[Congressional Bills 103th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 416 Introduced in Senate (IS)]

103d CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                 S. 416

 To authorize the provision of assistance to the victims of war in the 
 former Yugoslavia, including the victims of torture, rape, and other 
                     war crimes and their families.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

             February 24 (legislative day, January 5), 1993

    Mr. DeConcini (for himself, Mr. Domenici, Ms. Mikulski, and Mr. 
  Lautenberg) introduced the following bill; which was read twice and 
             referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
 To authorize the provision of assistance to the victims of war in the 
 former Yugoslavia, including the victims of torture, rape, and other 
                     war crimes and their families.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. FINDINGS.

    The Congress finds that--
            (1) the loss of life and human suffering in Bosnia-
        Herzegovina has reached an unprecedented scale in post-World 
        War II Europe;
            (2) war and ``ethnic cleansing'' in Bosnia-Herzegovina has 
        uprooted more than 1.5 million people, contributing to the 
        largest refugee problem in Europe since World War II;
            (3) the people of Bosnia-Herzegovina have been subjected to 
        organized, systematic, and premeditated war crimes and 
        genocide, including willful killings, rape, forced 
        impregnation, abuse of civilians in detention centers, 
        deliberate attacks on noncombatants, ``ethnic cleansing'' 
        through the forcible expulsion and deportation of civilians, 
        and torture of prisoners; and
            (4) there has been no concerted and coordinated effort to 
        provide assistance to the victims of such acts and their 
        families to meet their short- and long-term needs.

SEC. 2. AUTHORIZATION OF ASSISTANCE.

    (a) Eligibility for Assistance.--The President is authorized to 
provide assistance under this section for victims of torture, including 
rape and other war crimes, and for the families of such victims, in the 
former Yugoslavia, with a particular focus on victims of the war in 
Bosnia-Herzegovina.
    (b) Description of Assistance.--Assistance authorized by subsection 
(a) includes such activities as--
            (1) the provision of medical, psychological, and 
        psychiatric care and crisis counseling for victims of war 
        crimes stemming from the conflict in the former Yugoslavia, 
        whether in the United States or abroad;
            (2) the training of persons within the former Yugoslavia, 
        including those who have been the victims of torture and those 
        of the Moslem faith, to provide medical, psychological, and 
        psychiatric care and crisis counseling; and
            (3) the procurement of necessary medical and training 
        supplies.
    (c) Coordination of Assistance Efforts.--Assistance authorized by 
subsection (a) shall be coordinated by the Administrator of the Agency 
for International Development and channeled through such governments, 
international organizations, and nongovernmental organizations as the 
Administrator determines appropriate to reach those in need.
    (d) Special Authority.--Assistance authorized by subsection (a) may 
be made available notwithstanding any other provision of law except the 
provisions of section 104(f) of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22 
U.S.C. 2151b(f))

SEC. 3. DEFINITION.

    For purposes of this Act, the term ``former Yugoslavia'' means the 
territory covered by the former Socialist Federal Republic of 
Yugoslavia, consisting of the republics of Serbia, Montenegro, 
Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina, without regard to 
diplomatic recognition by the United States of any republic.

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