[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 40 (Tuesday, March 11, 2014)]
[House]
[Pages H2288-H2294]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
{time} 1930
UKRAINE
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Daines). Under the Speaker's announced
policy of January 3, 2013, the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, my remarks this evening will focus on the
crisis facing Ukraine and our world, the most significant test of the
will of liberty-loving people since the collapse of the Soviet Union
and the end of the Cold War.
The events halfway around the world remind us how precious our own
liberties are and how important it is for the world community of
liberty-loving nations, those that respect human life and those that
believe in democratic advancement. We have common cause with those who
stood in the streets in the subzero temperatures of Ukraine, whose
futures are uncertain as I deliver my remarks this evening.
The world community of liberty-loving nations and those that respect
treaty obligations and their roles as members of the United Nations
Security Council cannot let the kind of illegal invasion of another
country stand. Russia, one of the permanent members of the Security
Council of the United Nations, has invaded a sovereign country,
violating her territorial integrity and putting off the day that
Ukraine can handle its own internal affairs in order to get rid of the
corruption of the former regime and allow the voices of people who so
very much want to live in a free society to fully develop.
Our Nation and the world have to stand up for freedom, democracy, and
human rights in Ukraine. These precious values will be diminished
everywhere if we fail to raise our voices in
[[Page H2289]]
support of those whose lives are at risk. The West, involving our
allies from around the world, has to exert strong diplomatic
initiatives, economic reform, including a financing package that the
International Monetary Fund and other nations are putting together,
humanitarian relief, if requested, and military assistance to
strengthen our NATO alliance and the protection of borders.
Recently, the Ambassador from Ukraine to the United States,
Ambassador Motsyk, wrote a letter to Members of Congress, and tonight I
am going to read it into the Record so every American can hear it:
Dear Members of the United States Congress:
I would like to begin by thanking the United States of
America, and specifically the United States Congress, for the
unwavering support of Ukraine at these challenging times.
For the past couple of months, Ukraine has been in the
world's headlines. The whole world saw the determination of
hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians who took to the streets
to stand for a better life--for freedom, democracy, and the
end of blatant corruption that stifled our country for far
too long. Yet the Yanukovych regime tried to silence the
protesters with guns. Peaceful and unarmed demonstrators were
met by special forces with snipers who shot dead almost a
hundred people and wounded hundreds more.
In an attempt to prevent further bloodshed and resolve the
crisis, on February 21, 2014, leaders of the opposition
Vitali Klychko, Oleh Tyahnybok, and Arsenii Yatsenyuk on one
side, and the corrupt regime of Viktor Yanukovych on the
other, signed an agreement that had been negotiated with the
help of foreign ministers of Poland, Germany, and France.
Russia's Special Envoy, Vladimir Lukin, was present, but
refused to sign it. Therefore, the suggestion by the Russian
side that the opposition failed to implement the agreement is
groundless.
The agreement called for an end of violence, restoration of
the Ukrainian Constitution of 2004 and early presidential
elections. However, on February 22, 2014, President Viktor
Yanukovych fled the capitol and de facto removed himself from
his constitutional authority. Therefore, on February 27,
2014, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine was the only legitimate
authority in Ukraine at that time, given the resignation of
the government and the President's self-removal from
exercising his functions, and restored the 2004 Constitution
(approved by 386 votes out of 450), recognized that Viktor
Yanukovych removed himself from his constitutional duties
through unconstitutional means by 386 votes, including 140
votes from the pro-Yanukovych Party of Regions, and set the
early elections of the President of Ukraine on May 25, 2014
(328 votes).
That was 328, a vast majority of members of their Congress, of their
Rada, voted for that.
According to Article 112 of the Constitution of Ukraine of
2004, in case of early termination of powers of the President
of Ukraine, the functions of the President of Ukraine shall
be carried out by the speaker of the Parliament until a new
President is elected and inaugurated, the only legitimate
supreme authority in Ukraine is the Verkhovna Rada of
Ukraine.
The Verkhovna Rada is their Congress.
The Rada elected its new speaker, Mr. Oleksandr Turchynov
(by 288 votes), who acts as the President of Ukraine until
the elections, and appointed Mr. Yatsenyuk as the Prime
Minister (by 371 votes). These actions were made in full
compliance with Ukrainian laws.
That is over three-quarters of the membership. As the American people
listen to what is happening there, you are watching a country trying to
hold its government together. It was like at the beginning of our
Republic when we weren't quite sure exactly how it was all going to be
put together, but we were trying mightily to create a republic.
However, even after the Ukrainian Congress did that, Russia did not
recognize these changes and considers the former President, Viktor
Yanukovych, its legitimate President, despite the votes of the
Parliament, the highest standing body in the Nation of Ukraine.
Producing a piece of paper purporting to be Mr.
Yanukovych's letter asking Mr. Putin to send Russian trips to
Ukraine, the Federation Council of Russia, upon Mr. Putin's
request, approved such a decision.
Some of us who are old enough to remember, remember what it was like
living with the Soviet Union, a Soviet Union that invaded its
neighbors, a Soviet Union that moved its tanks across Europe, a Soviet
Union that killed over 14 million of its own people. There are some
Americans old enough to remember that.
Now, the former President of Ukraine, Mr. Yanukovych, who stole from
his own people--those are my words, not the Ambassador's--
Mr. Yanukovych is no longer the President of Ukraine,
particularly after his escape from Kyiv on February 22, 2014.
Therefore, none of his statements have any significance under
either Ukrainian or international law. But in any way, even
if the legitimate President of Ukraine called upon a foreign
country to intervene with its armed forces in Ukraine, such a
statement would also be worth nothing, because under the
Constitution of Ukraine, Article 85, only the Verkhovna Rada
of Ukraine, its Congress, can approve decisions on admitting
units of armed forces of other states to the territory of
Ukraine. The Rada clearly stated it had not made any such
decisions.
Seeing that Ukraine is determined to pursue its European
course, Russia, under the completely trumped up pretext,
invaded Crimea with its armed forces.
People of Hungarian-American ancestry understand what it is like to
be invaded. People of Polish-American heritage understand what it is
like to be invaded. People of Lithuanian, Latvian, Estonian heritage
understand what it is like to be invaded by the Big Bear. There are
plenty of American people who understand what the Ukrainian people are
facing right now.
The Russian forces are seeking to establish complete
control over Ukraine's military facilities in Crimea, trying
to block and disarm Ukrainian military garrisons and border
guard bases, blocking airports and ships. The Russian troops
and armored vehicles are moving uncontrollably around Crimea,
one of Ukraine's states, and numerous Russian military planes
and helicopters violated Ukrainian airspace.
Russia's power far outweighs Ukraine, which is nearly defenseless
facing this massive force, and yet, Ukrainian soldiers have hunkered
down in army bases, in air control stations, trying to stand up as they
are surrounded; what courage. What courage.
By countless provocations, Russian military is seeking to
instigate an armed conflict and replicate in Ukraine the
Abkhazia and South Ossetia scenario. However, Ukrainian
servicemen act with utmost restraint and don't react to such
provocations, but there's a threat that Russia may engineer
provocations against its own troops, and blame them on
Ukraine.
Don't forget, Russia's President was head of the KGB, their secret
police. He knows these techniques well.
There is also an ongoing accumulation of Russian equipment
on the Russian territory in close proximity to the border of
Ukraine in the Kharkiv, Luhansk, Donetsk and Chernihiv
oblasts.
What does that mean?
These actions may indicate preparedness of the Russian side for
possible intervention into the Ukrainian territory across the land
border.
The military intervention is accompanied by a huge outburst
of fabrications. I can assure you that Russian-speaking
citizens of Ukraine enjoy the same rights and freedoms as
other citizens of my country. Nobody has ever forbidden,
forbids, or will forbid the use of the Russian language, as
the Russian propaganda tries to demonstrate.
In fact, if you go to Ukraine, people speak many languages. They
speak Ukrainian, they speak Russian, some speak a combination. Some
speak Polish as well. Some speak German. There are many languages
spoken in the nation of Ukraine.
As of today, there is no proof of any violations of Russian
minority rights in Ukraine; there were no appeals to the
relevant Ukrainian authorities, neither from those allegedly
affected nor from Russia's officials. In accordance with the
Memorandum of Understanding between the Parliamentary
Commissioner on Human Rights of Ukraine and the Ombudsman of
the Russian Federation in case of such appeals to the Russian
side, they are transferred to the Ukrainian Ombudsman.
The actions by the Russian Federation constitute an act of
aggression against the state of Ukraine. Russian Federation
brutally violated the basic principles of Charter of the
United Nations obliging all member states to refrain from the
threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or
political independence of any state.
What has happened is serious.
Ukraine in the strongest possible terms protested such
actions, but Russia officially rejected Ukrainian proposals
to hold immediate bilateral consultation (under article 7 of
the Treaty on Friendship, Cooperation, and Partnership
between Ukraine and the Russian Federation of 1997).
Again, another treaty violation.
Russia's actions pose a serious threat not only to the
sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, but also to
the peace and stability in the whole region. Moreover,
Russian's action provoke a disbalance in the international
security system, and can lead to violations of the regime of
international nuclear nonproliferation on a global scale.
When in 1994, Ukraine became a party to the
Nonproliferation Treaty and voluntarily surrendered the
third-largest nuclear arsenal
[[Page H2290]]
in the world, it did so exclusively under certain conditions.
These conditions envisaged granting security assurances to
Ukraine by the five nuclear states. On December 5, 1994, the
United States, the Russian Federation, and the United Kingdom
signed the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances to
Ukraine. The French Republic and the People's Republic of
China support the memorandum by signing separate
declarations.
Ukraine has thoroughly implemented its commitments under
the Nonproliferation Treaty and has taken and fulfilled
additional obligations by getting rid of all of its
stockpiles of highly enriched uranium.
{time} 1945
Today, we witness the situation when the Russian Federation
attempts to undermine the NPT regime not only by violating
the Budapest Memorandum, but also by violating the
Nonproliferation Treaty, which clearly states in its preamble
that ``States must refrain in their international relations
from the threat or use of force against the territorial
integrity or political independence of any state, or in any
other manner.''
Nonadherence by one guarantor state--the Russian
Federation--to its commitments under the Budapest Memorandum
by the military invasion in Ukraine creates a situation when
the threshold states may consider international legal
instruments insufficient to ensure security, territorial
integrity and inviolability of their borders.
We rely on the commitments contained in the Budapest
Memorandum of 1994 and the Charter on a Distinctive
Partnership between NATO in Ukraine, as well as the U.S.-
Ukraine Charter on Strategic Partnership and other bilateral
documents.
Ukraine is asking the world community to pay attention.
We need help from the guarantor states, the United Nations,
NATO, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in
Europe--
Who, by the way, have been denied access on repeated attempts to
enter Crimea unarmed to observe, Russia has denied them entry.
--the European Union, all civilized nations to protect our
sovereignty and territorial integrity by all available means
and to prevent a war which would shatter peace in Europe and
will have grave and irrevocable consequences for peace and
security on a global scale.
Ambassador Motsyk goes on:
The aggression must be stopped, and we rely on the strong
and unified position of the global community.
Military units deployed from Russia must leave the
territory of Ukraine immediately, and those belonging to the
Russian Black Sea Fleet must return to their barracks. Armed
gangs that came from Russia must also immediately leave
Ukraine.
Crimea is an inalienable part of Ukraine, with citizens of
all ethnic backgrounds.
All issues should be resolved through negotiations. There
is no alternative to a peaceful and diplomatic solution of
the crisis. We hope that wisdom will prevail.
We need America's help, and we count on it.
Sincerely yours,
Olexandr Motsyk
Ambassador of Ukraine to the United States
I also want to say that there has been some conjecture in the news
that we have heard the President of Russia say that Crimea really
doesn't belong in Ukraine because, back in the 1950s, when there was a
Russian leader by the name of Nikita Khrushchev, that he got drunk one
night and he kind of consigned Crimea to Ukraine by accident--by
accident--because he wasn't thinking.
There are also very interesting facts contained in a book published
in Moscow in 2003 entitled ``Ukraine is not Russia.'' Do you know who
it was written by? It was written by the former President of Ukraine,
President Leonid Kuchma.
In chapter 14 of that book, President Kuchma devoted 13 pages to
trace the history of Crimea and Ukraine. He called it the ``Crimean
knot.''
The former President said--when he discusses the politics around the
transfer of Crimea to Ukraine in 1954, he says the then-transition to
Ukrainian administration after Ukraine became independent and how he
dealt with separatist forces during his tenure as President.
Kuchma maintains that the transfer of Crimea from Russia to Ukraine
came in response to petitions from the Crimeans themselves, who felt
Moscow was too far away and insufficiently responsive to their everyday
concerns, where their own country, their own capital of Kiev, was
likely to be more attentive, particularly on issues of water and other
utilities; so they could provide for Crimea better than Moscow, located
far, far away.
Crimea then, Kuchma writes, was a desert and frontier land. He is
referring back to the post-World War II period, particularly after the
devastation of World War II.
That area was just violated and leveled to such an extent. It is hard
for people in the West who have never experienced that to fully
accommodate what happened there.
The residents believe Ukraine would be a better fit administratively,
so he says--President Kuchma who had headed that country--the story of
a drunken Nikita Khrushchev ceding Crimea to Ukraine as a gift is a
fairytale. Those are his own words.
In 1954, right after Stalin's death--and what a butcher he was--
Khrushchev hardly had the unbridled authority to make such unilateral
decisions. At the time, he was vying for power inside his own country.
The actual act of transferring Crimea to Ukraine was signed by the
head of what was called the Presidium, Kliment Voroshilov, not
Khrushchev.
So the President of Russia maybe didn't read history, I don't know;
but the point was the transfer to Ukraine came in 1954. It was a
consequential date, and it has remained in Ukraine as part of that
region for the entire second half of the 20th century and the first
decade of this century. I thought it was important to put that on the
Record.
I also wanted to say, as a Member of Congress, I am so very, very
proud of the work that has been done by the Verkhovna Rada, the legal
authority in Ukraine that is holding that Nation together. They are our
counterpart. They are a legislative branch of their government, just as
we are here.
We for many years now, since 1999, have had a parliamentary exchange
with Ukraine, founded and signed by all of our Members, with the former
speaker of their Parliament, Mr. Oleksandr Tkachenko, and our Speaker
here for many congresses back, Speaker Dennis Hastert. That agreement
lives today.
Over the last decade and a half, we have had many parliamentary
exchanges. We have had teleconferences. We have had journeys by
Ukrainian parliamentarians here and American Members of Congress there.
We believe that the collective intelligence of Ukraine is contained
in that Rada. We are very proud of the work they are doing, and we want
to continue working with them.
Our agreement says that we want to build upon the strategic
partnership between the United States and Ukraine, first established in
1996, and that our parliamentary exchange would serve as a conduit in
further developing and continuing economic and political cooperation
between our two countries.
The types of discussions that we have held--and will continue to do
in the future--will encompass economic relations, trade, space
exploration, health care, the environment, agriculture, natural
resources, and any other matter important to the promotion of close
ties between the United States and Ukraine.
This is a moment for more robust engagement with the Parliament of
Ukraine and our own Congress. The idea is that we can learn from one
another, we can be mutually supportive, and we know how important
legislative bodies are to nations that actually expand freedoms, rights
of free speech, rights of assembly, rights of free press, rights of
free expression of religion, and we are very proud to be partnered with
the Verkhovna Rada.
I would also like to read this evening from an excellent article that
was written for The New Republic by Yale scholar Dr. Timothy Snyder,
the author of a recent bestseller called ``Bloodlands: Europe Between
Hitler and Stalin,'' during World War II. It is incredible work.
But in this particular article, he talks about where Putin is
vulnerable, where his soft spots are. He states at the beginning of the
article:
In dispatching troops to Ukraine, Russia has violated
international law, flouted multiple treaty commitments, and
set the stage for a European war.
It is right that the American people are paying attention; it is
right that we are using our power to try to put the bear back where it
belongs and to try to move the situation to stability. The price of
poor diplomacy, I think, would be catastrophic.
In this article, Dr. Snyder ends by saying:
[[Page H2291]]
Russian propaganda derides Europeans as fey and helpless,
and we too often tend to agree. But the European Union does
have instruments of influence. Its greatest power, of course,
is its attractiveness to societies on its borders, such as
Ukraine. But even where membership is not an option, and the
European Union faces unambiguous hostility, it can act.
Russia's very contempt for the European Union might force
Europeans to undertake a more active foreign policy and to
take responsibility for their neighborhood.
The United States has to use our power to help push the situation in
that direction.
I just wanted to ask if our dear colleague from Iowa, does he have
his own Special Order, or does he wish to join in this Special Order?
Congressman King of Iowa.
Mr. KING of Iowa. I very much appreciate the gentlelady for yielding
to me. I have a few topics I intend to bring up in the subsequent hour.
I want to thank the gentlelady for raising this topic and for the
significant information that has been delivered here with regard to
Ukraine, the Russians, and the political scenario that we are in.
I am contemplating what this means to the world. I will say, Mr.
Speaker, that I am more troubled than many about the circumstances that
have unfolded off of the Black Sea.
I have watched as Putin set up the Olympics. It looked like part of
it was for self-glorification. When I think about what this means
politically, much of the world is looking at Putin, thinking, well,
look at all of the $50-plus billion you invested in the Olympics, and
now, you see the world opinion now has turned against you when you had
all of that good will that was garnered at the Sochi Olympics.
I think it is a little bit different perspective from where I sit,
that is that the component of this is true, but I don't think Putin
cares about world opinion. I think he cares about how much hegemony he
can deliver from the seat that he has. I think that the good will that
came among the Russian people, his popularity numbers had to go up.
Remember, this is a man who went through a difficult contentious
election in 2012. There were demonstrations in the streets in multiple
places around Russia. The tension that was there, as any leader, his
hold on power can't just be by force and fear alone, there has to be
some support that is there.
I believe that the Olympics actually helped Putin and gave him the
support base at home that would allow him to pull off an invasion--an
illegal invasion of the Crimea.
I don't think he cares about what we think. I don't think he cares
what the President thinks, Mr. Speaker. I don't think he cares so much
even what the European Union thinks, as long as they continue to buy
gas from him and keep his economy going, but I think that was a
component.
The next thing is that I have watched him for a good number of years,
and perhaps not with the attention to detail the gentlelady from Ohio
has delivered here tonight, but I have long concluded that Vladimir
Putin is committed to restoring, to the extent that he can in his time,
the old Soviet Union.
I think he sees this as a giant geopolitical chess game. I would
think back at the time in 1984 when then Ronald Reagan's ambassador to
the United Nations Jeane Kirkpatrick stepped down as ambassador to move
on with her career.
I remember picking up on page 3 or 4 of the newspaper a little tiny
article there that mentioned it. It wasn't any examination, but it said
a little quote that I think she was very well known for, Jeane
Kirkpatrick.
{time} 2000
We were in the depths of the cold war at the time, I would add, and
she said: What is going on in this cold war between the United States
of America and the Soviet Union is the equivalent of playing chess and
Monopoly on the same board. The question is: Will the United States of
America break the Soviet Union economically in the Monopoly component
of the game before the Soviet Union checkmates the United States
militarily?
That was the contest. That was a contest as Reagan and Thatcher saw
it. That was the contest as far as Pope John Paul II saw it, I believe.
We know how that turned out at least in the temporary. The strength of
the economy of the United States and our ability to continue to develop
more and more technology--to put SDI up in order to restore our
national defenses--became the deciding factor. The Soviet Union could
no longer keep up with the United States, and the Soviet Union couldn't
keep up with the free world. The juggernaut of our economy overwhelmed
the managed economy of the Soviets. Of course, Gorbachev was a player
in this, and we had glasnost and perestroika. So I think he saw that he
couldn't hold it together anymore, and to the extent that he cooperated
with Lady Thatcher and President Reagan, we saw the worm turn of
history.
I hold in my office a piece of the Berlin Wall. That is framed in my
office, and I have had it since 1989. Excuse me. Actually, it was on
September 12 of 1990 that that piece was chiseled out of the wall for
me. I didn't get to do that myself. That piece of the Berlin Wall
represents a piece of the Iron Curtain, itself. The Berlin Wall was the
physical structure of the Iron Curtain that Winston Churchill described
at Fulton, Missouri, in 1948. The Iron Curtain was drawn by, I believe,
the finger of Winston Churchill, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Joseph
Stalin, whom the gentlelady has mentioned, at Yalta, on February 11,
1945, when we didn't know how World War II was going to turn out.
The Allies got together when we were allied with the Russians, and
they drew a line across the map. On the east side of that line, they
were going to live under the Soviet Union, under the iron fist of
communism. On the west side of that line, people were going to live and
be free, and the destinies of hundreds of millions of people were
determined at Yalta. It is curious to me that Putin has invaded and
occupied Crimea, which includes Yalta.
One day, I hope to stand on that real estate and look out across the
bay where that decision was made. It was a momentous time in history,
and it began the domino effect of the military invasion and occupation
of free country after free country. It spilled over to the east--into
Korea, Southeast Asia. I have long believed that, had we held a
different position--a stronger negotiating position--and if we had
insisted with Stalin that we were not going to hand the Eastern Bloc
countries over to him, we might have ended up with the map that we see
today rather than the map that was so hard fought through the cold war.
Think how different it is.
Now I would ask, Mr. Speaker, that when people think about this--and
the gentlelady from Ohio and I discussed this in some of the very
engaging conversations we have had--think about how the Iron Curtain
was constructed, defined at Yalta on February 11 and 12 of 1945, and
how that line moved when the Berlin Wall came down in November 1989 as
each of the Eastern Bloc countries stepped up and grasped their
freedom. I think of the people by the tens of thousands standing in the
square in Prague, rattling their keys in the square at Prague. Over
time, they rattled their keys into, essentially, a bloodless revolution
that brought about the freedom of the Czechs for the first time in
decades. That kind of desire--that heart for freedom--washed across
Eastern Europe. It actually washed across Russia for a time. There was
a time that I said that freedom echoed all across Europe and all the
way to the Pacific Ocean. I believed that for a while, Mr. Speaker.
Of course, we don't believe this today because the Russia that is
ruled under Putin isn't the Russia that the Russian people believed
they were going to get when the Soviet Union melted down and imploded,
and that became what we thought for a time--hoped for a time--was the
end of the cold war. Now I fear that it has relaunched and restarted.
Yet we should look at this map of where the new Iron Curtain is. It is
at the border of Russia. It doesn't go west of the border of Russia,
and it should not be allowed to creep west of the border of Russia.
That is what I believe the gentlelady and I are committed to working
towards--to restoring the strength and the prosperity of the people who
live free and who give the inspiration to those who do not to live as
we do, as a free people.
I very much appreciate the gentlelady.
[[Page H2292]]
Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I thank Congressman King for being here this
evening, also for attending the briefing this afternoon and for
participating fully in that effort.
As you were speaking, I have a piece of the Berlin Wall in my office.
I knocked it off with a hammer in 1989, and I have it framed, and it
will be there for the people of my region forever. It is all framed,
and it is labeled in memory of that incredible moment.
What we learned during that period of time, post World War II, was
that we have to maintain our resolve. I say this to the people of
Ukraine that we will not forget you, and if liberty-loving nations use
their collective power, change is possible, that change for the better
is possible. So, for those who have fear and trepidation, know that
there have been models of states before.
Take Hungary, which was invaded in 1956. I can remember Cardinal
Mindszenty, from my own denomination, being locked up. When the Russian
tanks came into Budapest, Cardinal Mindszenty became a symbol of
freedom for the whole world. He was held in the U.S. Embassy. They gave
him a closet there, and I actually saw it when I was traveling in
Budapest. He became a symbol in the West for defiance against the
regime, and our government played a role in that. Cardinal Mindszenty
was not an American. He was a Hungarian. He was a Roman Catholic
prelate. He risked his life, and he never came out of that Embassy. He
became a symbol.
If we look at what happened in the fifties and the sixties in Poland,
as labor union members began to demonstrate and be killed, Father Jerzy
Popieluszko lost his life in standing up for their right to have a
better way of life, and, ultimately, Pope John Paul II became a Pope
from inside the Iron Curtain. We saw how religious leaders struggled
with the people to give them full voice. It is just so historically
compelling and from another realm, from an advanced realm of where the
human soul seeks to bring a better way of life to people who seem to be
fighting against the odds. They don't have a lot of guns and weapons
and nuclear weapons and battleships at their behest, but there is a
spirit that attends to those who want to build a better way of life. In
standing with the people and in thinking with the people of Ukraine, we
hope we embody that spirit.
We were graced with the presence at the National Prayer Breakfast
recently with the head of the Orthodox Christian congregations of
Ukraine's Patriarch Filaret. We also had other leaders from the Greek
Catholic, the Baptist, the Jewish denominations in Ukraine. I have this
hope that as the Easter and Passover season approaches that the
religious leaders will find a way to invite the world community that
wants so very much for the people of Ukraine to be free, that we will
find a way to pray for their future together. We hope the religious
leaders of Ukraine invite us. I would love to be in that procession.
What a place for the world community to be in this Easter-Passover
season.
There were Muslims and imams who stood in the square in Kiev; there
were Orthodox; there were Baptists; there were Catholics; there were
Christian leaders; there were union leaders. What courage. They had no
weapons. The weapons were all around them, but they stood their ground.
The power of that message is not lost on the people of Ukraine. It is
not lost on her neighbors. Frankly, it is not lost on Russia. It is a
great power to stand with the spirit of those who want to be free and
to find a way to do that, to find a peaceful way to do that.
The Russian Government has never known freedom. They have never had a
free election. They have no concept of how to run a free society. I
first traveled into that region in 1973, trying to find the shattered
remnants of our family, and the further I got--the further we drove--we
ended up, I remember, going through then-Czechoslovakia as we entered.
We were the only civilian car on the road. Every single vehicle on the
road was either a little, white delivery truck or a military truck. I
can remember our beloved mother, Anastasia, and I were sitting there in
the car, and I was driving.
The further we got as we headed toward Prague, the military soldiers
would lift the tarp up on the back of the trucks and look at us--these
two women, driving in this orange car with a Western license plate. We
must have been a real curiosity, and completely unarmed as they checked
you before you went over the border. I remember going over that
border--and the gun turrets and the barbed wire--as we proceeded east
and how our luggage and our car was examined at every border. The
further we got, the more lonely it became until we were the only
vehicle on the road as we entered Ukraine for the first time, crossing
the border at a place called Uzhhorod, and the Soviets making us wait 5
hours at the border so they could take our car apart. It was just a
little car. We had just two suitcases. They couldn't believe we were
Americans. They thought we would have brought seven trunks. They looked
under the car. They held us at the border until it was night. There
were no streetlights, and there were no traffic signs.
We had to find our way from Poland to Lviv, the major city on the
western side of Ukraine. In riding over the roads, which had huge
rocks, I thought, boy, we are going to get a flat. There were no gas
stations. I mean, there was nothing. There was no electricity. We just
drove into the wilderness in trying to find that town. When we finally
got there, which was very late at night, I saw this little sign called
``In-Tourist.'' That was where they allowed guests or foreigners to
stay.
I said to Mom: This must be the place.
It was dusty. There was nobody. There was nobody on the streets, and
there were no vehicles. There was just this tiny, little sign in the
window.
I went in. There was one desk clerk and one gentleman who was dressed
in an elevator operator outfit. He didn't speak any English, and I
didn't speak his language. He signaled to me that he wanted me to take
the car. He was in the car, and we drove it to the Lviv Opera House,
which was in complete disarray. I mean it wasn't fixed up like it is
today. The car was then seized. It was put behind those closed gates,
and I never saw it again until we left the country. So we had to go
everywhere on foot, and we were watched everywhere. We were trying to
find the pieces of our family. Our grandparents had come to America 100
years before.
I remember how grim it was. I remember people didn't laugh a lot.
They didn't have a lot to eat. We tried to find our relatives. We had,
through relatives in Poland, tried to notify the village from which our
grandparents came. We stayed in the hotel for 3 days, and we thought,
well, nobody is coming. Then our mother, who spoke Polish and who could
understand Ukrainian and Russian, heard our name on the third day. Here
people had been trying to find us for 3 days. We were the only people
in the hotel, and they were told that we weren't there. I can remember
how awful that was. Of course, the room we stayed in was up on the
second floor of a building now that they call the St. George Hotel, but
then it was just the In-Tourist Hotel. They stationed a very large
woman outside our hotel door there, with a table and a water bottle,
and she knew whether we were coming or going or who came in, and there
was a listening device in the wall. There were no curtains on the
windows, and there was no hot water. I just remember how sparse it was.
{time} 2015
I am probably in Congress today because of what I experienced back
then and the understanding I came to have of what life was like there
and how difficult it was. I can't go into it all this evening, but I
learned about the suffering of the people firsthand.
I think one of the shocking experiences I had was how poorly the
Soviet government treated its veterans. They asked me for wheelchairs,
they asked me for crutches. I couldn't believe how little respect they
had for their own people.
So when I see Vladimir Putin invade Ukraine and invade Crimea, he has
no respect for the people there.
We got into the villages. You could only go to certain approved
villages in those days. I found that in the village of our grandparents
they had to build an outhouse for us to visit, with this little tiny
set of stones going back to the outhouse. Americans say, What? I said,
Yes. Their life was so basic.
I thought I would never eat a potato again in my life because all we
ate was
[[Page H2293]]
potatoes with lard on top for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and
tomatoes that had been canned. They gave us the best they had.
I thought, So this is communism.
The life of the ordinary person is so pitiful. They had no fresh
water. I got deathly ill. There were no doctors. You couldn't get
medicine. I learned what dysentery was. I learned what unsafe food was.
I learned how the relatives, including one of my great uncles, had been
tortured and sent to work camps. They called them gulags. His brother
died there. I began to understand the full price that families pay who
live under those kinds of systems.
So President Putin has no clue to what a free society really means.
So much unneeded suffering.
We have this moment in history to make a difference. I know the
American people are considering how to make that difference. Freedom-
loving people around the world are as well.
I find the judicious and firm acts of President Obama and Secretary
Kerry to be very constructive. America can't be the babysitter for the
world. On the other hand, there is a conscience that rises in freedom-
lovers, and, thinking together, America will make the right decisions,
with her allies around the world, to right this situation and to allow
those who want their liberty, after paying such an egregious price, to
have that moment in their own history.
I see our dear colleague from New York, Congresswoman Carolyn
Maloney, who is appropriately attired this evening in full Ukrainian
spirit, has joined us.
Welcome.
Mrs. CAROLYN B. MALONEY of New York. Thank you so much, Congresswoman
Kaptur, for your leadership and for organizing a briefing earlier today
for Members of Congress with head leaders from the State Department on
the actions that are happening, and for your leadership in passing H.
Res. 499 today, which condemned the violation of Ukrainian sovereignty,
independence, and territorial integrity by military forces of the
Russian Federation. We appreciate very much your making that happen and
helping us to pass that resolution.
Once again, the Russians have rattled their sabers and tightened
their grip on the Ukraine. In the past 24 hours they have seized a
Ukrainian naval base. Even though the Constitution declares Crimea to
be an integral part of Ukraine, the pro-Russian regional authorities in
Crimea continue to sever links to Ukraine's capital today, canceling
incoming flights from Kiev. They have also run out of town any of the
monitors that have come from the United Nations or the independent free
world. Flights to and from Turkey also have been suspended.
The Russians have threatened to confiscate Western assets and refuse
to even speak to the Ukraine's interim prime minister on the phone. The
interim prime minister has found $80 billion missing--even loan
guarantee money. This Congress needs to work together to find that
money and return it rightfully to the Ukrainian people.
Yanukovych, the disgraced former President, did the Russians' bidding
and appealed to Ukrainian military units to refuse to follow the orders
of the new interim authorities.
Once again, today, the Russians ignored international norms, calls
for restraint, and all the cries for justice for all those who were
gunned down in Independence Square.
Congresswoman, are you aware that there has been no action to punish
the people who killed community leaders and others in Independence
Square? Eighty-two people were murdered.
My constituents have held vigils. They have memorials that they have
constructed. In their churches they have pictures of every single
martyred hero and heroine, with their stories. Yet no one has been held
accountable for that crime against decency and humanity of killing
innocent people.
They have ignored Ukrainian sovereignty, treaties, and the rule of
law, all in an effort to reestablish a disgraced petty tyrant whose
secret life of obscene opulence included--this is hard to say--gold-
plated toilets--that is what they are saying on the Internet--along
with pictures of all of his zoos and his house and all kinds of things
where he wasted the money of the Ukrainian people on wasteful things.
On the other hand, the Ukrainians have already done the right thing
for the world around them. In 1994, they signed the Budapest Memorandum
on Security Assurances and willingly gave up the third-largest
stockpile of nuclear weapons. They are a peace-loving people. With the
peaceful stroke of a pen this eliminated a far greater threat to world
peace than North Korea and Iran combined.
The key thing the Ukrainians were promised in return was security
assurances against threats or use of force against the territorial
integrity or political independence of Ukraine. The U.S. and Russia,
Congresswoman, were signatories to that statement.
President Obama has made it clear that America will stand with the
Ukrainian people. We are all watching everyday on television what is
happening, and what has struck me the most was the scene where the
Russians were shooting in the air and shouting at the Ukrainians, and
they marched peacefully towards them. One general called out: America
stands with us.
That is true. America stands with peace-loving people around the
world and for democracy. We so often take for granted the freedoms, the
liberties, the democracy that we have that others are struggling for
around the world.
Tomorrow, the Ukraine's interim prime minister is scheduled to meet
President Obama at the White House here in our country. The White House
has announced visa restrictions on Russians and Crimeans who are
threatening the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine. The
President is working with America's allies to craft economic sanctions
that will punish and isolate the architects of this aggression.
Secretary of State John Kerry has traveled to Kiev to mourn for the
fallen in Independence Square and to bring $1 billion in American loan
guarantees and pledges of technical assistance. We overwhelmingly
passed the $1 billion loan guarantee without a cap here in our
Congress. It was an important vote. We all stood with the Ukrainians.
Now it is time for Congress to make it clear that we stand with the
Ukrainian people. The resolution we passed today is a good start--
condemning the violation of Ukrainian sovereignty, independence, and
territorial integrity by military forces of the Russian Federation.
To paraphrase the Ukrainian anthem: Their persistence and toils
should be rewarded. Let freedom's song resound.
We should be asking our friends in Russia, What is their word worth?
What is their signature worth on any document, on any treaty, or on any
contract? What is their word worth?
I would like to invite the distinguished Congresswoman to join me
this Saturday with the Ukrainian community on Roosevelt Island, named
after FDR, who went to Crimea for Yalta and spoke of the four freedoms:
freedom of want, freedom of religion, freedom of democracy, freedom of
speech. These freedoms are what the people in the Ukraine are fighting
for, longing for, working for.
We are going to gather at the Four Freedoms Park in Manhattan to pray
with, to be with, and to stand with the Ukrainian people who are
bravely fighting as we speak for their freedoms, for their
independence, for American values that they want as their values.
America stands with them. The American people are standing with the
Ukrainians.
I thank the gentlelady for having found the Ukrainian Caucus here in
Congress, of which I am a member, and also for having crafted
resolutions and so many statements in their support and helping to
organize in a bipartisan way. Because this country is united. We are
speaking with one voice, Republicans and Democrats, in support of the
Ukrainian people.
I thank the gentlelady for her magnificent leadership.
Ms. KAPTUR. I thank Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney of New York for
taking time out of a very busy day to work way over time tonight and to
be here and to join our plea for the people of Ukraine. Thank you for
your leadership in the Ukrainian Caucus, and thank you for wearing a
peasant blouse, which has a long, deep history in Ukraine.
Ukraine breadbasket to Europe breadbasket to the world--now the
[[Page H2294]]
third largest exporter of grain, despite all of the hardship that the
corrupt government of that country has placed on their farmers, who
simply want to earn a living from the soil and share their great gifts
with the world. They have faced so many roadblocks.
Thank you for appreciating the artistry and magnificent beauty of
that country and for your steadfast support of liberty both here and
abroad. You have just been a magnificent member. We thank you so much
for coming down here this evening.
As she was speaking about New Yorkers who are going to gather in Four
Freedoms Park in New York City, a home to people from throughout the
world, I wanted to say that there are more Ukrainians living outside
Ukraine than inside its borders because of the tragedies that have
occurred there over the last century and more, particularly because of
the Stalin and Soviet period.
Ukrainians live in Canada, Portugal, Italy, Argentina, and Australia.
The pieces of humanity are strewn across the globe, and as I mentioned
in earlier remarks this evening, millions of her own people were either
starved to death or murdered. They were killed by their own government,
the government of the Soviet Union, which tried to eliminate Ukrainian
culture, Polish culture, the Jewish religion.
Now we are worried about the Tatars in Crimea because they don't
share the majority religion. They are a minority. The history of
tyrannical leaders in that part of the world has, unfortunately, been
to kill those who don't agree with them rather than to create a civil
society in which all views can be expressed, even though we might not
agree with them.
So we worry about the people there. We are trying to be a voice for
them here in our own country--a voice for freedom, not for brutality or
repression. A voice for encouragement, not force alone.
I want to thank Congresswoman Maloney and Congressman King for
joining us this evening.
May God bless America, and may God bless the people and the
legitimate government of Ukraine as she seeks to build a freedom of
liberty and justice for all her people.
I yield back the balance of my time.
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