Interview With Jonathan Karl of ABC

QUESTION: So I want to ask you a question about Iran. Given all that Iran is up to, especially what we're seeing in terms of the flow of Iranian weapons into Iraq, isn't it time to have a weapons embargo on Iran?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, indeed at some point it will be a very good thing to have a weapons embargo on Iran. There already is Security Council resolution language about vigilance about Iranian arms sales. And Iran is obviously a very big problem for not just the United States and Iraq, but for the arms that it's supplying, for instance, to Hezbollah, which really is in violation of Resolution 1701 that ended the war in Lebanon.

QUESTION: So if Iranian weapons are such a major issue right now, such a big problem, why do the Russians still insist on selling arms in a pretty big way to the Iranian Government?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, this is something that I raised yesterday with the Russian Government, that anyone that's interested in stability in the Middle East should be very concerned about the flow of arms into Iraq. We'll continue to talk to the Russians about this and continue to seek stronger language in subsequent Security Council resolutions about Iranian arms.

But for now, the United States in Iraq is very actively seeking out those Iranian agents who are engaging in activities that are dangerous to our forces and indeed dangerous to innocent Iranians.

QUESTION: So what's your message specifically to the Russians on this?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, I've already given my message to the Russians, and that is that Iran is a destabilizing force in the Middle East. We are all for a stable and peaceful Middle East. In fact, when I talk to my Russian counterparts about Lebanon or about the Palestinian territories and the possibility of peace between Israel and the Palestinians, I think it only makes sense that if Iran is one of the destabilizing elements in seeking that kind of peace that we be tougher on Iranian arms.

QUESTION: And if you look at what's happened in terms of Russian arms exports, it's not just Iran. We've seen a big uptick in the amount of arms they're selling to Iran, to Syria, to Venezuela. What's going on?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, we've had exactly this discussion. The Russians, of course, say that there's nothing illegal about these arms sales. I said yesterday not everything that is legal in the narrowest sense is good for the international system. And clearly, in the case of Iran and Syria, you have states that are engaged in destabilizing behavior in one of the world's most volatile regions, and by the way a region where we and the Russians are working together to try to bring about peace between Israel and the Palestinians, a more stable Lebanon, a more stable Iraq. And so yes, it's a problem that we're continuing to work on.

QUESTION: You know a thing or two about the Russian military. What's your sense? You've seen a big increase in Russian military spending, kind a renewed assertiveness. What are the Russians up to?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, when one speaks to the Russians about this, they point to historically low -- in fact, they would say dangerously low -- budgets, military budgets, in the '90s because of lack of resources, and imply that what is going on here is that with their newfound oil wealth they're able to fund their military forces at a level that is appropriate to the size of their country and to the security issues that they face.

Nonetheless, I think the rapid growth in Russian military spending definitely bears watching. It's also important that there be transparency about what is going on in this regard. And frankly, some of the efforts, for instance Bear flights in areas that we haven't seen for a while, it's really not helpful to security. We don't have an adversarial relationship with Russia any longer, and I would sincerely hope that Russian military activities as well as Russian military expenditures would reflect that.

QUESTION: What do you think they're doing with those Bear bomber flights?

SECRETARY RICE: I can't really say. I, frankly, Jon, don't spend a lot of time following the course of the Bear bomber flights these days. It does seem at some level from something that belongs in another era.

QUESTION: I've seen a lot of commentary, especially in the last 24 hours, that Russian-U.S. relations are at their frostiest since the end of the Cold War. Why is that?

SECRETARY RICE: I don't know if they're at their frostiest or not. We have our differences. We have our disappointments. We have some areas in which I think our cooperation has never been better. I would cite in that way counterterrorism cooperation, cooperation on global nuclear proliferation. Even on an issue like Iran where we may have some tactical differences, I think we've held a pretty solid strategic line in the Security Council.

But we're going to have our differences with Russia. The issue is that we're going to continue to work through those differences. We came here -- Bob Gates and I came here to talk about differences on missile defense, to talk about differences on the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty -- a treaty, by the way, that is very important to Europeans. It is in many ways more important to the Europeans in security terms than to anyone else. And since our security is indivisible from theirs, we wanted to make some efforts on that.

What I can tell you is that we've put some new proposals on the table at the conceptual level. And if Russia is indeed seeking cooperation, not confrontation, then these proposals should deal with their stated concern, and we'll see.

QUESTION: But you have to be a little bit -- you have to wonder if the Russians are seeking cooperation or confrontation.

SECRETARY RICE: Well, we'll soon know because we've put proposals on the table that I think should really address the concerns that they repeatedly cite, concerns about how a missile defense might relate to the Russian strategic deterrent in the future, because I don't think even the Russians have been able to hold the line that nine interceptors in Poland and a few radars in the Czech Republic are going to disable thousands of Russian nuclear warheads. So they say, well, it's the future potential. So we've put some ideas on the table for that. They say they don't think that we have the Iranian threat analysis quite right. We've put some proposals on the table for how we come to a closer relationship between the threat analysis and the operation of a missile defense system. So we'll see. I think we've given them all that they could ask for. And if they're looking to cooperate, we've given them good reason to do so.

QUESTION: The workings of the Kremlin have also always been somewhat of a mystery, or an enigma. Is that still the case to a degree?

SECRETARY RICE: Sure. It's not like the Soviet days, of course, when one, including me, actually used to look to see who was standing next to whom on Lenin's mausoleum to determine the next leadership. And it's obviously a much more open system, more open press though not as open as it once was. And our goal is to emphasize with the Russians the need for free and fair elections, the need for institutional development that doesn't allow such heavy concentration of power in the Kremlin at the expense of other institutions like the Duma, an independent press and an independent judiciary. Now, obviously, there have been some reversals in recent years. Obviously, there's some disappointment about the direction that Russian domestic politics is taking. But all of that said, it's also fair to say that this country has come a long way from the days of the Soviet Union.

QUESTION: And a long way to go.

SECRETARY RICE: And a long way to go.

QUESTION: Madame Secretary, thank you very much.

SECRETARY RICE: Thank you.

QUESTION: Really appreciate it.

SECRETARY RICE: Yeah, you bet.

QUESTION: And we'll see you -- and we're all disappointed you're not skating, but you know --

SECRETARY RICE: (Laughter.) That would be something. I haven't been on the ice in ten years.

QUESTION: Are you going to skate yourself?

SECRETARY RICE: Oh, no. No, no, no. Not this time. Maybe when I've had a chance to practice. They claim that if you've skated as long as I did and as much as I did, you can get right back on the ice and --

QUESTION: Like riding a bicycle?

SECRETARY RICE: Yeah, but I'm not willing to risk that in front of you all. (Laughter.)

2007/T17-6