Kidnapers’ Demand a ‘Smoke Screen,’ White House Says

The White House said today that new terrorist demands over the promised release of an American hostage are a “smoke screen” and part of a troubling pattern.

“They do it every time,” presidential press secretary Marlin Fitzwater said when asked if kidnapers holding three Americans are toying with the United States.

“Syria still believes there’s a possibility of release. We’ll just have to wait and see if they’re sincere and hope that they are,” Fitzwater said

President Bush on Thursday defended his decision not to send a U.S. envoy to Syria, as the kidnapers demanded before they would release a hostage. “The United States does not knuckle under to demands,” the President said.

Fitzwater spoke aboard Air Force One as Bush flew here today from Key Largo, Fla., to help raise money for an underdog Republican candidate for the Senate.

Bush was in Birmingham for a fund-raiser for state Sen. Bill Cabaniss, a conservative businessman trying to oust incumbent Democratic Sen. Howell Heflin. He was then flying to Orlando, Fla., for another political fund-raiser before returning to Key Largo for a weekend of fishing.

In his speech at the Cabaniss fund-raiser, Bush renewed his plea for passage of a capital gains tax cut, from the current 33% top to 19% or lower. The tax in Japan on stocks and bonds is only 1%, Bush said, and other Asian trading rivals “don’t tax them at all.”

“Once again I call on the Congress to pass that bill. It’s time we stop giving the edge to (other) countries,” said Bush.

He also called for “rejecting the ideas of extremists on both sides” of the environmental debate, and passing a clean air bill that doesn’t throw people out of work.

Earlier, asked about the complaint from the Islamic Jihad for the Liberation of Palestine that Bush had not dispatched the envoy they requested to Syria, Fitzwater said, “That was just a smoke screen.” He said the United States has an ambassador in Damascus capable of conducting any talks that are necessary.

He called the terrorist demand, which came after they had promised to release an American by today, part of “troublesome patterns that we’ve seen before.” He cited the terrorists’ release of a photograph of one hostage one day, and of another hostage a day later.

“The pattern is very much the same,” Fitzwater said. “They announce the release, put out pictures for videotape or letters and then there’s some demand or reason why it can’t happen. So our attitude is to be prepared to take all the precautions and the preparations necessary to facilitate it if it does happen, but not to get overly optimistic.”

On the crisis in Lithuania, Fitzwater said U.S. officials are still talking with allies around the world about appropriate responses to intensified Soviet pressures on the breakaway republic. “There’s still a lot of unknowns we’re trying to work out,” Fitzwater said.