[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 58 (Tuesday, May 3, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Page S2619]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     REMEMBERING MAX VAN DER STOEL

  Mr. CARDIN. Madam President, as the Senate chairman of the U.S. 
Helsinki Commission, I rise today to pay tribute to Max van der Stoel, 
the first High Commissioner on National Minorities at the Organization 
for Security and Cooperation in Europe, OSCE, who died last week at his 
home in The Hague at the age of 86. Van der Stoel, a two-time Dutch 
foreign minister, worked tirelessly throughout the OSCE region as High 
Commissioner from 1992 to 2001 to prevent crises involving minority 
issues.
  Max van der Stoel had a life-long commitment to human rights. From 
his early life in Nazi-occupied Netherlands to defining moments spent 
with Soviet-era dissidents, van der Stoel was deeply affected by the 
abuses he witnessed. He described one such encounter, in then-
Czechoslovakia in 1977, when as foreign minister he met with Charter 77 
activist, Jan Patocka in full view of Czechoslovak authorities. Van der 
Stoel commented that, ``This support was of great concern to the 
Communist authorities. After our short meeting, Professor Patocka was 
arrested and rigorously interrogated. He died of a heart attack the 
next day.''
  Following the first gulf war, van der Stoel was appointed U.N. Human 
Rights Representative for Iraq, and he continued to raise human rights 
concerns in Iraq throughout the 1990s.
  In 1992, he was appointed as the OSCE's first High Commissioner on 
National Minorities, HCNM, with a mandate aimed at preventing conflict 
through quiet diplomacy and early warning to the OSCE countries. His 
successes in that role are largely unrecognized, as they lie in what 
did not happen rather than in what did. He traveled to countries where 
tensions were rising, encouraged dialogue, and made practical 
recommendations to address underlying issues related to ethnic tension.
  He worked in Estonia and Latvia in the early 1990s to address the 
processing for acquiring citizenship--which at the time disadvantaged 
particularly ethnic Russians in the newly independent states because of 
stringent language testing. He was the OSCE Chairmanship's Personal 
Representative on Kosovo--although unfortunately his early warnings in 
1997 and 1998 went unheeded by policymakers. His work on inter-ethnic 
relations and education in Macedonia resulted in the establishment of 
the South Eastern European University in Tetovo in 2001, which is still 
a model for integrated education. Throughout his time as HCNM, he 
promoted rights for Roma, the single largest minority in the OSCE 
region as a whole.
  His job was not easy, but his integrity, commitment, and diplomatic 
skills paved the way for his successors and built the position of the 
HCNM into one of the most effective OSCE tools for conflict prevention. 
His legacy to the OSCE is not only the work he did as HCNM, but the 
advice he left behind on the importance of early action to prevent 
conflict.
  In his last statement to the OSCE Permanent Council in 2001, he said:

       Governments should see the self-interest in protecting 
     minority rights and living in peaceful and prosperous multi-
     ethnic states. The only people who profit from inter-ethnic 
     conflict are nationalist entrepreneurs. That is not a 
     business that reaps long term profits. In the end, 
     intolerance, violence and instability hurt us all.
       I maintain that preventing inter-ethnic conflict will 
     continue to be one of the organization's biggest challenges 
     in the near future. Despite improvements in many OSCE states, 
     conflicts still rage and tensions boil below the surface. We 
     have to sharpen our tools and invest sufficient resources to 
     ensure that we remain on the cutting edge of conflict 
     prevention. . . . Collectively, we must do more to act in 
     response to the warning signs. It is not enough to admonish 
     States for falling short of their commitments. A concerted 
     response by the international community must be resolute, 
     targeted, and timely.
       . . . When a crisis becomes acute, everyone wonders what 
     went wrong or what steps should be taken to contain the 
     situation. Things do not need to get to that point. While 
     Foreign Ministries seem to be increasingly sensitive to the 
     benefits of relatively limited funding, treasuries are still 
     hesitant to invest in preventing the conflicts of tomorrow. 
     We need to put our money where our mouth is. It makes 
     political and financial sense to put resources into keeping 
     multi-ethnic states together, rather than bailing them out 
     after they have fallen apart.

  His words are as timely and relevant today as they were 10 years ago. 
It is my hope that, inspired by the dedication and accomplishments of 
Max van der Stoel, the United States and its allies will strive to 
ensure that ethic tension and human rights violations are not allowed 
to fester until they erupt into conflict.

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