SECRETARY OF STATE GEORGE SHULTZ TODAY DEFENDED AN ADMINSITRATION PLAN TO PROMOTE DEMOCRACY AROUND THE WORLD AS MEMBERS OF CONGRESS VOICED DOUBTS ABOUT ITS ORGANIZATION, AIMS AND EFFECTIVENESS.

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000200920012-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 16, 2010
• Sequence Number: 12
• Publication Date: February 23, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/16: CIA-RDP90-00806R000200920012-5
REUTERS
23 February 1983
h'ASHINGTON
By WILLIAM SCALLY
Secretary of State George Shultz today defended an administration plan to
ororote democracy around the world as members of Congress voiced doubts about
its organization, aims and effectiveness. STAT
Shultz formally asked Congress for 865 million next year for "Project
Democracy," an outgrowth of President Reagan's speech to the British Parliament
last June in which he pledged a U.S. effort to strengthen democratic
institutions.
Several rnembers of a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee expressed concern
out the project, one warning that some countries would regard it as "mischief
making."
Shultz strongly supported the plan, in which non-government organizations
also would be heavily involved, as "a project of great urgency."
The project will involve training in democracy for present and future foreign
leaders, exposure of educational systems to democratic principles, strengthening
institutions such as parties and trade unions, disseminating ideas and
information and developing ties between U.S. and foreign organizations.
Congressman Joel Pritchard, a Washington State Republican, told Shultz that
Arab nations and countries in Africa and Asia "are going to look at this thing
as a destabilizing factor in the wprld ... as sort of mischief making."
He added: "The more I look at this thing, the more nervous I become."
Robert Kastenmeier, a Wisconsin Democrat, called the program a multimillion
dollar American propaganda effort and said: "We are only asking for trouble if
we proceed."
Suggesting that the United States would find it difficult to promote
democracy in the face of governmental opposition in some countries, he asked if
democratic leaders in Chile, for instance, would be invited to participate.
Shultz replied that the program was not one of subversion and that the
Central Intelligence Agency ( CIA) would have no role in it.
The fact that it had been attacked by Tass, the Soviet news agency, he said,
"gives us some encouragement we are on the right track."
He said the plan was to support ideas, rather than any particular political
party and told Pritchard: "Don't be nervous about democracy, about holding that
torch up there."
Subcommittee chairman Dante Fascell, a Florida Democrat, described the
fundamental premise of the plan as sound but had problems with its organization
in the government bureaucracy.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/16: CIA-RDP90-00806R000200920012-5