Trump’s pick for Secretary of State tries to allay fears about his ties to Russia
Nominee for top U.S. envoy pressed on Putin, Aleppo
WASHINGTON — Rex Tillerson faced harsh questions from fellow Republicans on Wednesday for his personal ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, but his Senate confirmation as Donald Trump’s secretary of state did not appear to be in danger.
In a sometimes testy hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the former CEO of Exxon Mobil Corp., the largest U.S. oil company, defended his views on global warming, human rights and relations with Russia.
In a surprise, Tillerson said he and the presidentelect had not yet discussed U.S. policy toward Russia, an issue that dominated Trump’s first post-election news conference after a U.S. intelligence report said Putin sought to help Trump win the White House.
Tillerson, 64, also broke with Trump on foreign policy several times. It was unclear if that signaled a potential clash with the incoming White House or was intended to defuse his critics in Congress and the national security establishment.
Unlike Trump, he described an increasingly belligerent Russia as cause for alarm, and he condemned Moscow’s seizure of the Crimean Peninsula in Ukraine in 2014 as illegal.
He also offered support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade agreement that President Barack Obama has championed and Trump has condemned.
He called for a “full review” of the international accord that seeks to block Iran from developing a nuclear weapon, but he did not vow to rip it up as Trump has said.
He said he does not agree with Trump’s comments in March that Japan and South Korea should build their own nuclear weapons to help counter North Korea. Trump has since suggested that he was misunderstood.
Tillerson said he would oppose broadening ties further with Cuba because of its continued arrests of political opponents and other human rights abuses. But he did not pledge to shut Obama’s diplomatic opening, as Trump has suggested.
Unlike Trump’s other picks for Cabinet positions, Tillerson repeatedly found himself under fire from fellow Republicans as he struggled to allay concerns about his long-running ties to Russia.
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., proved his toughest interrogator, demanding to know whether Tillerson would label Putin a war criminal for what the U.S. government has said are Russianbacked attacks on civilian targets in Syria.
Tillerson said he “would not use that term.”
Rubio cited civilian casualties and other atrocities in the Syrian city of Aleppo that he said were committed by Syrian government forces backed by Russia.
“Those are very, very serious charges to make and I would want to have more information,” Tillerson said.
Tillerson was repeatedly pressed on his opposition, while running Exxon Mobil, to the economic sanctions that Washington and its allies imposed on Putin’s government for its actions in Ukraine.
Tillerson denied that he or Exxon had lobbied the government over sanctions, but senators presented several official documents that appeared to show extensive lobbying by the company.
In his testimony, Tillerson said sanctions too often hurt U.S. companies that do business abroad. Exxon Mobil has said it lost $1 billion after sanctions on Russia effectively killed a planned oil and gas project.
“In protecting American interests, sanctions are a powerful tool,” Tillerson said. “Let’s design them well, target them well, enforce them fully.”
He found support in the committee when he condemned Russia’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula and its support for anti-government insurgents in eastern Ukraine, actions he said were illegal.
“The taking of Crimea caught a lot of people by surprise,” Tillerson said.
“The absence of a firm, forceful response” by the Obama administration was interpreted by Putin as permission to push farther into Ukraine and to launch other military operations abroad, he added.