[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 192 (Tuesday, December 5, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H13933-H13934]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




     OUTRAGE OVER FRANCE'S NUCLEAR TESTING PROGRAM IN SOUTH PACIFIC

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of May 
12, 1995, the gentleman from American Samoa [Mr. Faleomavaega] is 
recognized during morning business for 5 minutes.
  Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Mr. Speaker, I rise again today to express my 
outrage and dismay with the continuation of France's willful disregard 
for the millions of human lives that may be seriously at risk because 
of its nuclear testing program in the South Pacific. France has now 
exploded four nuclear bombs in addition to 166 nuclear bombs that have 
already been exploded, filling the landscape in and outside of the 
Moruroa Atoll in French Polynesia.
  It may not be now, Mr. Speaker, but within the next 10 years when the 
French Government is no longer around in this part of the world, when 
the Moruroa Atoll finally starts to break apart, the horrors of 
France's nuclear testing contamination will infuse itself into the fish 
and other living organisms in our Pacific marine environment. If by 
some accident of nature this atoll starts to break up because of 
serious volcanic or earthquake disturbances in or around the ocean 
floor, what then, Mr. Speaker?
  The French Government certainly does not have the capability to clean 
up the environmental nightmare sure to result, and perhaps our own 
country may have to commit resources to clean up the mess.
   Mr. Speaker, do our colleagues and the American people realize that 
scientists have verified that the two areas of the Pacific where 
considerable concentrations of ciguatera poisoning exist are found in 
the reefs and marine life of the Republic of the Marshall Islands and 
of French Polynesia?
   Mr. Speaker, may I remind my colleagues and the American people 
there is a direct correlation between nuclear tests that were conducted 
in the Marshall Islands by our own Government and the nuclear tests now 
being conducted by the French Government in French Polynesia. The point 
is, Mr. Speaker, ciguatera poisoning is heavily concentrated in the 
fish and marine life of these two areas of the Pacific, and there is a 
tremendous need right now to examine this serious by product of nuclear 
testing which poisons the very food we depend upon from the Pacific 
Ocean.
   Mr. Speaker, we do not need to explode more nuclear bombs to see if 
it does harm to human beings.

                              {time}  1245

  The two nuclear bombs that were dropped on the residents of the 
cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki some 50 years ago killed and vaporized 
some 290,000 men, women, and children in Japan during World War II. Mr. 
Speaker, while the international community looks on, France continues 
to defy the concerns of millions of people around the world, continues 
to explode their nuclear bombs not in or anywhere near France, but some 
14,000 miles away from Paris.
   Mr. Speaker, I submit here is a classic example of a so-called 
democracy that so desperately wants and desires respect and preeminence 
as a superpower in Europe, they are pursuing nuclear weapons 
development at the expense of the lives and safety of some 200,000 
French citizens living in French Polynesia. Mr. Speaker, how does one 
justify the Chirac government's exploding more nuclear bombs when over 
60 percent of France's public is opposed to nuclear testing? How about 
the 200,000 French citizens who will be directly impacted if nuclear 
contamination breaks out from the atolls, where the tests now are being 
conducted?
  Is it fair, Mr. Speaker, for President Chirac of France to conclude 
that the lives of 200,000 French citizens living in French Polynesia 
are deemed expendable for the sake of France to become a preeminent 
force in Europe? Is it also fair, Mr. Speaker, that President Chirac 
has now determined that the safety of some 28 million people living in 
the Pacific region is also deemed expendable so as to promote France's 
nuclear capabilities? In the name of fairness and equity, Mr. Speaker, 
what right does President Chirac have to impose the hazards of nuclear 
contamination on millions of people in the Pacific who are not subject 
to French control? Mr. Speaker, I am not one to defend China's nuclear 
testing program, but at least they test within their own backyard.

  Mr. Speaker, recently the gentleman from Massachusetts, Congressman 
Edward Markey, and the gentleman from California, Congressman Pete 
Stark, and myself introduced a bill, H.R. 2529, that places up to an 
800-percent duty on all French beaujolais wine imported to this 
country. With each nuclear explosion, the price of French wine shall 
escalate. People should not buy French wine to protest France's 
testing. I ask my colleagues and the American people to support us in 
this effort, and to send President Chirac a strong message: Nuclear 
testing and nuclear bomb explosions are no longer relevant in our world 
today.
  I submit, Mr. Speaker, when are we going to stop this madness, in 
that we continue to justify ourselves by saying this is the only way 
that we are going to defend ourselves, by having a nuclear deterrent 
capability. Mr. Speaker, this is the height of contradiction. We outlaw 
germ warfare, we outlaw chemical warfare, but we don't touch nuclear 
warfare, the most destructive warfare in existence. This the height of 
hypocrisy, Mr. Speaker. The height of hypocrisy.
  Mr. Speaker, I include for the Record articles on the European 
Community's reaction to the bombings.

               [From the Washington Times, Nov. 20, 1995]

                        Test Critics Rile Paris


               Chirac cancels summits with italy, belgium

                         (By Pierre-Yves Glass)

       Paris.--French nuclear tests in the Pacific have blown open 
     a rift between France and most of its European partners. For 
     Paris, their criticism of the blasts amounted to betrayal.
       Angered by their support of a U.N. resolution condemning 
     French nuclear tests, President Jacques Chirac on Friday 
     abruptly canceled planned summits with the leaders of Belgium 
     and Italy.
       Paris justified its action, saying the positions of those 
     states and eight other European Union members didn't 
     ``correspond to our idea of European solidarity.''
       By joining 85 other nations in condemning France, those 10 
     EU states broke a decades-old tradition of backing a fellow 
     EU member when it deemed its actions essential to its 
     national interests.
       But their act could be a reminder to Mr. Chirac that the EU 
     has 15 states and isn't just a club run by its most powerful 
     members--France, Germany and Britain.
       The French have to understand that their partners in the 
     European Union have opinions on an initiative on which they 
     have not been consulted,'' Belgian Prime Minister Jean-Luc 
     Dehaene said Saturday.
       France has responded to world outrage by insisting its 
     series of six underground nuclear blasts in French Polynesia 
     this fall are essential to ensure the viability of its 
     nuclear arsenal. Government sources said the fourth 
     detonation would take place within the coming days.
       Paris has pledged to sign a testban treaty next spring 
     after completing the tests. The United States, Britain and 
     Russia all have adhered to a moratorium on nuclear testing.
       A U.N. commission's resolution Thursday ``strongly 
     deplored'' continued nuclear tests by France and China--
     without naming the countries--and demanded the General 
     Assembly call for a stop to them.
       Among the EU's 15 members, only Britain--the bloc's other 
     nuclear power--voted with France against the resolution. 
     Germany, Spain and Greece--usually staunch French allies--
     abstained.

[[Page H 13934]]

       The resolution was supported by all other EU members--
     Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Italy, 
     Luxembourg, Portugal, Sweden and the Netherlands.
       Paris wants to offset U.S. domination of NATO by creating a 
     more independent EU defense system. It interpreted the vote 
     by 10 EU countries condemning the French blasts as a slap in 
     the face.
       The vote of the 10 EU naysayers ``goes counter to 
     [European] solidarity just as everyone proclaims support for 
     a firmer European defense,'' former Premier Edouard Balladur 
     said.
                                                                    ____


             [From the Honolulu Advertiser, Nov. 24, 1995]

         Sales of French Beaujolais Hit by Anti-Nuclear Boycott


          politics of tests in s. pacific sour the new vintage

       It has evolved into one of the most hallowed annual rituals 
     in France, a moment when bleak autumn blues are swept away by 
     an ocean of fruity red wine spilling out of southern Burgundy 
     amid a boisterous chorus heard around the world:
       Le beaujolais nouveau has arrived!
       The yearly rush to ship the stuff to every corner of the 
     globe at the stroke of midnight on the third Thursday in 
     November is one of France's great marketing coups. The 
     unpretentious wine, bottled just weeks after the grape 
     harvest, produces sneers from connoisseurs but more than $100 
     million a year for growers.
       Alas, this year's vintage is already producing a horrendous 
     hangover. Foreign sales have dropped precipitously in many 
     markets, largely because of consumer boycotts over France's 
     decision to resume nuclear testing in the South Pacific.
       The United States is an exception: sales are solid in Les 
     Etats Unis, including Hawaii, where wine merchants say it 
     would be a crime to let politics interfere with imbibing.
       ``They are all fanatics,'' R. Field Wine Co. managing 
     partner Tim Learmont says of those who would forgo le beau 
     for le bombe.
       The protest, Learmont says, is misplaced. ``A lot of the 
     people that grow the wine are themselves opposed to nuclear 
     testing. They are punishing the wrong people, and they are 
     punishing themselves by boycotting the wine.''
       In fact, Learmont said, sales in his Honolulu shop at Ward 
     Centre appear to be brisker this year than last, with 12 
     cases sold in less than a week, and only 24 more cases here 
     or on the way.
       Learmont attributes the sales, at $13.99 a bottle with 
     discounts for six or more bottles, to the ``fresh, clean'' 
     quality of the new vintage, ``with a lot of strawberry 
     character to it.
       ``This nouveau is much better than last year,'' Learmont 
     says. ``Of course,'' he grins, ``we say that every year.''
       But in Japan and Scandinavia, where anti-nuclear protests 
     are popular, beaujolais sales have fallen by more than 30 
     percent, according to the French winegrowers' union. In 
     Germany, bar customers are asking to pay for the thrill not 
     of drinking beaujolais but of smashing the bottles.
       ``Politics never mixes well with wine,'' said Franck 
     Duboeuf, who operates France's biggest wine-exporting empire 
     with his father, Georges, known as the ``King of 
     Beaujolais,'' from their base in Romaneche-Thorins.
       ``Banning the bomb and nuclear testing may be worthy 
     causes, but to stop buying wine is not the best way to 
     achieve those goals,'' Duboeuf said in a telephone interview.
       But even new markets such as Brazil, China and Singapore 
     have not offset sharp declines in Japan, the Netherlands and 
     other anti-nuclear nations.
                                                                    ____


                [From the New York Times, Nov. 17, 1995]

        China Rebukes Four Other Nuclear Powers on Arms Control

                         (By Patrick E. Tyler)

       Beijing, Nov. 16.--Issuing a major policy statement on arms 
     control, China tonight sharply rebuked the United States, 
     Russia, Britain and France for continuing to develop 
     ``nuclear weapons and outer space weapons, including guided 
     missile defense systems'' while seeking in some cases to deny 
     the peaceful use of nuclear technology to the developing 
     world.
       The policy document, issued by the official New China News 
     Agency, said the world's major nuclear powers ``on the one 
     hand, vie with one another in dumping their advanced weapons 
     on the international market, even using weapons transfers as 
     a means to interfere in other nations domestic affairs.''
       ``On the other,'' it continued, ``they resort to 
     discriminative anti-proliferation and arms control measures, 
     directing the spearhead of arms control at the developing 
     countries.''
       Without mentioning Taiwan, the document implicitly warned 
     Washington that Beijing regards continuing arms sales to the 
     island as interference in China's internal affairs.
       For the first time, the policy declaration also appeared to 
     express China's formal opposition to an American proposal to 
     deploy ballistic missile defense systems in Asia to protect 
     Japan and American military forces there, principally against 
     North Korea. Beijing fears that such a missile defense system 
     could undermine Chinese strategic nuclear forces, which were 
     developed to hold American, Japanese and Russian targets at 
     risk of retaliation in any nuclear conflict.
       Chinese officials were alarmed when President Clinton and 
     President Boris N. Yeltsin signed a communique in May saying 
     Washington and Moscow should cooperate in developing 
     ballistic missile defenses.
       In a larger context, China's policy presentation was made 
     to a world and regional audience that is very much concerned 
     with fundamental security questions in Asia. They include the 
     rising military tensions between China and Taiwan; the 
     territorial conflicts in the South China Sea, where there are 
     rich deposits of oil, and China's competition with Japan for 
     regional dominance. The role of American forces in Asia is 
     connected to each one of these issues.
       China's policy statement may have also been timed in part 
     to blunt the international criticism that will resume when 
     Beijing detonates its expected third underground nuclear 
     warhead this year, part of a final series of tests leading up 
     to the conclusion in 1996 of a nuclear test ban treaty, which 
     China has pledged to sign. Preparations at the Lop Nor 
     testing range in the far west of China have been observed by 
     American reconnaissance satellites, foreign diplomats here 
     say.
       Concerning its own nuclear cooperation with such countries 
     as Iran and Pakistan, both of which have nuclear weapons 
     programs, the document pledged that China would combat the 
     spread of weapons of mass destruction. But it asserted, 
     ``There must not be a double standard whereby anti-nuclear 
     proliferation is used as a pretext to limit or retard the 
     peaceful use of nuclear energy by developing nations.''
       China defended its level of military spending, which has 
     increased about 50 percent, taking inflation into account, 
     since the late 1980's, according to estimates by Central 
     Intelligence Agency.
       ``China needs a peaceful environment in order to be able to 
     devote itself completely to its socialist modernization 
     program,'' the document said. ``As long as there is no 
     serious threat to China's sovereignty or security, China will 
     not increase its defense spending substantially or by a big 
     margin. It will never threaten nor invade any other 
     country.''

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