Summit’s Silence on Arms Sales Not Due to Scandal--Shultz
Secretary of State George P. Shultz today denied that last year’s allied statement ruling out arms sales to terrorist nations was dropped from this year’s summit communique on terrorism because of the clandestine U.S. arms sales to Iran.
The communique issued Tuesday by the 13th annual economic summit condemned terrorists and their sponsors. But, unlike the communique issued at the Tokyo summit in 1986, there was no mention of arms sales to terrorist nations.
Asked whether the U.S. arms initiative with Iran was responsible for the omission, Shultz said: “No. That is a problem that has gone away as far as these countries are concerned. We don’t sell arms to terrorist nations. That was aimed at Libya.
“It worked,” Shultz said of the 1986 communique. “The situation with Libya is much different this year than it was last year.”
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