Albright Tries to Shore Up Blasted Africa Ties

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright promised Africans on Tuesday that the bombings of U.S. embassies here and in Nairobi, Kenya, will not weaken American resolve to build a “strong new relationship” with the continent.

In a one-day trip to the two African capitals where more than 250 people were killed in the terrorist attacks, Albright also offered vague assurances that the United States will compensate victims of the bombings--Kenyans, Tanzanians and Americans.

“Rest assured that these bombings will not cause America to back down or retreat,” Albright said after a meeting with top officials here. “We will not be intimidated. We will maintain our presence in Africa and elsewhere where we are welcomed or needed.”

Albright, who is the highest-level U.S. official to visit the two countries since the Aug. 7 blasts, declined to answer questions about the FBI investigation into the attacks, aside from saying the probe was “proceeding fairly well.”

But she offered the strongest public comments by a U.S. official since the blasts about Saudi millionaire Osama bin Laden, a militant suspected in the bombings who lives in Afghanistan.

“Mr. Bin Laden’s activities are inimical to those of civilized people in the world and in the United States,” she said in Nairobi. “Whatever the connection to this, I have said previously that his funding of terrorist activities is something that . . . the world has been quite aware of.”

On a trip intended to boost morale at the battered embassies while shoring up U.S. relations with the shocked people of Tanzania and Kenya, Albright met with 200 embassy employees here at the waterfront home of a top embassy official.

Against a backdrop of blooming plumeria trees and a sparkling Indian Ocean, Albright presented the embassy staff--a majority of whom are Tanzanians--with a certificate of heroism and then stepped into the crowd, shaking hands and saying repeatedly, “Thank you, thank you so much for everything.”

“I am truly in the presence of heroes,” Albright told the gathering. “Your bravery and compassion and courage have been recognized around the world. The terrorists who would like to drive us apart have in fact brought us all closer.”

Appreciative embassy employees, who held a memorial service Monday for the 10 people killed in the Tanzanian blast, responded in kind, smiling and chatting about the celebrity presence of their normally distant boss. With the funerals behind them, several people said, Albright’s visit served as a pep talk for the future rather than a requiem for the past.

“It makes me very happy to have her here,” said Daniel Damas, a Tanzanian employee of the embassy’s motor pool, where two workers were killed. “It means a lot to everybody.”

But in Nairobi, where most of the casualties involved ordinary Kenyans who worked near the embassy, tight security around Albright’s visit soured the mood of some onlookers.

Kept hundreds of yards away, thousands of Kenyans along Moi Avenue strained to get a peek at Albright’s activities. But the best view went to the state, national and city dignitaries and the throng of media.

“It isn’t fair,” said one Kenyan, standing behind a yellow tape guarded by soldiers and police. “We are the ones who participated in the rescue, and the Americans weren’t even there.”

Albright’s half-day tour of the Tanzanian capital started at the embassy building, where she laid a wreath of white roses at the gutted main gate, just beyond a 12-foot-wide crater blown into the driveway by the bomb. She laid a similar wreath at the embassy building in Nairobi later in the day.

Albright’s walk through the embassy building in Dar es Salaam provided the first opportunity for journalists to see the damage inside. Until a few days ago, the building was considered too dangerous for any visitors, including investigators.

Albright was taken up a concrete spiral fire escape. On the rooftop, she stepped over twisted metal blown three stories high.

Once back outside, Albright posted a $2-million reward announcement on a crumbling section of the charred embassy’s front wall. “This is not politics, this is not religion . . . this is murder,” it says.

At the State House, Albright met with Tanzanian Foreign Minister Jakaya Kikwete. He assured her that the blast had not generated anti-American feelings.

Albright promised to seek special aid packages for Tanzania and Kenya from Congress. But when pushed on specifics, she wavered. At a news conference Tuesday evening in Nairobi, three Kenyan journalists asked questions of Albright--each inquiring about aid. Albright did not deliver anything concrete.

“It’s very hard to put a dollar amount on a lost eye or glass in your head and the terrible scars,” she said.

Times staff writers Alan Abrahamson and Steve Berry in Nairobi contributed to this report.