[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 38 (Tuesday, March 6, 2007)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E474]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       INTRODUCTION OF THE ``TORTURE OUTSOURCING PREVENTION ACT''

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. EDWARD J. MARKEY

                            of massachusetts

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, March 6, 2007

  Mr. MARKEY. Madam Speaker, I rise today to introduce, for the third 
time, legislation to prohibit the outsourcing of torture by the United 
States government. I am hopeful that this Congress the House will 
finally take up legislation on this matter.
  I know that policy battles can drag on for seemingly endless lengths 
of time. I remember that Senator Proxmire spent nearly 20 years arguing 
that the United States needed to ratify the Convention Against Genocide 
before finally succeeding to rally the Senate to action. But I know too 
that we cannot delay any longer in addressing the Administration's 
practice of transferring detainees for interrogation or other purposes 
to countries where there are substantial grounds for believing that the 
transferred individuals could face torture. I feel a rising optimism 
that we can end this repugnant and counterproductive practice of so-
called extraordinary rendition soon, and certainly within the timeframe 
of this Congress.
  There is no doubt that the United States is greatly challenged by 
violent extremists, and the terrible attacks of September 11 were not 
so much attacks upon our country as upon the values of liberalism, 
openness and democracy that we champion throughout the world. But there 
is a right way and a wrong way to conduct ourselves as we defend the 
United States from murderous criminals and terrorists.
  The wrong way is to lower our standards of conduct further and 
further for the sake of expediency. The wrong way is to compromise our 
core values of human rights and dignity for all people in the face of 
an enemy who disdains such ideals. The wrong way is to undermine and 
destroy international treaties guaranteeing all people security from 
cruel, inhumane, or degrading treatment; especially when these treaties 
are the last line of defense for our soldiers and personnel overseas 
unfortunate enough to be captured on the battlefield.
  The right way is to proudly and publicly hold the United States to 
the highest standards and prove again that our nation is founded upon 
the rule of law.
  The practice of extraordinary rendition is a travesty, and it is 
illegal under any reasonable reading of U.S. and international law. The 
Convention Against Torture, ratified by the Senate in 1986, provides 
that the United States may not ``expel, return, or extradite a person 
to another State where there are substantial grounds for believing that 
he would be in danger of being subjected to torture.'' And in 1998, 
this Congress passed the Foreign Affairs Reform and Restructuring Act 
(FARRA), which states that ``it shall be the policy of the United 
States not to expel, extradite, or otherwise affect the involuntary 
return of any person to a country in which there are substantial 
grounds for believing the person would be in danger of being subjected 
to torture, regardless of whether the person is physically present in 
the United States.''

  Both the Convention Against Torture and FARRA prohibit the transfer 
of an individual to a state where there are ``substantial grounds for 
believing'' that the individual will face torture. How has the 
Administration gotten around this prohibition when sending detainees to 
countries like Syria, Jordan, Uzbekistan, and Egypt; countries which 
our own State Department reports are habitual abusers of human rights? 
The Administration has received, and accepted, so-called ``diplomatic 
assurances'' from these torturing countries that they will not abuse 
transferred detainees. It is shocking that the Bush Administration has 
repeatedly and cynically accepted the word of known torturers without 
any mechanism to ensure that these promises were not broken.
  The Torture Outsourcing Prevention Act will require that the 
Secretary of State compile an annual list of all countries in the world 
known to use torture; it will be illegal to transfer individuals to the 
countries on this list, regardless of the citizenship or physical 
location of the individuals. Furthermore, the Torture Outsourcing 
Prevention Act will close the loophole of ``diplomatic assurances'' 
which the Administration has exploited to outsource the torture of 
prisoners to countries such as Syria.
  The Torture Outsourcing Prevention Act provides waiver authority over 
the prohibition to the Secretary of State when it is certified to the 
appropriate Congressional committees that the country in question no 
longer practices torture and there is a verifiable mechanism in place 
to assure that the person transferred will not face torture.
  The Torture Outsourcing Prevention Act does not inhibit treaty-based 
extraditions in any way. In those cases, current law already provides 
that an individual facing extradition may challenge the extradition in 
the courts with an assertion of their rights under the Convention 
Against Torture.
  Madam Speaker, it is past time for the Congress to end the practice 
of extraordinary rendition. I urge adoption of this important 
legislation.

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