Deputy State Department Spokesman James Foley briefed.

MIDDLE EAST/ALBRIGHT -- Madeleine Albright left September 9 for her first trip to the Middle East as Secretary of State. Foley said that many of the details of her trip are still being determined, but her first stop will be Israel, where she will have breakfast with President Ezer Weizman and later visit those injured in the recent suicide bombings.

Albright will stay in Israel and visit the West Bank September 10-12. She will meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as well as Palestinian Authority leader Yasser Arafat.

On September 12, she will travel to Damascus, Syria. She will be in Alexandria, Egypt, on September 13 and will stop in Saudi Arabia and Jordan on September 14. She will return to Washington on September 15.

BOSNIA -- Foley charged that the rally attempted September 8 in Banja Luka by supporters of Radovan Karadzic, former Republika Srpska president and indicted war criminal, was actually "a guise" for a second coup attempt against the elected Republika Srpska President Biljana Plavsic. The first coup attempt, he said, was thwarted by the discovery several weeks ago of wiretapping equipment and weapons in police headquarters in Banja Luka that had been controlled by Karadzic supporters.

Foley said the situation is calm at the moment, but SFOR (NATO Stabilization Forces) stopped dozens of bus loads containing perhaps thousands of Karadzic supporters -- many carrying illegal weapons -- from entering Banja Luka. "Their intent was clearly to try to overwhelm the local legitimate, elected authorities of Banja Luka," Foley said. He emphasized that the Karadzic supporters, by carrying illegal weapons, violated the Dayton peace agreement.

Some Karadzic supporters did manage to enter the city and conduct their rally before Plavsic loyalists chased them into a local hotel. That the rally did take place at all, Foley said, is a tribute to Plavsic's "extraordinary discretion" and "her tolerance, in the face of this kind of provocation, for the democratic process."

Foley reported that SFOR is currently transporting Karadzic supporters inside the hotel to a secure SFOR area where they will be searched and documented before being allowed to return to Pale, Karadzic's stronghold.

Municipal elections are expected to be conducted as planned September 13-14. Foley said that "SFOR is going to make a concerted effort, a very vigorous effort, to ensure that there is no disruption of these elections. And we're also, as you know, going to have hundreds, and perhaps thousands, of international monitors on the scene."

BRITISH COLUMBIA/SALMON -- Foley called for a reduction in "the level of rhetoric" regarding the differences between the United States and Canada over Pacific salmon fishing rights.

On September 8, the government of British Columbia filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court in Seattle. It accuses the U.S. government of having broken international laws for several years by ignoring the terms of a 1985 U.S.-Canadian treaty governing the catch of salmon stocks migrating from waters off Alaska to those of Washington State.

Foley said only that the lawsuit is "terribly counterproductive" and that the negotiating process "requires us to reduce the level of rhetoric and to establish an atmosphere in which the stakeholders (that is, regional fishing representatives) have a chance of making some real progress and not just turn up the volume, which we think this (the lawsuit) is all about."

Following are Middle East/South Asia excerpts from the State Department transcript:

INDEX

MIDDLE EAST Secretary's itinerary Iraq's biological weapons program

HONG KONG Tung meeting with Talbott, Pickering, and Albright; Hong Kong transition; elections proposed law; democratization

KOREA Kartman-Kim meeting DMZ; demarcation line; AmeriCares, four-party talks

CANADA Salmon suit

CYPRUS/TURKEY Russian missiles to Cyprus Dini remarks on Aegean conflict

BOSNIA stand-off in Banja Luka; political rally; SFOR response; Krajisnik involvement; Dayton agreement; Plavsic pledge Pale Serb weapons; municipal elections Karadzic involvement; SFOR reaction; war criminals; Plavsic air time; unmet Pale commitments; examples; recapture of transmission Gelbard trip; details

AZERBAIJAN arrest of Elchibey; Aliyev's promise of democracy; 1998 presidential election; oil development; US interests

ITALY Secretary meeting with Dini

(Begin excerpts)

-- SECRETARY ALBRIGHT'S MIDDLE EAST VISIT --

FOLEY: Welcome to the State Department daily briefing. I have no specific announcements to make except to comment just a little bit on the Secretary's trip to the Middle East. I would just say, first of all, though, that beginning now we're going to start observing our usual practice which is not to take questions on issues surrounding the trip of the Secretary of State. She and the traveling party are en route, and they will be in the region, and they will be able to answer all questions on those issues throughout the course of their trip.

I know there's a lot of curiosity in terms of what the order of her visit is, and I can give you some of that but not terribly much, because many of the details of the trip are still being ironed out. As you know, she left this morning, and she will be arriving in Israel at Ben Gurion Airport, at 5:55 a.m. Israel time. She will be having breakfast with President Weizman. She will be visiting the Hadassah Mt. Scopus Hospital to visit those injured in the recent bombings. She will meet with Prime Minister Netanyahu, and then she will tour the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial. Following that, she will have a meeting with Labor Party leader Barak.

Now, her schedule, as I said, is being worked out in its particulars, but I can tell you sort of the days on which she's going to be traveling and to where. On Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, she will be in both Israel and the West Bank for meetings with Prime Minister Netanyahu and Chairman Arafat. On Friday, she will be traveling to Damascus and then on to Alexandria. On Saturday, she will be, of course, in Alexandria, then traveling to Saudi Arabia. On Sunday, in Saudi Arabia, then traveling to Amman. And on Monday, she will be departing for Washington.

-- IRAQ/BIOLOGICAL WEAPONS --

QUESTION: Did you see the statement this morning by the new IEEA man in charge of Iraq, to the effect that Iraq is going to come clean on its biological weapons program for the first time and that they expect to receive all kinds of documents?

FOLEY: I've not seen the report. We support Mr. Butler in his efforts, and he will be placed to test whether Iraqi deeds match Iraqi words in this respect.

(End excerpts)