[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 84 (Thursday, June 17, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6990-S6991]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                 UGANDA

  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I wish to take this opportunity to 
report back to my colleagues on some observations during my recent 
visit to the nation of Uganda. The Congressional Coalition on Adoption 
is a bipartisan, bicameral caucus that enjoys the support of nearly 200 
members of Congress. I am fortunate to cochair this organization with 
my friend and colleague, the Senior Senator from Idaho. Every year, we 
have been taking a delegation of members and staff to a nation which 
plays, or could play, a leading role in assuring every child a loving 
family. In recent years, we have lead delegations to Romania, Russia, 
China, and Guatemala. However, this month, we traveled to a spot that 
is truly special in the world--Uganda.
  I am sad to say that if Americans know anything about Uganda, they 
know its tragic history. Since independence from Britain, Uganda has 
moved from tragedy to tragedy. Famously called the ``Pearl of Africa'' 
by Sir Winston Churchill, decades of misrule and grisly dictatorship 
left Uganda destitute and denied her proper role in the family of 
nations.
  Yet, the spirit of the people of Uganda seems indomitable. Despite 
Amin, despite Obote, despite HIV/AIDS, despite brutal terrorists in the 
north, Ugandans continue with a joy of life that is almost impossible 
to accept in our own terms. The people there have an amazing capacity 
to look past their personal tragedies and continue to strive for a 
better life for their children.
  Perhaps no man better captures the spirit of the people of Uganda 
than their current President, Yoweri Museveni. When Idi Amin staged his 
coup in 1971, now-President Museveni went into exile and began a 
history of resistance to dictatorship and misrule that has earned him 
comparisons with our own George Washington. Since his National 
Resistance Movement took power in 1986, Uganda has enjoyed the first 
sustained period of growth and stability that it has known since 
independence. As is often mentioned, President Museveni also exerted 
personal and farsighted leadership in the struggle against AIDS. The 
difference between this kind of personal leadership and its absence can 
be found by comparing the AIDS infection rates in Uganda with those of 
the rest of sub-Saharan Africa.
  Thus, Uganda is a country with capable and proven leadership, with an 
industrious people who are eager for more contact with the United 
States, and with an amazing natural beauty that is unparalleled in my 
own experience. However, Uganda faces two enormous challenges, and that 
is what drew the Congressional Coalition on Adoption to the country. 
Sadly, both of these challenges have contributed to the creation of 
orphans. They are the epidemic of HIV/AIDS and the ongoing terrorism by 
the Lord's Resistance Army in northern Uganda.
  Uganda has a population of 25 million people, and estimates suggest 
that nearly 10 percent of Uganda's population are orphaned. The good 
news is that Uganda has tackled one of the great orphan-generating 
disasters by acknowledging AIDS as a threat that can shake a country to 
its core. AIDS infection rates in some sections of Uganda were greater 
than 50 percent. From that devastating past, and with the good work of 
President Museveni and the First Lady, Janet Museveni, they have 
brought infection rates in Uganda to less than 6 percent.
  However, we must continue our support for the President's ``ABC'' 
program that endorses abstinence, being faithful, and condoms in that 
priority. The three pronged approach has been very successful, and we 
must ensure that ideological differences do not undermine our support 
for a program with such an amazing success rate.
  Additionally, we observed some very important clinical work with the 
drug Nevirapine. It is one of those small miracles that should do 
wonders in theory, but as a practical matter, the results are somewhat 
more troubling. Nevirapine has been shown to reduce mother-to-child HIV 
transmission rates by 50 percent. German pharmaceutical companies are 
providing the drug for free in Uganda. Nevertheless, because the 
healthcare infrastructure is so fragile and, in much of Uganda, 
nonexistent, Nevirapine has been subject to something called the 
``cascade effect.'' Effectively, this means that since Nevirapine 
treatment requires a number of steps, at each stage we lose 
participation of mothers. So, when 6,000 women enter a clinic's door 
seeking treatment, we end up saving about four babies at a cost of 
$5,000 for each child. It is not that those children are not worth 
saving, we should do everything we can to save every child. However, 
when we tackle an enormous problem with finite resources, we must 
devote our efforts to the most effective treatments available.
  As the administration unrolls its funding strategy for the global 
effort against AIDS, I think we must examine this question of mother-
to-child transmission carefully. In addition to the cascade effect, we 
must be careful not to ``create'' orphans with our healthcare funding 
choices. If all of our efforts go into saving infants, and we do less 
to help the mothers, we have only added to Uganda's difficulties with a 
large orphan population.
  But the real pressure creating new orphans in Uganda also deserves 
American attention. The Lord's Resistance Army, LRA, has been operating 
in Uganda since 1989. Suffice to say that its origins can be found in 
the delusional preachings of a self-proclaimed priestess, and since 
that time, it has lost whatever purpose it might have claimed. Fifteen 
years later, the LRA is lead by Joseph Koney, and his acts of cruelty 
can only rank with those of Hitler and Stalin. I heard personal 
testimony from an 11-year-old girl who was forced to kill her own 
mother in front of her siblings.
  This rag-tag group of brigands, thieves, and terrorists prey on the 
weakness of children. They swell their own meager ranks of 2,000 men by 
abducting children out of their homes. Young children are made to carry 
equipment, frequently starving to death during their treks of hundreds 
of miles to the LRA bases in southern Sudan. Older males are forced to 
fight or be killed. Girls are brutally raped and used as sex slaves for 
years.
  Child soldiers are regrettably not unique to Uganda. However, Koney's 
pathological desire to have children murder their own families and 
their fellow villagers leaves scars that are harder to heal than in 
other parts of the world.
  Despite this reality, U.S. military assistance to Uganda is a 
pittance. It is certainly true that the Ugandan army has a checkered 
past. It is also true that President Museveni has intervened in other 
conflicts, such as Rwanda. Yet, whatever harm might conceivably come 
from greater military assistance the United States would provide 
Uganda, it is overwhelmed by the horror of the status quo. If there is 
a moral obligation to use military force to defeat terrorists anywhere 
on Earth, I cannot conceive of a better place for the use of force than 
against the LRA.

  East Africa is an unstable and difficult neighborhood. Nearby Somalia 
is a failed state. Sudan has actively harbored terrorists, including 
Osama bin Laden. The Congo is an ongoing battleground. Rwanda 
experienced the worst genocide since Nazi Germany. This is a place that 
needs some attention and would benefit from a more robust American 
role. I am certain that we will need a real partner in this region--a 
partner in our fight against terrorism, an economic partner that 
demonstrates the success of the African Growth and Opportunity Act, and 
a regional model for the combat of AIDS. I believe that Uganda could be 
such a partner, and this Senator will pursue those steps available to 
me that would cement this relationship.
  Finally, let me say a word about intercountry adoption. President 
Museveni graciously received our delegation, and we had the opportunity 
to explain our position. Namely, the coalition feels that children 
flourish with

[[Page S6991]]

loving families, but suffer in institutions. Of course, Uganda's 
traditional culture would normally absorb orphaned children in 
precisely the way we think is most appropriate--first with their 
family, secondarily within their community. However, we feel that where 
these social systems have been overwhelmed, as they have been in 
Uganda, a country should consider the option of international adoption. 
We believe that a nation can have no better ambassador to the United 
States than a child who has been adopted into a U.S. family and now has 
an active interest in their home country. We have seen it in China, 
Korea, and Russia. The process of intercountry adoption simply connects 
Americans to another country in a way they otherwise never would be.
  So with these thoughts in mind, President Museveni has agreed to 
review our request that Uganda ratify the Hague Convention on 
Intercountry Adoption. International adoption is not going to be a 
solution to the very important tasks ahead of Uganda. However, in the 
lives of the children who find parents this way, intercountry adoption 
will be a true blessing.
  I am also very pleased to announce that President Museveni and his 
wife Janet have kindly accepted my invitation to join us for a 
reception in their honor at my home. This will be an excellent 
opportunity for the Washington community to welcome this distinguished 
leader and build upon the foundations of partnership that have already 
been laid. I look forward to seeing many of my colleagues there.

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