>> an answer needs to touch on all of that.

i have to be brief, though, but i think i would begin by saying there's a lot of great stuff going on in latin america that we need to be grateful for. at the same moment that we're troubled by the violence and the drug wars. and we've seen an incredible wave of democratization in latin america. it in many ways you could say it was the main precursor along with what happened in eastern europe to the arab evolutions or awakenings that we're seeing unfold right now. the number of latin american countries that went democratic is astounding. and it's essentially new democratic hemisphere. this is i think on balance extremely good news. we've also seen a couple of the democracies like columbia really get on the ball and figure out how to use their democratic process to find leaders who can make a meaningful difference in their violence and in a violence that affects us, too. we've also seen i think president obama one of his more significant accomplishments has been to ignore chavez.

he tried to say hello and it was uncomfortable and some people thought he smiled too much, some not enough. so he hasn't really spoken about him since and that's the perfect way to handle cahavez. he has a message that's broken. his country tragically is not doing well. it has one of the highest violence rates. he's a failed leader. he'll fade away. but we still have big problems in mexico. their political system is functioning okay in some ways. they're having vigorous democratic debates and they did things with their overall approach towards the drug war that in many ways mimic what general petraeus did in iraq and afghanistan. but they haven't managed to turn the corner. and we have to be analytical in how we think about what's needed

next. the mexicans will make the decision. one thing we have to think about in this country is what can we do to help the mexicans by way of reasonable gun control measures. and i'm not talking about taking guns out of the hands of law abiding americans. i'm talking about tracking the sales of semiautomatic weapons. they account for 80% of the violence in mexico. and we need to think hard about what next steps may aid modestly in their problems. >> the one country that has not yet been mentioned in the first two hours of symposium is our most apparent threat and potential nuclear power and that's iran. how does iran figure into your

calculus of national security? >> initially in the sense that i don't believe we can talk too much about a pivoting or rebalancing to east asia. the administration i think has done a good job reminding east asian allies take we're there, we're there and we're committed, we're not going to cut. it's certainly correct that we should not cut our capabilities. but whether you want to get out of the middle east or not, drags you back. it always does. and there are times when you get involved in wars of choice, but the united states still has dependency on the middle east and that's why in my argument in the wounded giant book and what i try to underscore today, i think you have to view the persian gulf as well as the broader middle east and the western pacific as equally

important theaters of future military focus. i think as a matter of defense planning, we cannot and must not understate the centrality of the persian gulf. the rebalancing of asian has been good up to a point because it reminded countries in that region including china that we are still very much a pacific power, that this is as important as any other, and that it has a lot positive going on that makes it important to stay involved. but the middle east while it has positive things, too has problems like iran that make it impossible to ignore. >> dr. o hanlon, thank you very

much for these looks at the defensive establishment.hanlon, much for these looks at the defensive establishment.'hanlon much for these looks at the defensive establishment. we have a couple of gifts for you. one is our coin. >> thank you very much. >> and a thank a you gift that we hope you use go forward and continue to be our conscious in the defense establish the. >> thanks to you all. libya's prime minister is here in the nation's capital today and he's speaking this morning at the carnegie endowment for international peace. he will be introduced by the vice president of the carnegie endowment who also served as jordan's foreign minister. we expect to get under way in just a moment.

good morning. let me just before we start mention that for security reasons, the doors of the room will be closed for the duration of the event. so i hope we can call on your understanding. good morning, ladies and gentlemen. i'm marwan muasher. i'd like to thank you for joining us for what promises to be a very fascinating discussion

by now it should be apparent to all that it will not be measured in months or year, but this decades and many generations. in the last 14 month, long tim automat autocrats have fallen. these are developments brought about by people of tremendous courage, but they're only the beginning of the story. now begins the painstaking work of governing and rebuilding. and while less dramatic than the fall of a dictator, the decisions made today by leaders in cairo, tripoli and elsewhere are powerfully shape the future of the arab world. in libya's case, the fall of

gadhafi raises a host of challenging questions. how do you rebuild political institutions hollowed out by 42 years of misroot. what can be done to ensure government is transparent and responsive to the will of the people. and how do you disarm and reintegrate the country's militias. how do you breathe life into the economy. our guest this morning is i intimately familiar with all these challenges. as many of you know, his excellence was educated in the united states and served as professor of electrical engineering so a problem solver at the university of alabama for several decades. he dropped everything earlier last year to join the uprising

against gadhafi and take an integral role helping finance and lead the revolution. last october, he was elected prime minister of libya by the national transition council and is today responsible for overseeing the country's rebuilding effort and shepards will i libya to elections this summer. it is our great pleasure to have him here at carnegie today. ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming his excellency prime minister abdel-rahim. >> thank you. distinguished ladies and gentlemen, good morning. i'm honored and very pleased to be here with you today and i

want to thank the carnegie endowment for international peace for their kind invitation and for their outstanding program which supports and promotes the rights of people to freedom and dignity worldwide. very pleased to be here. for many libyans, myself included, freedom and dignity in our country were distant dreams only eight months ago. to retain his grip on power in libya, gadhafi used the most repugnant tools in his arsenal. gadhafi used the most repugnant tools in his arsenal.

fear, systemic oppression and brutal violence. brutal violence. his regime's priority was the dehumanization of our people. his personal political theory was self-serving to his ego and his interests and his alone. after over 40 years of silence, libyans could be silent no more. driven by a desperate desire for dignity and resolve for freedom, they erupted. on the 17th of february, a little over a year ago today,

our young libyan women and men took to the streets protesting peacefully the unjust imprison mts of libyan activists. a few days later, just a few days later, this was echoed in tripoli when the tripoli took to the streets chanting benghazi, we sacrifice or lives and blood for you. eventually other cities followed. they followed suit. and the first popular revolution in the history of libya broke out. however, the road to dignity, equality and freedom was very costly. the brutal regime could not

adhere to the will of the libyan people without a verb issues figh fight.it promised and i quote rivers of blood.issues fight.it promised and i quote rivers of blood. close quote. and i quote, hundreds of thousands of deaths, close quote. and it was determined to deliver on that unwavering promise the most violence attacks were launched against our people, supposedly his people. fire was open on unarmed protesters and heavy weapons were used to crush them and crush them forever. but they were not to be crushed. that was the moment and the

tenacity in which the tide of history was turned. our brave men and women armed with nothing but courage and resolve faced a well prepared and well equipped gadhafi army. untrained but determined men thirsty for freedom picked up weapons to fight, picked up weapons for the first time to fight. women pushed their son, brother, husbands and fathers to join the quest for dignity and freedom. others, and some of them are here, worked the phones and internet pleading for help from the international community.

it was a difficult battle to say the least. the gadhafi killing machine would not slow down. libyan lives, body parts of thousands of our young men were lost. literally thousands of them. and anticipate not sure if i should say this, but you need to know that many of our young men and women were raped. and for others, their productive organs were literally cut off. as the revolution was entering its second month, things were looking painfully grim. and we all held our breath.

but courage, resolve, and a decisive point of no return was reached. and this turned events around. you, the international community, chose not to sit quiet and watch as we were being massacred. to our gratitude, the international community decided to implement the u.n. resolution to protect civilians and arrive to our support. the international community was united under the u.n. resolution the cornerstone of which was to protect innocent civilians. and it acted accordingly. these enormous efforts were initiated by our arab brothers

and sisters in the arab league and later with our friends and partners around the world and i take the opportunity to tell them all thank you. such efforts gave us the motivation we needed to continue our fight and push forward unyieldingly. our citizen army of teachers, mechanics, lawyers, students, engineers, doctors, professors, and businessmen suffered great losses. along with the rest of the civilian population. but stood strong. stood strong in their pursuit of democracy, shared governments and the rule of law. with great courage and sadly,

sadly, also with great loss, we manage to push back gadhafi forces from the east of libya. we endured and broke the inhumane siege maintaining the unity of our country we took control of the western mountains and then we liberated tripoli. after a few months and thousands of deaths, and wounded young men and women, we freed our holy country on october 23rd, 2011. it was tatent energy and the

thirst and hunger within the libyan people which has brought to life freedom and gave us back our dignity. the liberty revolution is the proof of the incredible resilience and tenacity of the libyan people. whereas gadhafi may have believed that he had contained, even extinguished libyans' dreams of freedom and dignity over four decades, he was approach wrong. comprehensively and graciously wrong. when he asked his now infamous question who are you, the cry went up all libya, we are libyans and we will be free. yes, now, we are called free.

today a year after the outbreak of our great revolution, its electrifying spirit is still alive on the streets of our country. it is exciting. it be liberating and it is truly humbling. humbling specifically to those of us who are interested with political responsibility during this period. it is perhaps tempting to speak over all of guardianship, but that would be too pre-sump should you us. all libyans are guardians of the revolution. all of them.you us. all libyans are guardians of the revolution. all of them. i see our koel as being to preliminarily facilitate and focus the tremendous energy of

the libyan people, to help try to ensure that it is used in such a way as to realize the aims of the revolution and keep it alive. we acknowledge that the times ahead will be challenging. 42 years of dictatorial rule have taken their toll on and you are country and people. 42 years. we can it not build our new country overnight. we cannot build new institutions overnight. we cannot build understanding and acceptance of a new order overnight. all this will take some time. and mistakes will be made. however, libyans will proof their perseverance and resolve

yet again and rise up to the challenge. there may be times when things in libya may appear to be outside or to be deviating from their track. but we, the libyan people, would bring them back on course. libyans are learning for the first time in four decades to have trust in their government. most libyans have never known a government and never cared to know that government which searched them or which deserved their respect. quite the opposite. it is for the members of my government to prove that we are different, that we understand and respect the principals and spirit of the revolution, that we are acting in the interests of all libyans.

and that we are building the future with then and for them. the principles of the revolution need to be nurtured and promoted about they are to be upheld. libyans fought for democracy. and it is our job as interim government to pave the way for democracy, to take root in libya. we are working hard to build it. we realize that democracy is not just a concept, but a system which has to be built up piece by piece. therefore, the national transitional council, our presiding body, recently passed the election law and appointed the election commission that could carry on the job for the

election. soon we will be electing the national assembly, the first democratically elected body in over 40 years. my government will do its part to ensure that these elections are a success because we understand that these elections are the first stage of libya's accelerated path to genuine democracy. there is surprising parallelism between the libyan and american experience in fighting for democracy. take for example the formation of the continental congress as a transitional government body of the united states during and after the american revolution. it led thepath towards an elect government and to a convention which drafted the american

constitution in much the seam t government has represented the will also guideduring and after the upcoming election of the national assembly in june. the national assembly will oversee the drafting of a constitution which will serve as a bedrock for our dwd and ensure peaceful transitions between elected governments. it will define the rights and responsibilities of all libyans. george washington once said the constitution is the guide that i will never abandon. and libyans, too, embrace this idea as we move forward with our democratic transition. libyans also fought for human rights and as interim government, we must pave