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Former president George W. Bush said Tuesday that the United States must stand with dissidents and democracy activists around the world even if the change they sow makes things more difficult in the short run.
In a rare appearance in Washington for an event sponsored by the George W. Bush Presidential Center, Bush avoided any direct praise or criticism of the Obama administration but made clear his belief that the Arab Spring movement demands "active American leadership."
"America's message should ring clear and strong. We stand for freedom," Bush said. "If America does not support the advance of democratic institutions and values, who will?"
Bush didn't mention the latest freedom fighter to receive U.S. assistance, blind Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng. The State Department under Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton worked with Chinese leaders to win a deal under which he is supposed to be able to study in the USA, but he remains in a Beijing hospital.
The former president and his wife, Laura Bush, did single out Burmese dissident-turned-member of Parliament Aung San Suu Kyi. She spoke to the group by Skype from Burma, where she continues to battle the government from her seat in the legislature.
"I was always confident that we would prevail in the end," Suu Kyi said of her 20-year battle for freedom. Her advice to others, she said, is "very simple: Persevere. You'll get there in the end. Just go on."