Department Of State U S

On the first day of the recent U.S.-Russian summit, American business executives in Moscow were treated to a rare, but telling sight: Secretary of State Warren Christopher standing at a lectern in an elegant hotel dining room, stalling for time because the featured speaker was delayed. The speaker was Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bentsen.

Backing away from some of the provocative assertions he made during his career as a journalist, Strobe Talbott expressed unreserved support for Israel on Tuesday and said that the United States should never use foreign aid to pressure friendly democracies into changing course.

Two members of Congress accused the State Department of stubbornness Wednesday in refusing to meet with an Iranian opposition group it accuses of terrorism. Reps. Robert G. Torricelli (D-N.J.), and Dan Burton, (R-Ind.), urged the State Department to consult with the Iranian People's Moujahedeen before writing a report on the Iranian opposition, due in three weeks.

In the elegant, antique-lined executive suite on the State Department's seventh floor, an unusual silence reigns. All along the main hallway, lined with oil portraits of 19th-Century diplomats, office after office stands empty, abandoned by James A. Baker III and his top aides for the more pressing business of George Bush's reelection campaign.

Acting Secretary of State Lawrence S. Eagleburger ordered a departmental investigation Monday to determine whether any U.S. officials were involved in a British government search for information that might have damaged Bill Clinton's presidential campaign.

State Department Inspector General Sherman Funk is to release his findings about the search of President-elect Bill Clinton's passport file this afternoon, possibly determining whether the episode was limited to mid-level department officials, or leads to the White House. If a White House connection can be established, the search seems likely to explode into a larger scandal, even though President Bush's defeat can be expected to take momentum out of the issue.

In the long white halls of the State Department, the talk on Wednesday was of anguish and anger, and the stinging hurt of a proud institution that feels itself betrayed. "Our reputation has been tarnished," Acting Secretary of State Lawrence S. Eagleburger said somberly, his usual ebullience erased. "We have no business being engaged in this kind of activity, and I am sorry it happened . . . . The damage done to the governor, if there has been any, I apologize for it.

Several leaders of the American Jewish community have launched a quiet campaign to dissuade President-elect Bill Clinton from naming Los Angeles lawyer Warren Christopher as secretary of state, warning that the choice might alienate an important part of Clinton's constituency. Christopher, who was the State Department's second-ranking official under President Jimmy Carter, has been a key Clinton adviser during the presidential campaign.

State Department investigators looking into the department's search of Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton's passport files have not established a link to anyone at the White House, a White House official said Saturday. "As far as I know, this investigation is contained at State," the official said.