So Condi Lied About Something? Say It Isn’t So…
Posted by buelahman on April 23, 2008
Carter says Rice ‘untruthful’ over Hamas meeting
WASHINGTON (AFP)
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter on Wednesday accused Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice of being untruthful over remarks made about his controversial meeting with the Islamist Hamas group.
Rice had chided Carter for meeting with Hamas, saying U.S. State Department officials had told him such talks would not help the Middle East peace process.
But a statement from the Atlanta-based Carter Center, which speaks on the ex-president’s behalf, said no one from the U.S. government told him not to meet with exiled Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal or other leaders of the group.
“President Carter has the greatest respect for Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and believes her to be a truthful person,” the statement said.
“However, perhaps inadvertently, she is continuing to make a statement that is not true,” it said.
According to the statement, “No one in the State Department or any other department of the U.S. government ever asked him to refrain from his recent visit to the Middle East or even suggested that he not meet with Syrian President Assad or leaders of Hamas.”
Rice had said Tuesday that the United States would not deal with Hamas and “we certainly told President Carter that we didn’t think meeting with Hamas was going to help the Palestinians who (are) actually devoted to peace.”
Following his talks with Meshaal on Monday, Carter said Hamas told him it would recognize Israel’s right to live in peace if a deal is reached and approved by a Palestinian vote.
But Meshaal said later that Hamas would not recognize the Jewish state and would insist on the right of some 4.5 million Palestinian refugees to return to Israel.
Before leaving on his Middle East trip, President Carter placed a telephone call to Rice to describe his itinerary and to inform her of his intended conversations, the statement from the Carter Center said. Rice was in Europe and her deputy returned his call, it added.
“They had a very pleasant discussion for about fifteen minutes, during which he never made any of the negative or cautionary comments… He never talked to anyone else,” the statement said.
