana, Slovenia. It just worked out that it turned out to be Slovenia. There was no other secret here. It just coincided.

SECRETARY POWELL: It turned out (inaudible) for our two presidents and their travel. For the last several weeks, the Minister and I have been travel agents, talking to each other almost daily, because both of our presidents and both of us wanted to see this meeting take place as quickly as possible. And it was during that period of time, around the 16th of June, where we found an opportunity we could bring them together in a convenient place. And Slovenia is a beautiful land and a very hospitable place in which to have such a meeting.

With respect to later this evening, yes, I hope we will have a chance to relax a little bit and enjoy each other's company, just the two of us. And I am sure we will also find opportunity to pursue the issues of the day, but also just to kick back, as we say in America, as two friends.

Q: Minister Ivanov, is Russia now prepared to sign on to the US plan for streamlined sanctions on Iraq? And if not, what are the outstanding differences?

And secondly, did you discuss the fate of Mr. Tobin, and did you offer any reassurances that he might not have to serve his full term?

FOREIGN MINISTER IVANOV: We discussed in great detail the situation with respect to the Iraq settlement. Our US partners put forth their vision, their approach to this issue. We have also our own proposals. Our experts have carried out two rounds now of discussions or negotiations, or at least exchanges of opinions. And these discussions, I think, will continue in New York.

We have a common understanding of the final goal that we are striving to reach. This is a full implementation of the appropriate resolutions of the Security Council of the United Nations, which from one side presume the non-startup of development of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and simultaneously removing sanctions from Iraq. This is a very complex problem, and how to approach it we're now studying how best to approach this, on the one, hand to lighten the burden on the Iraqi people, make their life easier, and yet to reach the final goal that we're seeking that stands before us. I think we're going to continue discussions in New York.

Now, as far as the fate of Tobin, this issue was raised by the US side. You know the substance of this issue. This now lies in the competence of the juridical sector. I promise to take the US concerns to the right authorities. Mr. Powell expressed concerns and today in the Congress of the United States those concerns were expressed, and I promised to bring them forward.

Q: My first question to Igor Sergeyevich and then second question to Secretary of State. Igor Sergeyevich, Mr. Powell said that you proposed to create two working groups in order to define the modern threats. Could you tell us what kind of initiative this is?

And, Mr. Secretary, some time ago you talked about the possibility of introducing a regime on visas, a visa regime to Russian citizens. What kind of steps and moves have you made so far?

Thank you.

FOREIGN MINISTER IVANOV: As we have just noted, in fact between us there are ongoing consultations on all of the issues having to do with strategic stability. Today, during our negotiations, taking into account that the set of issues is rather wide and really requires expert analysis, our side proposed to create two working groups at a very high level in order that one working group be mandated to study the threats that could be potential or that exist so that we would have a very good idea of what are the threats that are out there so we can analyze what kinds of instrumentalities we have now at our disposal of our two sides to neutralize these kinds of threats.

Now, the second working group would take charge of questions, as the Secretary of State says, to look at how to solve these problems in a new situation vis-�-vis strategic stability. Now, it's possible that one group or two groups -- this is really sort of a working plan. The most important thing is that we find a good dialogue between us and have all of these issues not escape our field of vision.

SECRETARY POWELL: (Inaudible) particular focus on transit visas, and I told the Minister that there were some problems that I would look into right away to try to get as much relief as I could as quickly as possible.

Q: Mr. Secretary, if I could go back to the Middle East, please, sir. First of all, can you tell us if there have been repercussions -- is it making your job more difficult with US relations with other Arab countries in terms of the current fighting, the escalation of fighting?

And is there anything, given the level of contacts you and the President have made, is there anything you can do besides deplore the upgrade in violence? Is there any action you can take besides that?

SECRETARY POWELL: I think all of our lives have been made more difficult by this situation. The Arab nations in the region are quite disturbed. They want to see an end to the violence, just as we do. They want to see quick movement back to a negotiating track, and so do we.

At the moment, we are trapped in this cycle of violence. And if there was any solution that I could come up with, any conference or meeting that could be held right away that might move us in such a direction, I would leap at it.

We remain in close contact with other world leaders, with the EU and with the United Nations -- Kofi Annan, as I said earlier. And we continue to look for solutions. We continue to look to see if a new kind or another kind of presence or another kind of activity on our part would be helpful.

But so far I find that we are still stuck at point number one. Unless there is an unconditional cessation, reduction, elimination of the violence, it's hard to get to step two; it is hard to get to the confidence-building measures; it's hard to get back on a satisfactory negotiating track.

I have no plans at the moment. I am always reviewing my plans, but I have no plans at the moment.

Q: Igor Sergeyevich, you were the first representative of the Russian Government who met with George Bush in his new capacity. What is your impression of his manner of holding a discussion? And knowing our president, how do you feel they are going to get together in their discussion in Ljubljana?

Q: Can you assure us, sir, that as long as the consultations go on the United States will not be trying to circumvent or abrogate the ABM Treaty?

FOREIGN MINISTER IVANOV: If I am not mistaken, last year on the 26th of April I was also, I think, the first foreign official representative who was received by Mr. Bush when he was then a candidate for the presidency. For me, it is an honor that this year again I was the first representative of our country with whom the President of the United States met.

I think that you know what the manner of holding of discussion is practiced by President Bush. This is a very open attitude, very frank, constructive. And I might express my personal opinion that, knowing our president, that a dialogue I think between the two of them is going to be lively; it's going to be full of content and very directed at discussing very specific issues.

SECRETARY POWELL: I think they will enjoy each other's company I think they will have a very frank and direct relationship with each other.

With respect to consultations, on the 1st of May in his speech, it was President Bush who launched this consultation process and sent teams around the world to begin that process and to explain our views to those who are interested in these views, both within the alliances that we are part of but also in countries with which we have good relations who have a particular interest in this matter, such as especially Russia. Those consultations will continue. We want to hear everyone's views.

Obviously consultations can not go on forever without reaching some sort of conclusions. Consultations can't be a substitute for action. So we will take the necessary time to get the views of all who have an interest in this matter. We will factor those views into our considerations. And then at a time when we think there has been enough consultation or we've reached agreements with others, then we will act on those agreements or act on what we believe are our bests interests at that time. So there is no time dimension on it except it can't be a substitute for ultimate action on our part.

Thank you very much.