[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 26 (Wednesday, February 12, 2003)]
[House]
[Page H397]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                 BURMA

  (Mr. PITTS asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. PITTS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of the ethnic 
minorities of Burma, otherwise known as Myanmar. In January, I visited 
the Thai-Burma border and met with refugees, democracy activists, 
prisoner-of-conscience groups and others working to help the people of 
Burma. Sadly, the international community has failed to recognize that 
there is, under international legal definitions, a campaign of genocide 
against the ethnic minorities by the ruling SPDC dictatorship in Burma.
  We met with victims' groups, land mine victims, orphans, rape victims 
and others. One little boy I met was an 8-year-old orphan. He had seen 
both of his parents killed, then he was trafficked over the border into 
Thailand and there he escaped to the refugee camps. This little boy was 
so traumatized that he could not even smile. I saw many children like 
him.
  Mr. Speaker, the U.S. Government and the international community must 
do something to assist the people of Burma and stop the brutality. 
Otherwise, we will all be responsible for the successful genocide 
campaign ethnic cleansing going on by the vicious military of the SPDC.

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