yes? >> jesse ransom with the public policy from group. can you briefly talk on syria and how that is affecting u.s. russia relations and how that could potentially affect u.s. russia wto discussions as well? >> john, do you want to take a crack at that one? >> well, we all see what's happening in syria with increasing alarm. we have been watching this develop i wouldn't say in slow motion over the last six to eight months. it is quite aapalling. we are as a government to see the killing end and see stability return to that part of the world and to syria in particular, but to do this the united states needs to work in concert with our allies. we need to work in concert

particularly with those countries in the united nations that form with us the p-5. russia i think shares the goal. i won't speak for sergei. i think i will let them speak. i think they share the goal of stability and an end to violence. we share a strategic vision of what's happening in syria, but we've had some disagreement on the tactics that we should take to bring that about. we are committed to continuing to do everything in our power to end the violence, to see an orderly succession take place. we have made very clear we think president asad's time has come and gone, and we hope very, very much through the dialog we've had with russia and with our other partners in new york, that we will continue to find ways to hasten that kind of change in transition so that the people in

syria can live normal lives free from violence. >> i will add to that that we want violence ceased. we want political dialog of all the signs in syria to be engaging and successful because we do not believe that anybody in washington, europe, or in moscow can tell the syrians as to how they need to lead further and who is going to be the next president. it needs to be done by the syrians themselves for obvious reasons because they have to decide their own future and we need to be able to recognize it, all of us, so the difference was especially was how you approach owl of these issues, currently i think we have a little bit more of common ground because both the united states and russia

supports the so-called annan plan for the immediate steps to be taken in syria and then we'll see how the dialog and political process can be ordered in the country but we insist that it knees to be done by the syrians themselves and not dictated from outside. >> okay. more topics. >> excuse me, and the second part of the question was how it affects russian and america relations. i would say that it is one of the issues on which we do not see eye-to-eye but at the same time it doesn't under mine our ability to work on issues where we do agree, and here i think we have a little bit more normalcy in our relations. disagreements occur, especially on issues that are very explosive and important to countries, but at all points even at the points of significant disagreements, i

think we had pretty open and respectful dialog on this issue. >> thanks. we'll collect two or three questions right here in the front and over there to the left. >> lloydhand, let me put this question to you. i have been listening very carefully and it is very clear to me there is a consensus that we should grant pntr. i have gathered that the white house should speak out a little more forcefully. what isn't clear and i hope maybe i realize that this discussion has sensitivity and nuances and diplomatic niceties and perhaps you can articulate one, two, three, four, what are the specific suggestions and not say who in congress is opposing but the groups so we can get a clearer idea what are the objections if you would, please. >> thank you, all. i will be happy to do that.

yes? this gentleman. he has the microphone and we'll go back to you. >> if i am correct, there has been a bilateral investment treaty negotiated and agreed to by both the russian government and the united states government and not ratified. if that's true -- is that not true? i would like to know the status. >> i will repeat. i will answer very briefly. we have been offering to our american colleagues the idea of sitting together and developing this agreement because absence of such agreement is handicap for development of long-term relations and the american call they were rethinking the strategic approach to that kind of agreement not supplied to russia but most probably as applied to the rest of the world. my sense is that our american

colleagues are now a little bit more ready to engage and we are looking forward to that. >> we should have a bilateral investment treaty and negotiations and the administration just finally came up with its model that so maybe we can engage with russia and a number of other countries on the negotiations. >> okay. let me just before you get back to that, that's fine. i will try to address your question and anyone can jump in. i am sure our official representatives will be thrilled to do so. one of the advantages of working with a think tank is you can say whatever you want. i have no constraints. one set of objections is from people concerned about human rights and democracy and deficiencies perceived in russia in those areas and this is where the case of course sergei magninsky, the lawyer that died while being held in prison, and concerns about that. i won't go deeply into the case.

there is a whole set of concerns there. the way the parliament try elections have been held, the presidential elections, et cetera. that's one constituency. a second constituency would be those that are concerned that russia is pursuing certain foreign policies that are counter to u.s. interests, so the point to the disagreement about syria, there is no question that the syria issue is seriously poisoned russia's perception, reputation, on capitol hill right now because it is such a big issue in the headlines. our inability to come to an agreement about missile defense, aspects of russia's relationship with iran while in fact actually i think that our cooperation with the russians on iran has been quite extensive. there are a whole series of concerns that people will have there about aspects of russian, foreign and security policy.

then i think more about pertinent to the susan and klaus's area, there are concerns about how russian does business. there are concerns about whether russia will actually live up to the wto commitments that it has made, and whether adequate -- i hate to use this word, concessions, were made in the negotiations as part of the agreement on intellectual property rights, sanitary standards, et cetera, et cetera. so i think sort of broadly there are these three constituencies that have various objections for different reasons to granting russian pntr status. anybody want to jump in on that one? >> i certainly not one who will be defining the arguments against russian -- i understand

and i have heard all of this. >> all too often. >> when i listen to that kind of argument, i ask myself what is it? are we still in the cold war? are we in a relationship with the united states is supposed to teach the younger brother how to lead? that kind of logic can lead to is denial of gradiation, so be it, be it. we will lead further. we'll go on and develop our partnership with the europeans and the biggest economic partner, much greater than the united states, and we'll develop relations with our immediate neighbors, but it will not choice of american people.

if they do not want to work with us, it is their choice. if they want to work with us, it first needs to be based on mutual respect and the maginski litigation is fragrant lack of mutual respect as far as we concern and had needs to be based on mutual benefit because that is the most reliable under pinning for any corporation, especially when you talk about long-term. we respect the business of the united states that this enters to make money and make business in russia and it is wonderful because we know what our partners want and when we feel that what they want is fully in line with the goals of developing russian economy, creating jobs, we welcome this. and when it comes to the business environment to russia, mind you, 20 years in market economy and i think we are doing

excellent job of developing market that hasn't existed in a huge space of russia for generations and generations. that's not only to create new looks. you need also to create new mentality and mind you not everybody except even the notion of market economy, there is a stronger position in the parliament that is still do not want us to proceed with privatization and i think and it is normal because people have views and they are different, but the overall direction that russia has taken, i think, is certainly very, very reliably democratic and market economy and i am very proud of what we have accomplished so far. as to the business environment, i think it is much better than it is described sometimes by company working in russia even

very respectful companies and i will tell you when i was supposed -- appointed ambassador here i had a meeting with a number of the heads of russian affiliates of american companies and i wanted to understand how they feel in russia. all of them, the ones i met, all of them said that they know how to operate it. they make excellent business there. they want to stay. not a single one told me that they are reconsidering. i even joked, why in the world they didn't go to the united states and do not explain how well it is to do business in russia and some said, joked that they do not want additional competiti competition. what i am suggesting is that companies that have entered, american companies like others

that have entered the russian market with honest and serious proposals for business there, like alcoa and some others, they are doing pretty well, and they are well respected. it doesn't come without overcoming problems, but show me a market where there is no problem, including here in the united states. i have been talking to russian companies operating here. overall they feel comfortable. when you ask them have you experienced some problems? some of them say, oh, yes, but it is also normal because the other companies that operate in the united states have the same problems. they need to abide by the laws. they need to abide by the accounting procedures. sometimes it is something that is new to them and it is entering a market, a serious proposition, and everybody told me among the people i have spoken to, that the moment you

enter the russian market, and you understand it, they feel pretty reliableably comfortable. >> susan, one of the objections i have heard has had to do with china's wto session and that the experience of china's wto is raising concerns about what to expect from russia. from your perspective what have we learned from the experience of negotiating china's entry into the wto? >> one of the things you learn is a trade negotiator is you can always second guess your predecessor's deal. you just -- >> monday morning quarterback. >> monday morning quarterback is alive and well in any trade negotiation. you can always think of things that you would have done differently, right, had it been your negotiation. that said, i think that most objective observers if you had to sit today and contemplate what the world and the trading

system would look like today if china were on the outside of the trading system or if china were on the inside of the trading system and the u.s. hadn't granted china pntr, we would all be in much worse shape. the u.s. would be in much worse shape and china would be in worse shape. similarly, it is both in back to point one, it is in the u.s. interest and in russia's interest for russia to be joining the wto, and for the u.s. to be benefitting from russia's entry into the wto and that will only take place when pntr is history, when pntr is granted, and jackson vanek is history. i would say something, though, which is i would offer the following observation. i think you are three baskets of objections that you described, i think those are accurate

baskets. this is a complex bilateral relationship, but i do agree with the ambassador that we need and we should be at the point where we can navigate a complex bilateral relationship in some sort of normalcy and that should enable us to have a healthy bilateral economic relationship, economic and commercial relationship, and still be trying to -- still be working our way through complex foreign policy disagreements. now, i am speaking as a former u.s. cabinet official who went around the world listening to individuals around the world always second guessing u.s. politics, okay? everyone, trust me, everyone in the world has an opinion about u.s. politics and our economics. it just comes with the

territory. you get used to it. trust me. you do get used to it. >> we also do. >> yes, you just get used to it. so i would say it is also in russia's interests for u.s. businesses to be active participants in the russian market. u.s. businesses as i noted are very actively engaged on capitol hill and at the white house and in the state department saying, you know, let's get pntr because they recognize the importance of this, so it would be a real shame if the most vocal and the most active advocates of russian's accession to the wto in the united states were somehow punished by russian spfs

or government procurement actions or some other kinds of actions out of some fit of peak if the timing was off because i would say you heard it here, i would predict pntr is going to happen just as russia will be a member of the wto and the congress of the united states is going to move pntr. the only question is one of timing. is it going to be july? is it going to be after july? i hope it will be july, and i know the business community is working very hard to get that done. i would also predict it will be in parallel with another piece of legislation. that's out of my lane. that's not my field of expertise. i just think that i leave that to the high foreign policy types and you guys are used to dealing with much more complicated issues than this and, you know, put on your big boy pants and figure out how to do it and the

relationship will survive. >> we have had enough already. >> klaus, did you want to weigh in? >> i can only say from the business side. i think it is a very simple thing. number one, wto gives us a level playing field which i think if you look at what has been one of the largest wealth creation engines by far larger than any development program that any country or countries together have been creating is globalization, right, and here we're bringing another country onto that system and we're opening it and we have conflict resolution mechanisms that everybody accepts and i mean if you look at long negotiations and you mentioned all of that has been concluded in a good fashion and that's very good. gives us finally what we always wanted and oddity of history that russia was not on it in my view. second thing now, we talked about the export opportunities, right? so i would argue, i mean,

counter to what i heard here in the room of saying, hey, election year, i would say, yes, it is an election year. who on this planet can say that we don't need jobs in the u.s.? i mean, honestly, it would be out of my mind, you know, to see that anybody can say we're leaving that on the table. impossible to imagine, right? the third thing is what you get on top of it an some of you might not understand that, most of the companies, these days are global companies and they are headquarter and had based in the u.s. and very happy and have a great heritage here. in the end, it is the international competitiveness that decides about how strong they can be anywhere on this planet and certainly also here in the u.s. and you get that in addition to that access to the russian market and for those that don't understand that, i mean, the russian automotive market is the largest automotive market already today in europe,

right? largest one. it is fast growing. when you go there, you see it. you compare it to two years, three years ago when you drive to moscow and st. petersburg and you saw all the cars you probably wouldn't want to drive. these days a lot of cars are cars you want to drive and you still see a good thing you don't want to drive so those that are driving look very unhappy so that's good news there, and i talked about it and talked about the farming and there is thousands of other industries where u.s. companies are extremely well positioned into really make the market their own and the good news is the modernization program is open and clearly says that and i have stated that i agree with you and i think it is also an understanding in russia and in other countries what do u.s. companies bring to russia? if i look at when we acquired these two large plants, we have very strong safety culture.

i mean, we recognized as one of the best safety cultures on this planet. so the culture in russia as we know has not been safety culture. if you look at today, today we have the safety numbers and on the level of all of our plans. i tell you what, that was extremely hard job. it requires level of detail and education of training that was nightmarish and that's the change that we bring. that's the change. i tell you a person that changes the behavior and the work, i mean, number one, more respected to your point, right. number two, not giving that when they go into the private space. just last week we had our annual shareholder meeting and we have practice which we call month of service every october worldwide where we ask our employees to give back to the communities and

when we started that in russia, everybody said what is that? we don't know what that is. we feel that we all should give back to the community which should be an old soviet concept and really wasn't because they all think somebody else has to give back, right? so today last year in october we had had 56% of all of our russian employees basically doing work in the communities and in addition to their jobs and this idea of volunteerism, and i could go on and on and on and give you examples. this is the value add, and this is what comes with the globalization, with the positive impact and actually achieves on a political front and achieves much more in society, much more in society and that i think also is what is behind the whole idea of modernization. that's what russian leaders understand. >> i know there are a lot of other questions and comments in the audience, but i have to be somewhat responsible in my role of moderator so that our guests

can get to their next engagement. susan, i agree with you when you say evident autoly russia is going to get pntr. you know, it reminds me of what churchill said about u.s. foreign policy. the americans always make the right decision after exhausting all the other alternatives. so on that note let me thank klaus, susan, and john for sharing thoughts and time with us today. thank you.

earlier today the house oversight committee held a hearing that examined vacancies in federalfederal. the committee chairman recently plamd president obama for not nominating people for these positions. there are currently ten inspector general vacancies, seven of which that have been vacant for more than a year. you can watch the hearing today at 7 p.m. eastern here on c-span

3. both chambers of congress were in session today. the house gafled in earlier to debate and pass a bill to replace what's been called the budget sequester. that legislation replaces $98 billion in cuts from defense and social programs with different types of cuts. the sequester was the deal made last year to cut 1.2 trillion to offset the debt ceiling increase and when the super committee failed to reach the agreement on cuts, the sequester went into effect. the chamber also finished work on 2013 federal spending for the commerce and justice departments as well as nasa and other science programs. that bill totaled $51 billion in spending. follow the house live on c-span. the senate's continuing work on its version of a student loan bill, the measure seeks to prevent the doubling of student loan interest rates currently at 3.4%, they're due to rise to

6.8% on july 1st. earlier this week the chamber failed to advance the legislation and still unclear where the measure goes from here. follow the senate live on c-span 2. >> i got to polk has not us and there is a post there and one here and this makes a rectangular space that would be the chancel and pochantus marries john wolf in this church in 1614. i guarantee you i am standing exactly a little deeper than she was but this is where she stood when they got married. >> this saturday on american history tv tour the jamestown colony dig with project director william kelso. the colony yielded more than 1.5 million unique artifacts. take the tour starting at 1:30 p.m. eastern and visit the rediscovery lab at 2 and then

join in the conversation with william kelso answering your questions live saturday. >> earlier today the justice department announced a lawsuit against arizona's maricopa county sheriff's office and its current leader. this stems from allegations that the sheriff's office violated constitutional rights of citizens, particularly hispanics courtesy of k tv k in phoenix, this is half an hour. >> good morning. i am tom perez, the assist apt attorney general for civil rights at the united states department of justice. today the department of justice did something it has done only once before in the 18 year history of our civil police reform work. we filed a contested lawsuit to

stop skrim to her and unconstitutional law enforcement practices. in our police reform work we have invariably been able to work collaboratively with law enforcement agencies to build better departments and safer communities. maricopa county and maricopa county sheriff's office and sheriff ar pile have been a glaring exception to our. they have proven elusive here in maricopa county n june 2008 the department of justice began its initial inquiry into allegations that montgomery county sheriff's office and cher ar pio were violating constitutional rights of people many maricopa county. in september of 2007 following repeated unsuccessful efforts to obtain mcsos and the sheriff's voluntary compliance with the legal obligation to provide information in connection with our