[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 125 (Tuesday, October 10, 2000)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1727-E1728]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                      NO VIABLE POLICY FOR AFRICA

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. FRANK R. WOLF

                              of virginia

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, October 10, 2000

  Mr. WOLF. Mr. Speaker, the President has spoken of the need for 
consistent and dedicated leadership in world affairs as the keystones 
to abiding and lasting peace in the world. I would observe that there 
certainly has been a consistency in the leadership from this 
administration in African affairs--a consistent lack of a viable policy 
to improve the lives of the persecuted peoples on the African 
continent.
  I rise today to express my profound disappointment with the Clinton 
Administration's policies toward Sierra Leone, in particular, and 
Africa in general. To be sure, there are many good people who have 
tried to implement worthy and thoughtful policies regarding Africa 
during the tenure of this Administration. But the problem with this 
Administration's Africa policy is that more often than not, the voices 
that should have been heard, have not carried the day.
  ```African Renaissance' Hailed by Clinton Now a Distant Memory'' is 
the title of a recent article in the Los Angeles Times by Robin Wright. 
Ms. Wright says that just two years ago, President Clinton hailed what 
he called an ``African renaissance.'' Now, despite several years of 
rhetoric on Africa by the Clinton administration, this article states 
that a recent national intelligence estimate says that ``Africa faces a 
bleaker future than at any time in the past century.''
  President Clinton has traveled more than almost any other President. 
He has had first hand experiences throughout Africa, more experience 
and actual time in Africa than any other President. But all of his time 
there only amounted to photo opportunities and handshakes, amounting to 
substance-free public relations.
  Because of his time in Africa, he should have and could have done so 
much more. The death, suffering, and destruction that has occurred over 
the past eight years needed more than a touch down by Air Force One. 
This Administration lost an opportunity to make a real difference in 
the lives of millions of Africans. As a result of its inaction and lack 
of vision, millions of people have died in Africa during the Clinton 
Administration's watch. The past eight years could have been different 
if energy, attention, and rectitude had been applied.
  This Administration floundered, delayed, and refused to take timely 
action in the face of the genocide that occurred in Rwanda. Perhaps 
close to a million people died during the slaughter of Tutsis and this 
Administration did nothing as reports flowed into the U.S. about the 
potential for and outbreak of this genocide. This Administration did 
nothing during the violence.
  More recently, in Sierra Leone, thousands of people have been killed, 
maimed, and tortured and hundreds of thousands of people became 
refugees at the hands of brutal rebel forces. I have been to Sierra 
Leone and I have seen first-hand results of the Sierra Leonian rebels 
atrocities. In December of last year, Congressman Hall and I went to an 
amputee camp, a camp set up for the survivors of the rebels' machetes. 
At the amputee camp, we met thousands of people who are lucky to be 
alive. The people we met were the survivors--those who did not bleed to 
death as they struggled to flee the rebels who had just cut off their 
arms, legs, or ears.
  No one was spared the brutal, grotesque, and evil actions of the 
rebels. infant babies had their arms and legs cut off. Young men in the 
prime of their life suddenly had half of a leg. Women were raped by 
rebels and then had their limbs amputated--only to give birth several 
months later as a result of the rape they suffered.
  What motivated these rebels of Sierra Leone? What gave the rebels 
incentive to launch their horrible rampage? The answer is diamonds. 
They want to profit and control and trade in Sierra Leone's vast 
diamond wealth.

[[Page E1728]]

And the rebels in Sierra Leone received weapons and support in exchange 
for their diamonds from Liberian President Charles Taylor.
  I have repeatedly asked this Administration to name all those 
involved in the atrocities, Sierra Leonians and Liberians, as war 
criminals, and I have repeatedly asked the Administration to seriously 
address the issue of conflict diamonds. The control and trafficking of 
conflict diamonds in Sierra Leone and several other African countries 
has fueled and funded rebel movements that otherwise had little to no 
sources of income.
  On March 16 in a letter to Secretary of State Albright I wrote:


       Congressman Hall has introduced legislation, H.R. 3188, to 
     certify the country of origin of all diamonds. Thus a diamond 
     buyer will know where a diamond has been mined and a 
     purchaser can avoid buying conflict diamonds. Passage of 
     Congressman Hall's bill will be a huge stride in ending this 
     practice. Your support for this important legislation would 
     be very helpful.
       Promised U.S. action if the rebels do not comply with the 
     conditions for disarmament should be:
       they and their families will not be allowed entry into the 
     U.S., Britain or any other country--no visas should be issued 
     to rebels or their family members;
       if the rebels have bank accounts in the U.S. and in Europe, 
     they should be frozen and they should be denied access to 
     these accounts and to future commerce with the U.S., bank 
     accounts of rebel family members should be included in this 
     prohibition too;
       the rebel leaders should be declared war criminals by the 
     U.S. and other Western countries and direct its intelligence 
     and police agencies to actively pursue apprehending rebels 
     who have not disarmed.
       These same conditions should also be applied to Liberian 
     Charles Taylor and all Liberians who have assisted the rebels 
     in Sierra Leone. It has come to my attention that Taylor 
     escaped from a Massachusetts prison and fled to Liberia. 
     Taylor and many Liberians have blood on their hands from 
     their support of these rebels. By being the primary conduit 
     for trading the conflict diamonds mined by the rebels, and by 
     reportedly supplying the rebels with military assistance, 
     Taylor and others have fueled the atrocities committed by the 
     rebels upon the people of Sierra Leone. The U.S. should enact 
     similar measures and conditions against Taylor and other 
     Liberians as those I proposed for the rebels in Sierra Leone.
       If the rebels are not disarmed and if Taylor and other 
     Liberians continue to traffic in conflict diamonds and to 
     provide the rebels with military assistance, Taylor and 
     others should be named as war criminals and they should not 
     be allowed to travel outside of their country. You should fix 
     a date that you think is reasonable and helpful.

  In a letter dated July 12 I wrote to President Clinton, Secretary 
Albright, and National Security Advisor Samuel Berger asking for the 
Administration's support for an amendment submitted by Representative 
Tony Hall and myself that was included in the Treasury, Postal Service 
and General Government appropriations subcommittee that would have

       Yesterday the House Treasury, Postal Service and General 
     Government appropriations subcommittee voted to include 
     language submitted by Rep. Tony Hall and me in the FY 2001 
     Treasury spending bill that addresses the massive problems of 
     conflict diamonds in Africa. I have heard reports that for 
     some reason, your Administration opposes this provision.
       The problem of conflict diamonds is one of the major 
     reasons for the instability, death, and gross human rights 
     abuses that are occurring throughout Africa. Your 
     Administration to date has not addressed the issue of 
     conflict diamonds. The language approved by the subcommittee 
     yesterday will help to prevent the types of atrocities 
     against millions of people, like the young girl and the young 
     men in the enclosed pictures, who have had their limbs cut 
     off by rebels intent on controlling and trafficking in 
     conflict diamonds.
       This is an opportunity for your Administration to take bold 
     action to help the suffering people of Africa. Please support 
     this effort. It is the right thing to do.

  This language was never supported by the Administration. In fact, the 
Administration circulated a memo staying that they opposed the 
amendment, and this amendment was taken out of the Treasury, Postal 
Service, and General Government appropriations on the floor of the 
House, in part because of the Administration's opposition.
  In a subsequent meeting with a staff member of the National Security 
Council, she declared to my staff and to Congressman Tony Hall that the 
Administration would work with us to draft and move legislation 
addressing conflict diamonds. Several months later, to my knowledge, 
this Administration has offered no legislative proposals to us, nor 
have they attended any subsequent legislative meetings or drafting 
sessions.
  In a May 1, 2000 letter to President Clinton, I urged him to act 
quickly to prevent the continuing bloodshed and trafficking of conflict 
diamonds in Sierra Leone, saying:
  An op-ed by Michael Kelly, from the July 19, 2000, Washington Post 
comments on an article published in the New Republic that describes how 
the verbosity of the Administration does not match their actions. Kelly 
observed how the Administration pushed the Government of Sierra Leone 
into accepting the Lome Peace Accords, an agreement that placed rebel 
leader Foday Sankoh as head of the diamond commission and that allowed 
the prosperous diamond regions to remain under rebel control:

       [U.S. Department of State spokesman Phillip Reeker said] 
     `The United States did not pressure anybody to sign this 
     agreement . . . We neither brokered the Lome peace agreement 
     nor leaned on President Kabbah to open talks with the 
     insurgents . . . It was not an agreement of ours' This is, in 
     a sense, true. The United States was not a signatory to the 
     Lome agreement; so it is not an agreement of `of ours' But in 
     a large sense, the surrender of Sierra Leone to the murdering 
     mob was very much our handiwork . . .
       And what did the U.S.-pushed agreement entail? Only that . 
     . . ``the democratic president of Sierra Leone . . . hand 
     over much of his government and most of his country's wealth 
     to one of the greatest monsters of the late 20th century.'' 
     Sankoh was made vice president and given control of Sierra 
     Leon's diamond mines; the RUF [Revolutionary United Front] 
     was granted amnesty.

  The bottom line is, like the rest of its Africa policy, this 
Administration is all talk and no action--they have had a touchdown 
policy where handshakes and smiles are exchanged, but where facts on 
the ground no unchanged and unaddressed.

                          ____________________