Obama's Press Conference With Medvedev Nov. 15

Obama met with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in Singapore. Obama will travel to China today. See his travel schedule here.

“I have found, as always, President Medvedev frank, constructive and thoughtful,” Mr. Obama said after the meeting.

“The reset button has worked,” he added, alluding to the administration’s early promise to “reset” the bilateral relationship after several years of bickering over a variety of issues from missile defense to Kosovo.

With the START treaty set to expire soon, the Obama administration is searching for ways to have weapons inspectors remain in Russia to keep American eyes on the world’s second most formidable nuclear arsenal. In the absence of a treaty or a legally binding “bridge” authority, American inspectors would be forced to leave Russia when the treaty expires. Likewise, Russian inspectors would have to leave the United States.

Under START provisions, both nations are allowed a maximum of 30 inspectors to monitor each other’s compliance with the treaty.

On Iran, administration officials said, Mr. Obama and Mr. Medvedev discussed a timetable for imposing sanctions if Tehran and the West do not soon agree on a proposal in which Iran would send its enriched uranium out of the country, either for either temporary safekeeping or reprocessing into fuel rods.

“Unfortunately, so far at least, Iran appears to have been unable to say yes to what everyone acknowledges is a creative and constructive approach,” said Mr. Obama, sitting next to Mr. Medvedev. “We are running out of time with respect to that approach.”

Mr. Medvedev also alluded to running out of patience. He said that while a dialogue with Iran was continuing, “we are not completely happy about its pace. If something does not work there are other means to move the process further.” more at the NYT

Robert Gibbs' press briefing on the meeting:

Press Briefing by Senior Administration Officials on the APEC Summit and the President's Bilateral Meeting with President Medvedev

Filing Center, Swishotel, Singapore


PRESS BRIEFING BY WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY ROBERT GIBBS, NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL SENIOR DIRECTOR FOR RUSSIA MIKE MCFAUL, AND DEPUTY NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR FOR STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS BEN RHODES, ON THE APEC SUMMIT AND THE PRESIDENT'S BILATERAL MEETING WITH PRESIDENT MEDVEDEV

4:27 P.M. SGT

MR. GIBBS: We're going to do this rather quickly because the President is running -- Helene, you looked awfully disappointed when I said we were going to do this quickly.

Q No, I didn't see you come in.

MR. GIBBS: Oh, okay. It's the voice of -- never mind. We're going to do this rather quickly; the motorcade is going to leave rather shortly. The President is a tad behind schedule. So I'm going to bring up Mike McFaul and Ben Rhodes to answer some questions. Mike will give us a quick readout, much of which you heard from the two Presidents a few moments ago.

The only thing that I would add to what has happened thus far today -- the President was just, as you know, in the scheduled meeting with the 10 ASEAN nations and brought up in the meeting the -- reiterated exactly what he said yesterday in Tokyo about the release of Aung San Suu Kyi by Burma. So he brought that up directly with that government.

So we'll give this over to Mike.

MR. McFAUL: Thanks, Robert. I'll be brief. Today the Presidents met for the fourth time. The subject matter, as they expressed at the end of the meeting, was the START treaty -- the new START treaty, Iran, and a few other issues -- a little bit on Afghanistan and some other economic issues.

On the new START treaty, we progressed. We talked about some sticky issues that still have to be resolved. And both Presidents committed to trying to get a new treaty in place by the end of the year. And they said that publicly and that was a big part of the discussion on the substance of that treaty.

Second, we talked about Iran, again, as we do at every meeting that we've had with President Medvedev. And again, as they said publicly, what they discussed privately, we had a very constructive relationship with the Russians in terms of the offer that we had on the Tehran research reactor. We worked very closely with them in all aspects of that deal. And time is running out, as the President said and as President Medvedev also affirmed, in terms of -- the offer has been on the table and we have to consider other measures and other ways to go if the Iranians are not going to be serious about the diplomatic path.

And then we discussed Afghanistan briefly. The President just informed President Medvedev about the review and told him that once we have our review done, that he'll debrief him through either his government or him personally.

MR. GIBBS: Any questions for Mike? Yes, sir.

Q I have two. On START, the commitment is to have it in place by the end of December, but doesn’t it expire in mid-December?

MR. McFAUL: Yes, it does expire on December 5th. And in parallel, we have a bridging agreement that we also are working with the Russians. I fully suspect we'll be able to get that in place by December 5th.

Q You're definitely not going to make the December 5th deadline, though?

MR. McFAUL: Well, I don't know that for sure, but what I do know for sure is that we won't have a ratified treaty in place by December 5th. That has to go through our Senate, through their Duma. So that is for sure we do need a bridging agreement no matter what. Read the rest here

Obama Accepts Nobel Award as Call To Action

Obama spoke in the Rose Garden. He accepted the Nobel Peace Prize as a call to action.
"I don't view it as a recognition of my own accomplishments," he said. But rather an affirmation of his goals, one of which is to eliminate nuclear weapons.
He said he doesn't deserve to be in the company of those who've won the award.
In the past, the award has been given to give momentum to a set of causes, not just to honor specific achievements.
Obama said Malia said: "Daddy you won the Nobel Peace Prize and it is Bo's birthday." Sasha said: "We have a three day weekend coming up," he said. "It's good to have kids to keep things in perspective."

Obama and Russia's Medvedev Meet - Video

They look so happy together. They agreed to work on reducing nuclear stockpiles:

In a statement after a closed-door meeting, the two leaders pledged to begin immediately on a new treaty on offensive nuclear weapons to replace the 2002 Moscow Treaty on Strategic Offensive Reductions, which expires at the end of this year. They committed to reducing their nuclear arsenals to levels lower that those mandated by the START treaty, which calls for both nations to have between 1,700 and 2,200 warheads by Dec. 31, 2012. WaPo

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From Politico:

Senior Official One says that 6 months ago was the lowest point in U.S.-Russia relations since the end of the Cold War.

"This document shows we’re in a different place," brags the official, touting the joint communique that includes a promise to renew an arms control treaty.

The official, though, noted that Obama and Medvedev found areas of disagreement, pointing to Georgia, the general concept of "spheres of influence" and missile defense.

Both leaders acknowledged that the relationship between the two nations had "drifted" -- with each using the same word, Obama in English and Medvedev in Russian.

Read the transcript here. Medvedev:

I can only agree that the relations between our countries have been adrift over the past years. As President Obama has said, they were drifting, and drifting in some wrong directions. They were degrading, to some extent.

That is why we believe that since such a situation was not to the benefit of the United States or Russia Federation, to say nothing about the global situation, we believe that the time has come to reset our relations, as it was said, and to open a new page in progression in the development of our common situation.

Indeed, it was said that we are prepared to cooperate further in such areas as the nonproliferation of WMDs limitation of strategic weapons, countering terrorism, and improving economic and financial situation and the overall economic situation in the world. It is important to note that there are many points on which we can work. And indeed there are far more points in which we can -- where we can come closer, where we can work, rather than those points on which we have differences. Thus, by bringing our positions closer we can attain significant progress and, much more importantly, further our achievements.