wfn.org | U.S. Delegation Meets Clinton, Annan

[CAROL_FOUKE.parti@ecunet.org (CAROL FOUKE)]

National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A.
Contact: NCC News, 212-870-2227
E-mail: news@ncccusa.org; Web: www.ncccusa.org

55NCC5/6/99           FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

INTERFAITH DELEGATION THAT FREED U.S. SOLDIERS RETURNS HOME,
MEETS WITH PRESIDENT CLINTON AND U.N. SECRETARY GENERAL

NEW YORK, May 6 ---- Exhausted but elated, the 
interfaith delegation co-led by Joan Campbell and Jesse 
Jackson returned from Yugoslavia with hope that the moment 
of joy over the release of the three U.S. soldiers would 
translate into a moment of peace.

 Delegation members brought this message to meetings 
with President Clinton (May 3) and United Nations (U.N.) 
Secretary General Kofi Annan (May 4).  In both meetings, 
delegation members encouraged the leaders to pursue 
diplomatic solutions to the conflict in Yugoslavia and to 
work for NATO's release of two Yugoslav prisoners, 
suggesting the prisoners be handed over to the Serbian 
Orthodox Church.

 A 19-member delegation including 12 Christian, Muslim 
and Jewish religious leaders journeyed to Belgrade April 28 
- May 1 on a "pilgrimage of faith" on the invitation of 
Patriarch Pavle of the Serbian Orthodox Church and 
Yugoslavia's Ambassador to the U.N., Vladislav Jovanovic.  
The group went intending to meet with leaders from the many 
faith communities in Belgrade and to visit the three captive 
soldiers.

Over two days, April 30 and May 1, various members of 
the delegation were able to visit the soldiers.  On May 1, a 
smaller group met with Slobodan Milosevic, President of 
Yugoslavia, and pressed for the soldiers' release.  Later 
that day, it was granted.  On May 2, the three soldiers were 
handed over to the delegation who traveled by bus with them 
to Zagreb, Croatia.  In Zagreb, they were met by the U.S. 
Army, which flew the soldiers and delegation in two planes 
to a base in Germany.  The delegation parted with the 
soldiers there.  On May 3, the interfaith delegation was 
flown home as the soldiers' families were joyfully reuniting 
with them in Germany.

 "We return today grateful to our God for working 
wonders in our midst," said the Rev. Dr. Joan Brown Campbell 
at a news conference Monday upon return to Andrews Air Force 
Base from Germany.  "We went to perform our pastoral calling 
to visit those in prison and to release the captives," she 
said.  "We negotiated for and were granted their release - 
unconditionally.  Today we rejoice in our hearts in the 
freedom of Andrew Ramirez, Steven Gonzales and Christopher 
Stone.  Their freedom is not just theirs alone."

 Included in this pastoral calling, Dr. Campbell said, 
is "talking to the enemy, daring even to love the enemy."  
Both Dr. Campbell and Rev. Jackson stressed the need to 
"build spiritual bridges that can't be blown up" and called 
for an end to violence on all sides.  They took this same 
message into their two high-level meetings with President 
Clinton and Secretary General Annan.

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55NCC5/6/99 BELGRADE RETURN/Page 2

Delegation Emphasizes Humanitarian Nature of Mission with 
President Clinton

 In their meeting with President Clinton and his foreign 
policy staff, delegation members stressed that they went to 
Belgrade as citizens and as religious leaders to meet with 
religious leaders in the region and with a specific request to 
Milosevic to free the prisoners.  "We didn't go to negotiate for 
the government or to create policy," Dr. Campbell said.  "We went 
as religious leaders whose communities of faith have lines that 
cross nation states and whose organizations do humanitarian work 
in the region.  This was, itself, a humanitarian mission."

 "We assured the President and the others that all of us in 
the delegation had in fact repeated the four NATO points 
faithfully to every person every time we talked in Belgrade," Dr. 
Campbell said, "those four points being that the violence had to 
stop in Kosovo, the refugees needed to be repatriated, a 
diplomatic solution should be sought and that there be the 
establishment of a NATO peacekeeping force."

 "We pressed hard the possibility that the two Yugoslav 
prisoners be returned to the Serbian Orthodox Church," Dr. 
Campbell said.  "They listened carefully to our request and 
essentially said, `We'll get back to you.'"  President Clinton 
was less receptive to Rev. Jackson's idea that the President call 
Milosevic to thank him for releasing the three American soldiers, 
Dr. Campbell said.  A letter from Milosevic was delivered to 
President Clinton, but the delegation members did not know its 
contents.

 Dr. Campbell said delegation members also stressed that the 
NATO bombing is very destructive and that civilians are being 
hurt and killed.  Delegation members acknowledged that the 
bombing is not the moral equivalent of the violence wrought by 
Milosevic in the region, but pressed Clinton and the others to 
explain what purpose the bombings were serving.

Humanitarian Concerns on Agenda with Kofi Annan

 These kind of humanitarian concerns were also on the agenda 
during Dr. Campbell's and Rev. Jackson's May 4 meeting with U.N. 
Secretary General Kofi Annan.  "The Secretary General said he 
felt the trip was an important initiative which changed the 
debate, especially in this country," Dr. Campbell said.

 "We pressed for the U.N. to get heavily involved in working 
toward a settlement, because one of the things Milosevic said is 
that he would accept a peacekeeping force provided it was under 
U.N. auspices," Dr. Campbell said.  "President Clinton has also 
said the U.N. should be involved, though he believes the major 
player should be the United States, and Milosevic told us he 
would see a NATO peacekeeping force as a police force, even using 
the word `occupation.'  Mr. Annan, of course, is aware of all of 
these complexities."

 "Mr. Annan assured us that the United Nations is already 
working to establish a diplomatic settlement and will increase 
their efforts," she reported.  "He also talked a great deal about 
the humanitarian crisis already existing and building in Kosovo, 
where there are some 400,000 refugees who will not have housing 
when winter comes, and we discussed the need for non-governmental 
organizations (NGOs) to be emphasizing these concerns."

 Dr. Campbell said her reflections on the trip included as 
many memories of prayer as of negotiations.  "We prayed as if our 
lives depended on it," she said, "and maybe they did."

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