[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 146 (Tuesday, September 19, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H9142-H9143]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   CALL FOR INVESTIGATION OF ACTS OF AGGRESSION BY BELARUSAN MILITARY

  (Mr. NEAL of Massachusetts asked and was given permission to address 
the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. NEAL of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, on Tuesday, September 12, 
1995, my office was advised that Mr. Michael Wallace, a participant in 
the Gordon Bennett balloon race, had been forced to land his balloon in 
Belarus, part of the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
  I later learned that a second balloon, flying under the flag of the 
Virgin Islands, had been shot down and its occupants had been killed.
  After numerous contacts with officials of the American Embassy in 
Mensk, I was advised that Mr. Wallace had been reunited with his chase 
crew and that he had been accompanied by diplomatic officials to the 
Poland-Belarus border where he was released to begin his return to the 
United States.
  I met personally with Mr. Wallace yesterday morning and he has been 
able to provide me with information which confirms my earlier appraisal 
that these incidents should never have occurred.
  Mr. Wallace has provided my office with the formal approval which had 
been given by Belarus for contestants of this balloon race to fly over 
their country. Furthermore, Mr. Wallace is convinced that Alan 
Fraenckel and John Stuart-Jervis, the operators of the Virgin Islands 
balloon, would most certainly have landed their craft had they been 
given an opportunity to do so.

[[Page H9143]]

  Mr. Speaker, these events which took place in Belarus last week 
cannot go unchallenged. I am calling today for a complete investigation 
by the State Department of these unwarranted acts of aggression by the 
Belarusan military. I hope that this investigation will force the 
country of Belarus to hold the parties who participated in these 
senseless acts responsible for their actions.

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