DEPARTMENT OF STATE DAILY PRESS BRIEFING INDEX Friday, June 6, 1997 Briefer: Nicholas Burns [Excerpt] QUESTION: What is the State Department's reaction to the decision of the German Interior Ministers to put the Church of Scientology under nationwide observation by the anti-extremist watchdogs? MR. BURNS: Well, we understand that the German state and federal interior ministers have agreed to pursue the recommendations of an experts group which called for the collection of information on Scientologists and scientology. It is our understanding - and we have a very incomplete understanding, actually, of this decision - that the ministers directed state and federal law enforcement agencies to develop a plan to implement these recommendations. We will examine the details of this decision carefully, but since I don't believe our embassy in Bonn or our German experts here at the State Department have had sufficient time really to look at this in detail, I don't think it's appropriate for me to give you a detailed comment. I will say this. The United States obviously has to stand for freedom of religion. We have that in our own country and we stand for freedom of religion around the world. If you would just look at our annual human rights reports, I think four out of the last five years or five of the last six - I forget which - we have mentioned this issue of scientology. But I feel compelled to say something else about this issue, and that is that Germany needs to be protected, the German Government and the German leadership need to be protected from this wild charge made by the Church of Scientology in the United States that somehow the treatment of Scientologists in Germany can or should be compared to the treatment of Jews who had to live, and who ultimately perished, under Nazi rule in the 1930s. This wildly inaccurate comparison is most unfair to Chancellor Kohl and to his government and to regional governments and city governments throughout Germany. It has been made consistently by supporters of scientology here in the United States, and by Scientologists themselves. I do want to disassociate the United States Government from this campaign. We reject this campaign. It is most unfair to Germany and to Germans in general. QUESTION: Anything in this latest effort by Germany to deal with the Church of Scientology that concerns you? MR. BURNS: Well, Carol, as I said, we have a sketchy understanding, at best, of what this means. It appears to be instructions by state and federal law enforcement agencies to look at a set of recommendations and develop a plan upon recommendations. We have an alliance relationship with Germany. We have a very close relationship. I think among friends, you don't shoot first and ask questions later. What we need to do is study this issue, talk to the German Government about it, and then perhaps we will have something to say later on. But I think it would be most unfair to Germany for us to have detailed comments when we don't have a detailed understanding of what this process may or may not be. Yes. [End excerpt]