Remarks after UN HIV/AIDS Plenary

(3:15 p.m. EDT)

QUESTION: --this is effectively if the Iraqis had, and the administration has been, in fact, wasting money. What is your response to this? Do you think this is jumping the gun?

SECRETARY POWELL: You're putting words into their mouths that they haven't yet uttered. We have a good plan, a seven-step plan, that Ambassador Bremer has laid out, that will lead to a full return of authority to the Iraqi people, after a constitution has been written, and from that constitution, elections are held, and the people of Iraq will have the opportunity to decide who their leaders should be. Money that is being asked to go up on the Congress will be handled in a responsible manner by the Coalition Provisional Authority working with the Governing Council, and, of course, especially, you've got ministers who are responsible for providing services to the people, helping the reconstruction effort, and that's who we will be working with.

But CPA has to be in charge of this until such time as we allow the Iraqi people to determine how they wish to be governed, with a constitution, and then select those who govern them. It's interesting to talk about short cuts, and once we turn sovereignty (inaudible), that sovereignty can only be returned to a responsible government that has been selected by the Iraqi people, not selected or appointed by anyone else but the Iraqi people, a process that's been laid out. The Governing Council, cabinet ministers, the government's starting to function, starting to take action on an economic package, independent judiciary, cabinet ministers coming up with plans that we're sharing with Ambassador Bremer -- all of which is part of a deliberate and well-considered plan to get to the point that we all want to get to, and that is to give Iraq and the Iraqi people full authority for their own destiny and their own hopes and dreams. What we don't want to do is set them up for a failure by jump-starting the process or trying to do something now which is absolutely unrealistic.

QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, when do you expect to have a new draft of the Iraq resolution?

SECRETARY POWELL: We'll work on that. It's more important this week for us to have consultations with all of our Security Council colleagues and others. The President will be having a consultation with heads of state and government, and so after those consultations have been held, you get a better sense of what people are thinking, then we'll move forward. There's no sense of urgency here because we have a pretty good idea of what such a resolution should say, and there's pretty good support for a resolution. There are still some ideas and different points of view around the President looks forward to hearing and discussing with his fellow heads of government and heads of state.

Thank you.