[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Pages 14805-14823]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



      FOREIGN OPERATIONS, EXPORT FINANCING, AND RELATED PROGRAMS 
                        APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2000

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will now 
proceed to the consideration of S. 1234, which the clerk will report.
  The legislative assistant read as follows:

       A bill (S. 1234) making appropriations for foreign 
     operations, export financing, and related programs for the 
     fiscal year ending September 30, 2000, and for other 
     purposes.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kentucky.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, the committee was provided an 
allocation virtually identical to last year's bill of $12.6 billion. 
Although it is $1.8 billion below the request, I think it effectively 
manages our global responsibilities, and it does so within the budget 
caps.
  For the past few years, the bill has emphasized funding in two 
areas--export promotion and growth in the New Independent States of the 
former Soviet Union. This bill sustains that commitment--in fact, 
expands support for export promotion by $20 million for a total of $785 
million to the Export-Import Bank.
  This year, we have added recovery and reconstruction in Southeast 
Europe to our priority list.
  While I expect the Europeans to bear the lion's share of 
responsibility for reconstruction, we have concrete trade interests in 
regional economic recovery and security interests in promoting 
stability and democracy.
  With funds straight lined, this becomes a zero sum game. We have to 
reach consensus on tradeoffs and priorities.
  There is no question that this will mean reductions in other 
accounts--but it's time to recognize priorities. There are obvious and 
easy cuts that the administration can make. Just as one example, the 
administration has asked for another $70 million for Haiti after 
spending billions in Haiti, with little to show for it. In fact, recent 
press accounts report an increase in drug trafficking through Haiti, 
and we have failed at every turn to restore a legitimate government.
  This is just one example where I think the administration could cut 
back in order to serve more urgent priorities.
  There are others. The request from the administration is redundant in 
the area of peacekeeping. They have asked for funds for a global peace 
keeping initiative, a regional Africa peacekeeping account and the 
Africa Crisis Response Initiative which trains peacekeepers.
  I think we can and should shift priorities. We have just waged a war 
in Europe, and we need to build the foundation for sustaining the peace 
in the aftermath of that war.
  The Balkans Initiative in this bill does three things to serve what I 
see as our long term interests: It rids the region of Milosevic by 
declaring Serbia a terrorist state; we increase funding for stability 
and recovery; and we condition funds to Russia on total cooperation 
with NATO in Kosovo.
  Let me elaborate.
  In section 525, the bill establishes Serbia's status as a terrorist 
nation. With this terrorist designation, the administration cannot 
provide bilateral or support multilateral aid, and Belgrade is stripped 
of protections under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act.
  This in turn, will allow Kosovars to take Milosevic to court for 
damages rendered during his brutal war of ethnic annihilation.
  The administration has complained that this designation is inflexible 
and unreasonable, that Serbia is not the same as the other countries on 
the terrorism list because they don't sponsor groups such as Hezbollah.
  Frankly, I am hard pressed to understand the difference between thugs 
blowing up a village with a car bomb or thugs shelling and burning a 
village to the ground.
  The intent and the impact are the same. In both instances, innocent 
civilians are the targets and the victims.
  The second important change in the bill affects funding. We have 
increased and changed the funding mix to fulfill two goals. We have 
tried to promote refugee confidence to return home, and relieve the 
pressure on the front-line states.
  The administration requested $393 million for Eastern and Central 
Europe which included $55 million for Serbia and $175 million for 
Bosnia.

[[Page 14806]]

  I have taken out Serbia's funds, cut back on Bosnia and added $142 
million for a total of $535 million.
  Of the total the bill earmarks $150 million for Kosovo, $85 million 
for Albania, $60 million for Romania, $55 million for Macedonia, $45 
million for Bulgaria, and $35 million for Montenegro, leaving $105 
million unallocated for other regional uses.
  We have also earmarked funds within the Kosovo account to promote 
internal stability and confidence including the provision of $20 
million to train and equip a Kosovo security force. Again, the 
administration had complained bitterly about this provision on the 
grounds that it arms the KLA at a time when the agreement is seeking to 
dismantle their capabilities.
  There is nothing in the bill which calls for arming or supporting the 
KLA. In fact, the administration has plans to train and equip a police 
force and has estimated that this will cost $25 million. The bill is 
not consistent with the planning underway. It simply earmarks funds for 
a security force which I view as essential to any Kosovar having 
confidence the past will not be repeated.
  Members of the KLA may very well be included in a security force, but 
that is not a decision for us to make. A Kosovo civilian government 
should make all decisions regarding recruitment standards, organization 
and supervision of internal security. Autonomy can not be preserved 
without security--that is just what this $20 million will launch.
  In addition, to strengthen democracy, we have provided $20 million to 
support the development of local government institutions. This support 
should help the Kosovars rebuild independent judicial, legislative, and 
executive branches of self-government, as well as help at the local 
municipal level.
  The United States made a commitment at Rambouillet to support a three 
year period of autonomy which would be followed by some kind of final 
decision on political status. Specifically, the Secretary of State 
pledged to support a referendum on independence if that is the course 
Kosovars chose.
  I think we all hope that a change of government in Belgrade might 
produce conditions which would allow Kosovo to maintain some kind of 
tie with a democratic federation. In the interim, however, Kosovo must 
develop the capabilities and institutions to govern themselves, which I 
believe these funds will support.
  Finally, the bill conditions future Russian aid on total cooperation 
with NATO on peacekeeping. The administration seemed caught by surprise 
when Russian troops marched into and took up positions at the Pristina 
airport. Frankly, I was surprised that they did not take up positions 
along the Belgrade-Pristina road. This move was calculated and 
inevitable--notwithstanding senior officials' attempts to explain it 
was just a few rogue troops.
  If stability is to be restored in Kosovo, the Russian's cannot be 
allowed to maintain a client relationship with Serbia which may lead to 
de facto partition of the country.
  To prevent this outcome, we link Russian aid to the Secretary of 
State certifying that the Russians have not established a separate zone 
of operational control, and that their forces are completely integrated 
under NATO command and control.
  In the last few days, the Secretary of Defense seems to have worked 
out an arrangement that may secure these objectives. We all certainly 
hope so. But, just as the administration was surprised by the dash to 
control the Pristina airport, they could be surprised by difficulties 
in implementing the agreement. We must maintain some leverage to assure 
there is full compliance with the current expectations.
  And, lest anyone doubt the relevance of this leverage, I suggest a 
review of the vote to condition aid to Russia on a withdrawal timetable 
from the Baltics. This was a few years back. Every leader in the region 
called me after the 89-11 Senate vote to congratulate the Senate for 
securing immediate negotiations which produced the desired result.
  In other words, what we did in the early nineties was to condition 
Russian aid on withdrawal of troops from the Baltic countries. Shortly 
after we had that vote in the Senate, the Russian troops were out of 
the Baltic countries.
  Beyond, the Balkans, this bill maintains United States interests in 
the New Independent States of the former Soviet Union and sustains our 
financial commitment to crucial allies ranging from Israel to 
Indonesia.
  I also want to mention the increase in this bill's funding levels for 
the surveillance and treatment of infectious diseases. A recent process 
report noted that children and vulnerable populations are dying at a 
staggering rate of treatable and often preventable diseases. Thanks to 
Senator Leahy's commitment, we are now in our third year of a multi-
year strategy to significantly increase the U.S. commitment to control 
and prevent infectious diseases.
  Finally, let me say that there is no question we could have spent 
more on foreign operations program. Senators Leahy and I have both 
expressed strong support for increasing foreign assistance initiatives. 
However, working together, we have produced a bill which lives within 
the budget caps. It is very similar to the bill we passed in the Senate 
just 1 year ago with an overwhelming bipartisan majority vote of 90-3. 
Senator Leahy and I certainly hope that will be the result again this 
year.
  Before passing the baton over to my friend and colleague from 
Vermont, I thank him, at the beginning of what we think will be a 
rather short debate, for his leadership and cooperation in producing a 
bipartisan bill that went through the Appropriations Committee without 
dissent and we think has widely accommodated the interests of Members 
who take a particular interest in this bill every year.
  We anticipate very few amendments. I will say in advance what I hope 
to do is, sometime before noon, seek consent that all amendments be in 
by a reasonable time today--probably by noon --within an hour from now. 
What I hope we can do is ask for a consent agreement to have all 
amendments filed before noon. There is every reason to believe this 
bill should be handled very quickly, and we hope we will have maximum 
cooperation from other Members of the Senate to do that.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I thank my good friend from Kentucky for 
his comments, and as always, when working on this piece of legislation 
with him, it has been a pleasure, notwithstanding the lack of 
allocations we had.
  I concur with the distinguished senior Senator from Kentucky that we 
should try to wrap this up at a time certain. I will join with him at 
the appropriate time in a unanimous consent request that all amendments 
be filed by noon today. The reason I mention that now is so that, on 
this side of the aisle, people are alerted we will be making a request 
of that nature. I think it can be done.
  With the agreement entered into last night by the distinguished 
majority leader and the distinguished Democratic leader, there is an 
effort to move some of these bills forward so we can get on to the 
question of the Patients' Bill of Rights when we come back after the 
July 4 recess. I urge Senators who have amendments to come to the 
Chamber and offer them.
  This bill was reported by the Appropriations Committee with actually 
no debate and no amendments. One of the reasons, unfortunately, for the 
lack of any debate is the amount of funds in this bill is so far below 
what is needed to adequately fund our foreign policy priorities that 
there is little point in debating it.
  Even if Members want to make changes in the bill, there is no way to 
pay for it. Everything in it is already underfunded. The bill is $800 
million below the 1999 level. It is $1.9 billion below the President's 
request. No one can accuse the President of failing to

[[Page 14807]]

try to protect this country's global interests. Unfortunately, the same 
cannot be said for the Congress. Devoting less than 1 percent of the 
Federal budget to our foreign policy is not responsible.
  What this means is we are unable to meet our commitments--our solemn 
commitments--to the international financial institutions. We did not 
provide any funds for the President's expanded threat reduction 
initiative, to dismantle Russian nuclear weapons, to protect fissile 
material, and pay for other nonproliferation and security programs. We 
spent hundreds of billions of dollars--literally trillions of dollars--
to defend against the threat of the then-Soviet Union.
  We are unwilling to spend a tiny, tiny, tiny fraction of 1 percent of 
that same money now to dismantle some of those nuclear weapons and 
protect the material from them--material that can fall into the hands 
of people who do not have the kind of controls that were imposed at the 
time we were spending hundreds of billions of dollars to protect 
ourselves. It goes beyond penny-wise and pound-foolish; it goes into 
irresponsibility, especially in a nuclear age. I, frankly, cannot 
understand how we have gotten to this point.
  We had to cut funding for many of the programs of special interest to 
Senators, i.e., the Peace Corps. Is there any foreign policy program in 
this country that we can point to with more pride than the Peace Corps? 
Yet we cut that.
  With additional funds, we could do a great deal more to promote 
American exports in extremely competitive foreign markets. Other 
countries that do not begin to have the ability to export as we do are 
spending more money in trying to build up their foreign markets because 
they know that will create jobs, good-paying jobs, in their country. We 
step back and say we do not want to do this.
  We can improve global health at a time when infectious diseases are 
our greatest threat after nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons. 
There is no major infectious disease that is more than one or two plane 
rides away from our shores. And this isn't a case where we are showing 
some great humanitarian gesture to try to stop infectious disease in 
other continents; it protects us. Not only does it protect the people 
there, but ebola plague, a resistant strain of tuberculosis, and any 
other number of things can begin in one country and within hours be in 
a major airport in our country and then in our population. When it gets 
here, we will spend fortunes trying to get rid of it. We will not spend 
pennies in trying to stop it in the first place.
  We should be doing more to protect the Earth's natural resources. 
They are under siege on every continent. Our health and our economy 
depend on a clean environment. Yet we spend a pittance as we see the 
environment continue to degrade, almost as though we think as Americans 
we can look at the borders of our great country and assume that we 
determine the environment for our people just within those borders.
  The environment is determined by the rain forests of the world, by 
the ``desertization'' of large parts of the world, by chemical and 
other dumping in our oceans in other parts of the world. If we want to 
protect us--a quarter of a billion Americans--we ought to be concerned 
about what happens in other parts of the world.
  Half the world is asking for help in building new democratic 
societies, but we have little to offer. For decades, again, we spent 
hundreds of billions of dollars--trillions of dollars--saying we were 
going to stand up for democracy, we were going to stand up against 
communism; we wanted democracy in the world.
  Well, the Berlin Wall has come down. The Iron Curtain has rusted 
through. These countries are saying: Thank God America is there; they 
can help us form our democracy. And we say: When we thought you would 
be Communists, we could spend billions and billions and billions of 
dollars to contain you, but now that you want to be democratic, we 
don't really have even a tiny fraction of that amount to help you 
become democratic, to help you develop courts and a free press and a 
civil system, and on and on.
  We should double or triple our support for international 
peacekeeping, especially in places such as Sierra Leone where NATO 
cannot intervene but the atrocities are far worse. Daily we see it in 
Kosovo. We almost have this thought that if we do not turn on CNN and 
see atrocities, they are not occurring. I suggest that Senators read 
the Intelligence Digest, read the free press, when they do report them 
and think of these atrocities that we could help stop.
  If we do not do anything in these areas, all the areas I have talked 
about, because we save some pennies today by not doing anything in 
these areas, we are saddling future generations of Americans with far 
greater costs, and as we go into the next century, we saddle future 
Americans with a more dangerous and unstable world, a world that is 
increasingly polarized between the very rich and the extraordinarily 
poor.
  I have little doubt that the President would veto a foreign 
operations bill at this level.
  Having said all that, Senator McConnell and I did the best we could 
with the allocation we received. We have tried to allocate the funds we 
had in the most responsible way possible.
  I thank the senior Senator from Kentucky for the bipartisan way he 
worked with me to put this bill together. It has become a tradition of 
the Senator from Kentucky and the Senator from Vermont to work together 
on these issues. I am grateful to him. I think what he has done serves 
the Senate well. I think it serves the American people well.
  Obviously, if I were in Senator McConnell's position, I might have 
done some things differently, just as he would look at some of the 
things I have asked to be put in this bill and are included and do them 
differently. But on the whole, we have worked together to write a 
balanced piece of legislation. In fact, the funds are so tight, the 
balance is so delicate, I cannot imagine how I might accept any 
amendments, Democrat or Republican, to cut or add funds in this bill. 
This is a Rubik's cube, a small Rubik's cube but a Rubik's cube 
nonetheless, we have tried to put together.
  I think we Senators should thank the chairman and the ranking member 
of the full committee, the senior Senator from Alaska, Mr. Stevens, and 
the senior Senator from West Virginia, Mr. Byrd, who did their best to 
give us a fair allocation within the limits they had to work with.
  But if I might, before I yield the floor, mention a couple issues I 
am especially concerned about. One is the Global Environment Facility. 
It is one of the world's leading international environmental 
organizations. It funds projects to protect biodiversity, to prevent 
ocean pollution, to protect the ozone, and to prevent climate change.
  Take a poll of the American people. Ask them how many are in favor of 
just those items. A resounding majority of the American people would be 
in favor of protecting biodiversity, preventing ocean pollution, 
protecting the ozone, preventing climate change. For this endeavor, the 
administration requested $143 million for fiscal year 2000. That 
includes $35 million we owe already in prior year arrears. This bill 
contains just $25 million for arrears, and that is not acceptable.
  Ask the American people if they have a justifiable concern about 
terrorism, and they will say yes. Those of us, the chairman and myself, 
who have access to the most current intelligence of our intelligence 
agencies know that the fear of terrorism is justifiable. The President 
requested $33 million for antiterrorism training programs. Under our 
allocation, we could only provide him $20 million. The request also 
included $10 million for a new antiterrorism program to help developing 
countries strengthen their border control systems--again, because the 
terrorism that may show up in those developing countries is a plane 
ride away from our shores. Even though the President's antiterrorism 
initiative is a good one, we cannot include any funds for it. Not that 
we don't want to

[[Page 14808]]

fund these programs; the money is not there to do it.
  There are a lot of other programs I could mention that need 
additional funds. Hopefully, before this session is over, we may get a 
revised allocation that will allow us to go into some of these areas. 
But right now I think we should act on the bill to move the process 
forward.
  Again, I salute the chairman and ranking member of the full 
committee, the distinguished Senators from Alaska and West Virginia, 
for pushing so hard to go forward. The fact that the distinguished 
senior Senator from Kentucky and I have the working relationship we do, 
I think, helped us move forward with this. We should go forward with 
the process. Hopefully the other body will start moving on theirs. I 
think we could complete action on this bill in a very few hours. 
Senators who have amendments should not delay to offer them.
  As I said earlier, to preserve the delicate balance of this bill, I 
expect to be opposing amendments that do not have suitable offsets.
  With that, I yield the floor. The Senator from Kentucky and I are now 
the humble servants of the Senate, ready to start the sausage grinder 
forward. Hopefully, we can end up with a product very quickly.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kentucky.
  Mr. McCONNELL. I thank my good friend from Vermont for his 
cooperation in developing this bill on a bipartisan basis. I agree with 
him that without the allocation that Senator Stevens and Senator Byrd 
provided for us, we couldn't have even done this well. I do think that 
even with this, some would argue inadequate allocation, we can meet our 
responsibilities around the globe. I believe we have done that in this 
bill.
  Now the Senator from Kansas is here and has an important amendment to 
be offered.
  Let me just mention to all Members of the Senate, Senator Leahy and 
I, at about 10:30, are going to propound a unanimous consent request 
asking that all amendments to this bill be submitted by noon, which we 
think will help the Senate dispose of this measure in a timely fashion.
  Mr. President, seeing the Senator from Kansas here, who has an 
amendment to offer, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas.


                           Amendment No. 1118

    (Purpose: To amend the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 to target 
 assistance to support the economic and political independence of the 
           countries of the South Caucasus and Central Asia)

  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, I thank my colleagues, the Senator from 
Kentucky and the Senator from Vermont, for allowing me to bring forward 
this amendment. At this time, I rise to offer an amendment to the 
Foreign Operations Appropriations Act, and I send the amendment to the 
desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Kansas [Mr. Brownback] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 1118.

  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (The text of the amendment is printed in today's Record under 
``Amendments Submitted.'')


                Amendment No. 1119 To Amendment No. 1118

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the amendment to 
the desk and ask for its immediate consideration, on behalf of myself 
and Senator Abraham of Michigan.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Kentucky [Mr. McConnell], for himself and 
     Mr. Abraham, proposes an amendment numbered 1119 to amendment 
     No. 1118.

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On Page 9, line 3, strike all after ``(c) Restriction 
     through line 12 States.''.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas is recognized.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, I rise to address the underlying 
second-degree amendment and to talk about the overall amendment itself 
and the area of the world with which we are dealing.
  This amendment is an issue that has been heard in front of the 
Foreign Affairs Committee, both this Congress and last, and has passed 
this time by a voice vote of the Foreign Affairs Committee. It passed 
by a majority vote in the last Congress. It deals with an important 
region of the world, and it deals with a difficult policy issue for the 
Senate and for our Government to consider.
  The underlying bill itself is called the Silk Roads Strategy Act. It 
deals with eight countries, and it provides an overarching policy 
towards these countries in the south Caucasus and central Asia. 
Specifically the countries are Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakstan, 
Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.
  I realize those are not common names of countries that people across 
the United States perhaps banter around, but I think they do know and 
recall with some knowledge the Silk Road, the old Silk Road made 
legendary many years ago, discovered and traversed by Marco Polo and 
many others who traveled throughout the region of central Asia.
  It was really at that point in time the bridge; the Eurasian bridge 
was developed and brought commerce from Asia to Europe and from Europe 
to Asia. We are seeking to reinitiate this Silk Road, a new Silk Road 
that would have an economic corridor along with a freedom corridor in 
central Asia and the south Caucasus.
  You can see this region of the world. I wish this map were a little 
clearer. I hope Members can see where this region of the world is 
caught. These are all countries in the former Soviet Union. They are in 
the south of the former Soviet Union; they are recently independent 
nations. They had some independence before, but these are just recently 
coming out from underneath the rubble of the fall of the Soviet empire.
  They are caught between world global forces that seek to have them 
under their control. The Russians continue the desire to have an 
unusual influence, would be the best way to put it. The Iranians sit 
right here and seek to have a greater influence in the region. They 
seek to dominate most of these nations that have a Muslim-based 
population. They seek, the Iranians, to radicalize and put governments 
in place that are militant fundamentalist governments. China then, off 
to this side of the region--what we are seeking to do is to create an 
area of democracy, an area of free enterprise, an area of independence 
free from these world powers that seek to dominate them, in a group of 
nations that seek to be united with the West, again, in a Eurasian 
corridor of commerce and freedom. That is the new Silk Road Strategy 
Act. That is what this bill is about.
  Lest we forget and just look at it as a geographic area, as important 
as this region is, I hope we will look at the people in this region. We 
are talking about nearly 72 million people involved in these countries 
of the Silk Road. You can look at them: the Armenian population of 3.4 
million; the Azeri population of 7.8 million; on down, Uzbekistan being 
the biggest with over 23 million people yearning to be free, yearning 
to be associated with the West, yearning not to go back under Russian 
dominance or to be put under Iranian dominance or Chinese dominance, 
but yearning to be free and associated with the West. That is what this 
bill is about.
  This is a sanctions lifting bill. It lifts a particular sanction, 
sanction section 907 that has a set of provisions limiting any sort of 
assistance, any sort of work of the United States with Azerbaijan, 
which is also a key country for this corridor, and it doesn't lift the 
sanctions. It merely provides a national interest waiver. So this 
doesn't lift it.

[[Page 14809]]

The President still has to say it is in the national interest of the 
United States to waive this sanction, and then he has the authority.
  So it simply provides that authority to the administration, which is 
in line with the Freedom Support Act, which we originally passed to 
support these newly independent countries that came about from the 
Soviet empire falling. This act authorizes assistance for all these 
countries, specific economic assistance, development of infrastructure 
assistance, border control assistance, as well as assistance in 
strengthening democracy, tolerance in the development of civil society.
  Authority in this bill to provide assistance for these countries of 
the south Caucasus and central Asia is in addition to the authority to 
provide such assistance under the Freedom Support Act, but it does not 
provide any new resources. It simply allows us to offer these resources 
and assistance to these countries bilaterally and multilaterally. We 
can provide assistance programs to the entire region, working it in a 
package and saying to these countries: You are better off if you will 
work together and bond together to be able to stand before the forces 
that are seeking to dominate you once again.
  Mr. President, I think the window of opportunity for the United 
States to effect positive change in this region will only be open for a 
short period of time. I think that is the very critical part of this 
bill and why we need to have this debate and pass this issue now.
  The window is short. I want to show you some of the activity that is 
taking place in this region. I mentioned the militant fundamentalists' 
efforts taking place to seek domination of most of these countries that 
have a Muslim-based population.
  This is a chart of Iranian worldwide export of terrorism and 
fundamentalism that we are putting up here. I want to highlight this 
region that we are talking about. Of the eight countries we are talking 
about, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan 
have Iranians operating in this region. Afghanistan is operating here, 
seeking to put these countries under militant fundamentalist control. 
They are doing this today.
  As recently as 2 months ago, the President of Uzbekistan had an 
assassination attempt that was put forward by militant fundamentalists 
who seek to have him removed. He provides mostly a secular Muslim 
government. They said we want him out and we want a militant 
fundamentalist government in here, and we are going to do what we can, 
including trying to assassinate him. They are trying to destabilize the 
Fergana Valley in this area. My point is, look at this map. It looks 
similar to the map I just put up here, the countries of the Silk Road. 
The Iranians are funding this effort. They are going into the camps 
here and funding the populations in this area. They are doing this 
today. Members can check this. This is happening.
  If we want to let these countries slip off and go into the militant 
fundamentalist camps so we have more places to fight terrorism and more 
countries we have to fight against that are willing to spawn hatred 
against the West, let's fail this bill, and with all due respect to the 
Senator from Kentucky, let's pass his amendment. We have a disagreement 
about this particular amendment, section 907. I think it is critical 
and important that we pass and eliminate this bilateral sanction that 
we have against Azerbaijan, which is much of the gateway for the flow 
of democracy and freedom throughout this region. Time is of the 
essence.
  In my view, the single best way to consolidate our goals in the 
region is to promote regional cooperation and policies that will 
strengthen the sovereignty of each nation. Each of these countries has 
its own individual needs. However, many of the problems in the region 
overlap and are shared, and a number of common solutions and approaches 
can apply. That is why we have put together this overarching Silk Road 
strategy. This region has generally taken a back seat to U.S. foreign 
policy. We have generally deferred to Russia and to Iranian policy and 
said we are going to let these drift along. The problem with the drift 
is that people are going to feel the power vacuum. It is being fueled 
by the Iranians and pushed by the Russians and other outside influences 
that don't seek for them to have their freedom.
  We have eight countries, as I noted earlier, most of which have 
secular Muslim governments, that are fighting to stave off the Iranian-
style Islamic extremism, which are looking westward, and at great risk 
to themselves, they have considerable economic ties with the West--and 
I want to note as well, with Israel.
  Many of these countries in this region have historic and ancient 
Jewish populations existing there as well; living, surviving, thriving, 
but if you put in these anti-Western militant fundamentalist, those 
populations, Jewish populations are going to be run out and these 
countries are not going to be having good relationships with Israel.
  These countries are recovering from 70 years of Soviet domination. 
They need our help in all spheres, including human rights. No one is 
suggesting that these are Jeffersonian democracies yet. There is a lot 
of pessimistic talk about the prospects for democracy in this region. 
All of these countries have human rights violations.
  At any given point in time, some of the human rights violations may 
seem worse than others. Here is our choice. Do we engage and try to 
make what difference we can? Or do we ignore and let the region drift 
without us, becoming either violently anti-Western, anti-American, or 
become, once again, an extension of Russia, China, or Iran? It is a 
pretty clear, simple choice. They seek our support.
  Now, on the point of human rights--because I think a lot of people 
will say there are human rights violations in this region and we really 
ought to watch out for that and we should not support these areas. 
Again, I point out that this is a waiver authority to the President. He 
still has to certify and it will have the same standards as other human 
rights issues. Recently, we had the Israeli Minister for Trade and 
Industry, Natan Sharansky, a well-known international figure on human 
rights, here in Washington, together with the Foreign Minister of 
Uzbekistan. Mr. Sharansky's reason for being here was to make one 
point, which I thank him for making.
  He said:

       Look at the human rights situation and weigh this against 
     the importance of the threat that is facing us. It is very 
     important to engage and continue to encourage a positive 
     process and the way to do this is to strengthen the role we 
     are playing in the region.

  He supported and endorsed this Silk Road Strategy Act in the region.
  I want to look particularly at the second-degree amendment that my 
colleague from Kentucky put forward. I have immense respect for the 
chairman of the Foreign Operations Subcommittee. He did excellent work 
on the overall bill, but we have a difference of opinion on section 
907. I want to go specifically at this issue.
  My overall amendment would provide a Silk Road Strategy Act for the 
entire region, providing a waiver authority in section 907. The second-
degree amendment leaves the rest of the language but does not provide 
the national interest waiver on section 907. That is a key part of this 
bill, and that is why I oppose the second-degree amendment of my good 
colleague from Kentucky and my colleague from Michigan, Senator 
Abraham, as well. We have a dispute on this. I want to go right at that 
issue of section 907.
  With the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Congress, in the fall of 
1992, adopted the Freedom Support Act. This was designed to provide 
financial and technical assistance to the newly independent states, 
those of the former Soviet Union. I want to put that map back up here, 
if we could, so people can have that in mind. It was to aid them on a 
path toward democratic and market reforms. Because of the then ongoing 
conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the enclave Nagorno-
Karabakh, Armenian supporters were successful in including language in 
section 907 singling out Azerbaijan--the only former Soviet republic so 
treated--for sanctions. I will put up here a

[[Page 14810]]

map of that region so you can see specifically what this area looks 
like. This is the Armenia and Azerbaijan area and the Nagorno-Karabakh 
region, which was in dispute, and this was in 1992, mid-1993, and late 
1993.
  In 1992, at that point in time, we passed the Freedom Support Act and 
Armenian supporters got narrow, bilateral sanctions against Azerbaijan 
put in place, saying we think Azerbaijan is treating Armenia wrong, 
blockading it. Therefore, we want section 907, which removes the United 
States from providing any assistance to Azerbaijan. Bilateral 
sanctions, some of which have been lifted--the chairman of the 
committee has lifted portions of these, but not all have been lifted. 
We provide waiver authority for the lifting of these bilateral 
sanctions. That was 1992. The only former Soviet republic so treated 
was Azerbaijan. The 907 sanction prohibited the ability of the U.S. 
Government to provide direct bilateral assistance to Azerbaijan until 
the President determined that demonstrable steps had been taken in 
ceasing hostilities and lifting the embargo against Armenia. A cease-
fire has been in place for the past 7 years since that time period.
  Peace negotiations under the auspices of the OSCE group are ongoing.
  To me, it makes no sense whatsoever to continue these 907 sanctions. 
Proponents of retaining 907 argue that the restrictions should remain 
in place until the Azerbaijan embargo against Armenia is lifted. In 
point of fact, however, it is Armenia's ongoing occupation of Nagorno-
Karabakh and the surrounding territory. Armenia currently occupies 
about 20 percent of Azerbaijan in violation of international law. Both 
the OSCE and the U.N. have condemned this occupation.
  This is the region on the map they are occupying against the OSCE and 
U.N. ruling. They both have said this is an international law 
violation, that Armenia is occupying 20 percent of Azerbaijan. This 
functionally prevents the opening of the borders between the two 
countries.
  In an attempt to end the stalemate, the OSCE advanced a proposal 
calling for Armenia to withdraw from the occupied land in exchange for 
the reciprocal opening of rail and pipeline facilities by Azerbaijan. 
Azerbaijan has accepted the proposal. Armenia has rejected it. This 
would be pulling back from a 20 percent of lands, and then opening up 
the rail and pipe corridors. Azerbaijan accepted it. Armenia has not.
  The imposition of 907, I think, was a bad idea in 1993. It was 
adopted over the strong objections of the Bush administration, and its 
repeal is strongly supported by the Clinton administration.
  For the United States to continue unilateral imposition of sanctions 
against Azerbaijan--that is what we have--does not make sense from 
either a geostrategic-political point of view or an economic point of 
view.
  This is much of the corridor for the Eurasian bridge that is going 
through Azerbaijan.
  The energy potential of the Caspian is one facet of Azerbaijan's 
strategic significance to the West. The broader issue of the timing and 
development of the Iranian transit corridor and the sovereignty of the 
individual republics of the South Caucasus is also at stake.
  This provision--I might note, as well, the Silk Road strategy--is 
strongly supported by all the countries in the region outside of the 
Armenians. I think it would be a great benefit to Armenia as well.
  Continuing 907 is an impediment to the improved truce between the 
United States and Azerbaijan and the entire region. It undermines the 
ability of American companies to secure their substantial investments 
in the region, and prevents the U.S. Government from being a truly 
honest broker in the peace negotiations.
  Repealing of section 907 would allow for commercial and technical 
assistance to aid in the development of infrastructure, trade, pipeline 
projects, and to further development of democracy so they don't fall 
into the hands of the Iranians or the Russians.
  Further, with the ongoing political turmoil in Moscow, removal of 907 
would allow Azerbaijan to participate in a partnership for peace and 
broader security programs, as well as market reform and democracy-
building initiatives necessary to promote political stability in this 
potentially volatile region.
  Some may suggest this is not the time to do this on 907. I don't know 
of a better time other than 907 having not been put on in the first 
place. It doesn't lift the sanction. It provides a waiver authority for 
the President to do it.
  Some may say, well, this is at a particularly susceptible time in the 
peace process. I don't think that is accurate. The last real peace 
initiative was in 1997, calling for Armenia's withdrawal from the 
occupied territories in exchange for normalization of trade with 
Azerbaijan. This was rejected by Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.
  Unlike other provisions of the Freedom Assistant Act, I want to point 
out that section 907 does not provide for a national interest waiver. 
What we are doing here is making section 907 be in line with the rest 
of the Freedom Assistance Act in providing a national interest waiver.
  The final point I want to make before yielding the floor for a 
discussion is, again, I point out my deep respect for my colleagues 
from Kentucky and Michigan who are opposed to the overall national 
interest waiver on section 907. We just have a differing point of view 
on this.
  But the issue is, we are talking about a region of the world--a 
Eurasian corridor--that has had historical roots in the old Silk Road. 
They know how to relate with one another, and they are in a tough 
neighborhood. They have the Russians bearing down on them with undue 
economic and other influence, and the President of Georgia has had 
several assassination attempts where the assassin fled to Russia.
  Georgia wants this bill very much. They have undue influence from the 
Iranians, who are providing aid to many of these terrorist groups 
operating in the region and fomenting discontent because they know they 
are inherently weak at this time. The Chinese have a certain amount of 
influence, but it is really between the Russians and the Iranians. And 
they seek to be connected with us.
  If you pull 907 out of this and its interest waiver, and you say, OK, 
we are going to do everything but 907, as the amendment provides, you 
block this part of the key corridor of providing economic trade, 
developmental assistance, and, through much of the region, its commerce 
and its activity will flow through Baku and Azerbaijan. This is a 
critical part of it. That is why, with all due respect, I oppose the 
second-degree amendment, ask my colleagues to vote against that and to 
support the underlying amendment without amendment, and pass this 
critical issue that we really need for U.S. foreign policy.
  I thank my colleague.
  I thank the President.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kentucky.


                          Filing of Amendments

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, this has been cleared on both sides of 
the aisle.
  I ask unanimous consent that all first-degree amendments to be 
offered to the pending appropriations bill must be filed at the desk by 
1 p.m. today, and, of course, other than the managers' amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I want to commend my friend and 
colleague from Kansas, first of all, for taking an interest in a part 
of the world that very few Members of Congress probably can find on a 
map. I share his view that this is an extraordinarily important part of 
the world.
  As the Senator from Kansas pointed out, all of these countries are 
part of what used to be the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union very early 
on, in the wake of the end of the cold war, said: This is our ``near 
abroad,'' sort of their version of the Monroe Doctrine, their 
territory, and we were not thereby expected by them to be in that area. 
Nevertheless, the Russians don't make foreign policy for the United 
States. And

[[Page 14811]]

we are in the process of trying to develop our own strong bilateral 
relations with each of those countries.
  The Senator from Kansas has been in the forefront of advocating the 
importance of the United States having its own bilateral relations with 
each of those countries. I commend him for it because he has been very 
farsighted in understanding the significance of this part of the world 
to the United States.
  I think all other aspects of the Silk Road proposal are good. Where 
we differ, as the Senator from Kansas indicated, is on that portion of 
the Silk Road called the ``repeal of section 907.''
  Reasonable people can look at this and reach different conclusions. 
What the Senator from Kansas would like to see--I am perfectly 
confident in what I would like to see--is a settlement of this dispute 
between Azerbaijan and Armenia.
  For our colleagues who have not paid a whole lot of attention to this 
part of the world, Nagorno-Karabakh is an almost entirely Armenian 
enclave, as the Senator from Kansas pointed out, within the territory 
of Azerbaijan connected by an area called the Lachin corridor. It is 
this area which is in dispute.
  As the Senator from Kansas pointed out, Armenia won the conflict that 
occurred with the breakup of the Soviet Union, and it occupies not only 
Nagorno-Karabakh but the other territory adjacent thereto, which is 
Azeri.
  The sad aftermath of that war is large refugee camps, which I 
visited, and the Senator from Kansas visited as well, of displaced 
people stuck in these refugee camps now for some 6 years, with the 
hopelessness and despair that develops in that atmosphere, reminiscent 
of an entire generation of Palestinians who have grown up in these 
camps in the Middle East. It breeds a fanaticism, a terrorism, that is 
an enormous unsettling aspect of life in that part of the world. 
Nothing could be better for that area than getting that dispute 
settled. I am sure the Senator from Kansas and I agree on that.
  The question is, How do you best get there? The Senator from Kansas 
mentioned the Minsk Group. I am not very optimistic that the Minsk 
Group is going to bring about a settlement. The Minsk Group, in 
addition to including Azerbaijan and Armenia, includes Russia, France, 
and the United States. I think the Senator from Kansas and I probably 
agree that the Russians like things the way they are around there. 
There are Russian troops in all of those republics still, with the 
exception of Azerbaijan. Some are there by invitation, some are not by 
invitation. I think the Russians enjoy keeping the Caucasus 
destabilized, with all due respect to our occasional friends, the 
Russians. The French, who most of the time are our allies, I think 
frequently are difficult in these negotiating situations.
  These are the players: The French, the Russians, the Americans, the 
Armenians, and Azeris. Nothing has happened, and I am not optimistic 
something will happen until the United States thinks this is important.
  Think of the money, time, and effort we have spent in the Balkans 
over the last 3 or 4 years. I happen to be in the minority in our party 
who think we have a national interest in the Balkans. I wish we had the 
interest in the Caucasus that we had in the Balkans, because we might 
have settled the dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan. We have not 
had that, and nothing has happened.
  The question before the Senate is, What kind of condition makes peace 
more or less likely to occur? Reasonable people can look at the same 
set of facts and reach a different conclusion.
  The Senator from Michigan, Mr. Abraham, and I have offered this 
second-degree amendment because we believe that section 907 --even 
though it has been constantly stripped down--is important to give the 
Azeris some incentive for ultimate settlement. It is the view of the 
Senator from Kentucky that the lifting of 907 ought to be part of the 
final settlement between Armenia and Azerbaijan. To give it away in 
advance of final settlement makes final settlement less likely.
  I completely respect the observations of the Senator from Kansas. As 
I said, reasonable people can differ about this. I think removing the 
last element of leverage in advance of the final settlement is not a 
step in the right direction.
  We will have at some point today--although no time agreement can be 
entered at this point--a decision on this. I hope my colleagues will 
consider whether or not lifting this sanction in advance of a final 
settlement of the dispute is helpful in achieving a final settlement of 
the dispute.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Enzi). The Chair recognizes the Senator 
from Michigan.
  Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, I lend my support to this amendment. I 
realize the chairman and ranking member have a number of other issues 
they want to discuss. I am not sure at what point we will reconvene on 
this second-degree amendment.
  I clearly associate myself with the Senator from Kentucky, both as a 
cosponsor of the amendment as well as with his comments today. I share 
his view that the appropriate role for the United States at this point 
is not to decide this matter by taking this action--which I think would 
be premature; I think there still remain serious issues in play that 
would argue against changing the status of section 907 at this point. 
My view is that we should move forward with the balance of this 
amendment.
  I, too, applaud the Senator from Kansas, who I think has done great 
work in this area. I fully support his efforts as well as the 
contribution he makes by raising the section 907 issue. Hopefully, it 
puts all of our policymakers in the United States more in focus on the 
issues.
  If we are to include the Silk Road Act or a major portion of it in 
this legislation, it should be included without inclusion of section 
907. I am willing to speak on this at a later point if we extend the 
debate.
  I appreciate the efforts of the Senator from Kentucky, and I look 
forward to working with him, as well as the Senator from Kansas, in 
hopefully resolving this.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, I hope we can get a time agreement so 
we know when we will actually vote on this particular issue.
  Reasonable people may differ, and will differ, on what the U.S. 
policy should be. Azerbaijan--section 907--is the only country from the 
former Soviet Union that we have unilateral sanctions against.
  We are not lifting those sanctions by this amendment. We are allowing 
a national interest waiver to the President which is the same as the 
rest of the Freedom Support Act. In that sense, we will put 
Azerbaijan--which is at the gateway to much of the Eurasian platform as 
far as connecting the countries together--on an equal footing with all 
of the countries that came from the rubble of the former Soviet Union.
  We seek peace in this region. It is important that we have a 
settlement in this region. This particular set of unilateral sanctions 
on Azerbaijan has been the United States policy since 1992. It has not 
led to peace since 1992.
  We are seeking to create an abundance of activity, on a multilateral 
basis, of all the countries in the region, causing them to work 
together, to lift each other up economically, democratically, and 
regarding human rights, as an area, an entire region, that is 
developing on those principles of a free democracy--free, independent 
status, and human rights.
  To pull this one out--it is a key corridor--the concept of the 
countries working together falls apart. It will not happen. It will not 
happen if we do that. That has been the U.S. policy since 1992. It has 
not led to peace yet between Armenia and Azerbaijan. I don't think it 
will now. If we get these countries to work together, to say, together 
we can support each other, we can grow economically in other ways, I 
think we create the atmosphere for peace to take place. Everybody has 
an interest in peace occurring.
  We are talking about a large set of resources in this area. They do 
have the economic wherewithal to be able to grow and grow together. But 
we have to have them all. You can't pull one of them out and say it 
will not happen.

[[Page 14812]]

  I think the proposal I put forward leads to peace and peaceful 
opportunities in the region. That is why I support it. I am happy to 
talk further about this at a later date if we get a time agreement. 
With all due respect, I disagree with my colleagues from Kentucky and 
Michigan. I think we have the national interest waiver on section 907.
  At the proper time, I will want a recorded vote on this so we can 
have a determination by this body of U.S. policy here.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from Vermont.


                         Privilege Of The Floor

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent Anne Alexander, a 
fellow in the office of Senator Feingold, be granted the privilege of 
the floor during consideration of S. 1233.
  I further ask unanimous consent Natalia Feduschak, an American 
Political Science Federation fellow in the office of Senator Frank 
Lautenberg, be granted such floor privilege during debate and votes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, again I remind Senators we have a unanimous 
consent agreement entered into by the distinguished Senator from 
Kentucky to have all amendments in by 1 o'clock today. I urge him to do 
that. I had hoped we could wrap this bill up at a relatively early 
time.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, I inquire of the Senator from Kentucky, 
what is his desire at this time on this particular amendment?
  Mr. McCONNELL. I say to my friend from Kansas, we are unable to get a 
time agreement on this amendment at this time. It is my intention to 
lay it aside and deal with some other matters. We will keep working on 
it during the course of the day.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. That is certainly acceptable to me. I suggest to the 
Senator from Kentucky, the manager of the bill, I have a second 
amendment dealing with the Sudan I am hopeful we can get worked out at 
some point in time, rather than calling it up. But if we cannot, I will 
seek recognition on that as well later on.
  Mr. McCONNELL. I say to my friend from Kansas, I am familiar with his 
other amendment. It is acceptable to me. If he will keep working on 
that, I think we should be able to get it cleared in the course of the 
day.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. I yield the floor.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, while we are waiting for other Senators 
to come up with amendments, I want to draw attention to an amendment I 
intend to offer if it is not accepted overall. It is an amendment 
entitled ``Humanitarian Assistance for the Sudanese Opposition 
Groups.''
  This is a very simple amendment that would allow us to give food aid 
to the southern Sudanese resistance and also the northern Sudanese 
resistance efforts, food aid only. This is not other forms of aid. It 
is certainly not military aid. But it is food aid to the Sudanese 
resistance movement.
  The language says, and I will provide the amendment:

       The President is authorized to provide humanitarian 
     assistance, including food, to the National Democratic 
     Alliance [That is an overall alliance of the groups in 
     opposition to the government in Khartoum] and the Sudanese 
     People's Liberation Movement, operating outside of the 
     Operation Lifeline Sudan structure.

  That is the simple amendment we put forward.
  I recently led a congressional delegation. Congressman Don Payne from 
New Jersey, Congressman Tom Tancredo from Colorado, and I went to Sudan 
and traveled to southern Sudan and met with the embattled groups that 
have been fighting against the Khartoum government, which is a 
government that was not freely elected. They stood for election in 
1988. They were defeated, got about 18 percent of the vote, and then 
took over the government in a coup in 1989 and have since then been 
operating a terrorist regime in Sudan. It is terrorist internally in 
Sudan and terrorist externally from Sudan.
  They have killed, according to the IS Committee on Refugees, 
internally in Sudan, in the last 10 years, 1.9 million people in a 
genocide and ethnic cleansing the likes of which the world has not seen 
in recent times. This is the worst humanitarian situation in the world. 
That is according to the director of USAID, Mr. Atwood, who testified 
on the issue, on the Sudan--the worst in the world--nearly 2 million 
killed, over 4 million internally displaced. That is the internal 
terrorism of this government.
  This is a government--and this is incredible--that actually allows 
slavery to exist. That is documented. The Baltimore Sun did a series of 
articles documenting this. Christian Solidarity International has 
bought back the freedom of over 6,000 slaves of northern people 
empowered by the Government to go south, kill the men in the village, 
take the women and children hostages, and make them slaves.
  This is a picture taken by one of my staff members at Christmas this 
past year when she was in Sudan. This little boy is probably 11 or 12 
years old. He is holding his arm out in this picture. It actually has 
on it his slave brand--branded slave.
  What the Government in Khartoum does is, they allow people from the 
north to go down as raiders into these communities, and part of what 
they get paid for is the slaves they can take. This is a closer picture 
of the little boy's arm showing the brand mark. They are taken and made 
to be herders, they are taken into sexual concubinage. The slave trade 
exists in the world today at the hands of the Government in Khartoum. 
It is absolutely unfathomable that this continues to occur. That is on 
top of the genocide and the ethnic cleansing that is taking place.
  This is a picture of the civilian bombing that takes place within the 
country all the time. I was in Yei. The hospital in Yei has been bombed 
three times in the last year. They are taking old Soviet cargo planes, 
Antonovs, and they roll bombs out the back. They are indiscriminate. 
They are not militarily significant, but it kills a lot of people. It 
terrifies the people on the ground.
  This is a picture of the hospital that has been bombed.
  This photograph is, again, a civilian target. It has a big red X on 
the top of it, and that is part of the bombing that takes place.
  This picture shows people who are watching for the bombers.
  I put up a quick chart of the atrocities of the Government in the 
north. Remember, this amendment we are going to offer simply allows 
humanitarian aid to the resistance movement. It does not provide arms 
of any nature, but it does provide food aid to the resistance movement 
in Sudan.
  This is what the Government in Khartoum has done. If people are going 
back and forth saying we are taking sides if we provide humanitarian 
aid to the resistance, I point out, the Government in Sudan is a 
terrorist regime as determined by the United States State Department. 
It is state-sponsored terrorism. They have housed Osama bin Laden since 
1997. He stayed in Khartoum.
  Most of the terrorist groups operating in the world have a base of 
operation in Khartoum. The Government in Sudan is supporting terrorist 
movements in three adjacent countries--Congo, Eritrea, and Uganda. They 
are seeking to expand this militant fundamentalism.
  I pointed this out earlier:
  Dead, 1.9 million people. It is the worst humanitarian situation in 
the world.
  An internally displaced population of 4.3 million.
  Last year, they let famine alone kill 100,000 people. Mr. President, 
this is the most incredible thing. Food sat in the

[[Page 14813]]

country, and the Government in Khartoum would not let us fly relief 
planes into the area where they needed it, and the people died. They 
died at the hands of the Khartoum Government because they would not let 
our planes deliver the food aid.
  Enslavement takes place, civilian bombings, forced religious 
conversions, terrorist threats throughout the region. This is the 
Government in Khartoum. This is the Government of Sudan. If Members are 
hesitant to support food aid to the resistance movement, this is 
against whom they are fighting. This is arguably one of the, if not the 
worst regimes in the world for the treatment of its own people and 
attempts to export a militant fundamentalism and spread it throughout 
Africa. They housed the terrorist who tried to kill President Mubarak 
of Egypt. I mentioned the Government in Sudan housed Osama bin Laden.
  This is a simple amendment. Rather than calling it up at the present 
time, I am making my colleagues aware, if it is not agreed to, I will 
be calling this amendment up and asking for a vote on this amendment. 
It is food aid to the opposition groups. It is not military aid. It is 
against the Government that supports the institutions of slavery, and 
it has the worst humanitarian situation in the world. Mr. President, 
100,000 were killed last year. This is the least we can do.
  I see other Members in the Chamber. I do not want to take additional 
time for this. I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from 
Minnesota.


                         Privilege Of The Floor

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Robin 
Goodman and Howard Kushlan, who are interns in my office this summer, 
and John Bradshaw, who is a fellow, be granted the privilege of the 
floor during the debate on this bill.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
pending amendment be laid aside. I say to my colleague from Kentucky, I 
will speak on an amendment I am going to offer just to save us time so 
we can move along today.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank the Chair.


                           Amendment No. 1123

   (Purpose: To combat the crime of international trafficking and to 
                     protect the rights of victims)

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, today I will discuss one of the most 
horrendous human rights violations of our time--the trafficking of 
human beings, which is particularly prevalent among women and children, 
for the purposes of sexual exploitation and forced slavery.
  Earlier this year, I introduced a bill, the International Trafficking 
of Women and Children Victim Protection Act of 1999, which addresses 
this issue. This legislation was cosponsored by Senators Feinstein, 
Boxer, Snowe, Murray, Harkin, and Torricelli.
  Today I am going to offer an amendment, which I will send to the desk 
shortly, to the foreign ops bill, which is basically this piece of 
legislation. If adopted, this amendment will put the Senate on record 
as opposing trafficking for forced prostitution and domestic servitude 
and acting to check it before the lives of more women and more girls 
are shattered.
  Trafficking in human beings is one of the fastest growing 
international trafficking businesses. Women and girls seeking a better 
life, a good marriage, a lucrative job abroad, unexpectedly find 
themselves forced to work as prostitutes or in sweat shops. Seeking 
this better life, they are lured by local advertisements for good jobs 
in foreign countries at wages they could never imagine at home.
  Every year, the trafficking of human beings for the sex trade affects 
hundreds of thousands of women throughout the world. That is hard to 
believe. Every year the trafficking of women and girls for sex trade 
affects hundreds of thousands of women or, for that matter, girls 
throughout the world.
  The U.S. Government estimates that 1 million to 2 million women and 
girls are trafficked annually around the world. According to experts, 
between 50 and 100,000 women are trafficked each year into the United 
States alone. They come from Thailand, Russia, the Ukraine, and other 
countries in Asia and in the former Soviet Union.
  Although trafficking has been a problem in some Asian countries, it 
was not until the breakup of the Soviet Union that a sex trade in that 
region began to flourish. This appalling trade has grown by leaps and 
bounds over the last decade. Trafficking is induced by poverty, lack of 
economic opportunities for women, the horrendous low status of women in 
many cultures, and the rapid growth of sophisticated and ruthless 
international crime operations.
  Trafficking rings exploit and abuse poor, vulnerable women in the 
devastated economies of Russia, the Ukraine, and other countries in 
Central Europe, where women are unable to find jobs to sustain 
themselves and their families.
  As many of you know, I am deeply concerned about what has taken place 
in Russia today. I am deeply concerned about it because I believe what 
happens in Russia, for better or for worse--and I hope it will be for 
better--will crucially affect the quality, or lack of quality, of our 
lives, our children's lives, and our grandchildren's lives. I suppose I 
am also concerned because my father was a Jewish immigrant who fled 
Russia.
  In that country, we know that some 6.5 million women are unemployed, 
and 2.5 million children are not in school but they are in the streets. 
These women and children are vulnerable to international organized 
crime that preys on the jobless, the destitute, the desperate, and the 
naive.
  Upon arrival in countries far from their homes, these women from 
Russia and the Ukraine, and many other countries, are often stripped of 
their passports, held against their will in slave-like conditions, and 
sexually abused. It is just unbelievable that this is exactly what is 
happening. Rape and intimidation and violence are commonly employed by 
the traffickers to control their victims and to prevent them from 
seeking help.
  Through physical isolation and psychological trauma, traffickers and 
brothel owners imprison women in a world of economic and sexual 
exploitation that imposes a constant threat of fear and deportation, as 
well as violent reprisals by the traffickers themselves to whom the 
women must pay ever growing debts.
  Many brothel owners actually prefer foreign women--women who are far 
from help and home who do not speak the language--precisely because it 
is so easy to control them. Most of these women never imagined the life 
of hell they would encounter, having traveled abroad to find better 
jobs or to see the world.
  Many, in their naivete, believed that nothing bad could happen to 
them in rich and comfortable countries such as Switzerland, Germany, or 
the United States. Others who were less naive but desperate for money 
and opportunity are no less hurt by the traffickers' brutal grip.
  Last year, First Lady Hillary Clinton spoke powerfully of this human 
tragedy. She said:

       I have spoken to young girls in northern Thailand whose 
     parents were persuaded to sell them as prostitutes, and they 
     received a great deal of money by their standards. You could 
     often tell the homes of where the girls had been sold because 
     they might even have a satellite dish or an addition built on 
     their house. But I met girls who would come home after they 
     had been used up, after they had contracted HIV or AIDS. If 
     you've ever held the hand of a 13-year-old girl dying of 
     AIDS, you can understand how critical it is that we take 
     every step possible to prevent this happening to any other 
     girl anywhere in the world. I also, in the Ukraine, heard--


[[Page 14814]]


  The Ukraine actually was where my father was born--

       of women who told me with tears running down their faces 
     that young women in their communities were disappearing. They 
     answered ads that promised [them] a much better future in 
     another place and they were never heard from again.

  We have had women from the Ukraine in our office, in face-to-face 
meetings, talking about the awful problem of women and young girls 
being exploited, leaving the Ukraine, coming to countries such as ours, 
and then finding themselves in this kind of situation.
  These events are occurring not just in far off lands but in the 
United States as well. Earlier this spring, 6 men admitted, in a 
Florida court, to forcing 17 women and girls, some as young as 14, into 
a prostitution slavery ring. The victims were smuggled into the United 
States from Mexico with the promise of steady work, but, instead, they 
were forced into prostitution. The ring was discovered when two 15-
year-old girls escaped and went to the Mexican consulate in Miami.
  According to recent reports by the Justice Department, teenage 
Mexican girls were also held in slavery in the Carolinas and forced to 
submit to prostitution. In addition, Russian and Latvian women were 
forced to work in night clubs in Chicago. According to charges filed 
against the traffickers, the traffickers picked up the women upon their 
arrival at the airport, seized their documents and return tickets, 
locked them in hotels, and beat them. This is in our country. The women 
were told that if they refused to dance nude in various nightclubs, the 
Russian mafia would kill their families.
  Further, over 3 years, hundreds of women from the Czech Republic who 
answered advertisements in Czech newspapers for modeling were ensnared 
in an illegal prostitution ring.
  Because the victims of international trafficking are frequently 
unfamiliar with the laws, cultures, and languages of the countries to 
which they have been trafficked, these victims often find it difficult 
or impossible to report the crimes that have been committed against 
them or to assist in the investigation and the prosecution of such 
crimes. Further, victims do not have legal immigration status in the 
countries into which they are trafficked, so the victims are often 
punished more harshly than the traffickers themselves.
  Trafficking in women and girls is a human rights problem. This is a 
human rights amendment that requires a human rights response. 
Trafficking is condemned by human rights treaties as a violation of 
basic human rights and as a slavery-like practice. Women who are 
trafficked are subject to other abuses--to rape, to beatings, to 
physical confinement--which are squarely prohibited by human rights law 
but are happening all around the world. The human abuses continue in 
the workplace in the forms of physical and sexual abuse, debt bondage 
and illegal confinement, and all are prohibited. But the practices go 
on.
  The Universal Declaration of Human Rights recognizes the right to be 
free from slavery and involuntary servitude, arbitrary detention, 
degrading or inhuman treatment, as well as the right to protection by 
law against these abuses.
  The United Nations General Assembly has passed three resolutions 
during the last 3 years recognizing that international traffic in women 
and girls is an issue of pressing international concern involving 
numerous violations of fundamental human rights. The United Nations 
General Assembly is calling upon all governments to criminalize 
trafficking, to punish its offenders, while not penalizing its victims.
  Fortunately, the global trade in women and children is receiving far 
greater attention by governments and nongovernment organizations 
following the U.N. World Conference on Women in Beijing. The 
President's Interagency Council on Women is working hard to mobilize a 
response to this problem. Churches and synagogues, and nongovernment 
organizations are fighting the battle daily, but much, much, much more 
must be done.
  This amendment provides a human rights response to the problem. It 
has a comprehensive and integrated approach focused on prevention, 
protection, and assistance for the victims and prosecution of the 
traffickers.
  I am going to highlight a few of the provisions in the amendment.
  One, it sets an international standard for governments to meet in 
their efforts to fight trafficking and assist victims of this human 
rights abuse. It calls on the State Department and Justice Department 
to investigate and take action against international trafficking. In 
addition, it creates an Interagency Task Force in the Office of the 
Secretary of State to Monitor and Combat Trafficking and directs the 
Secretary to submit an annual report to the Congress on international 
trafficking.
  The annual report would, among other things, identify states engaged 
in trafficking, the effort of those states to combat trafficking, and 
whether their government officials are complicit in the practice.
  Corrupt government or law enforcement officials sometimes directly 
participate and benefit in the trade of women and girls. Corruption 
also prevents prosecution of the traffickers.
  On a national level, as I look to this amendment, it ensures that our 
immigration laws do not encourage rapid deportation of trafficked 
women, a practice which effectively insulates traffickers from ever 
being prosecuted for their crimes. Trafficking victims are eligible for 
nonimmigrant status valid for 3 months. If the victim pursues criminal 
or civil actions against a trafficker or if she pursues an asylum 
claim, she is provided with an extension of time. Furthermore, it 
provides that trafficked women should not be detained but instead 
receive the needed services, the safe shelter, and the opportunity to 
seek justice against her abuser.
  Finally, this amendment provides much-needed resources to programs 
assisting trafficking victims here at home and abroad. We must commit 
ourselves to ending the trafficking of women and girls and to building 
a world in which women and children are no longer subjected to 
horrendous abuses.
  I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.
  I have worked on this bill for a long time with a lot of groups and 
organizations. I believe this will have strong bipartisan support. I 
have tried to respond to a variety of different concerns. I say to my 
colleague from Vermont, as long as he doesn't think this is in the 
spirit of buttering him up, I view him as a champion in human rights 
work. I really believe this is consistent with his work. I think we 
ought to have this kind of response. I thought, in order to save time, 
I would speak on this amendment. I know there are other amendments that 
are on the floor.
  I wonder whether I might send this amendment to the desk so that we 
will have it for consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Minnesota [Mr. Wellstone] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 1123.

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (The text of the amendment is printed in today's Record under 
``Amendments Submitted.'')
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I see my colleague from Illinois. I 
have another amendment that I could introduce, but for now, I yield the 
floor.
  Mr. LEAHY addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, we have several Senators on the floor 
seeking recognition. The Senator from Minnesota, of course, had the 
floor. We are going to take a look at his amendment, which would not be 
in order for a vote right now. I listened to very much of what he had 
to say.
  I am wondering if we could have an agreement that the Senator from 
New Jersey be recognized, the Senator from

[[Page 14815]]

Oregon be recognized, and the Senator from Illinois be recognized next 
in that order.
  Mrs. BOXER. Will the Senator from Vermont add the Senator from 
California?
  Mr. LEAHY. And then the Senator from California. I see the 
distinguished chairman is now on the floor. I am wondering if this 
might kind of expedite things. I do not think any of these Senators 
wish to speak for any great length of time.
  I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from New Jersey be 
recognized for 5 minutes, the Senator from Oregon be recognized for 5 
minutes, the Senator from Illinois be recognized for 5 minutes, and the 
Senator from California be recognized for 5 minutes --
  Mr. WELLSTONE. I wonder whether or not before colleagues speak, I 
could just send this amendment, the second amendment, to the desk so it 
is filed.
  Mr. LEAHY. And then before this begins, that the Senator from 
Minnesota be recognized to send an amendment to the desk for 
appropriate filing purposes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 1124

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The amendment is filed.
  The Chair recognizes the Senator from Kentucky.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I apologize to my friend, Senator 
Leahy. I just walked onto the floor. Are the speakers here in relation 
to the Brownback amendment and the second-degree by myself and Senator 
Abraham?
  Mrs. BOXER. We are.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous consent, the Chair 
recognizes the Senator from New Jersey.
  Mr. TORRICELLI. Mr. President, yesterday the citizens of South 
Florida watched in horror as live television cameras revealed an 
extraordinary spectacle. The hopes of freedom and the great traditions 
of America collided on the open seas with the harsh reality of the 
Clinton administration's arrangements with Castro's government in 
controlling immigration to the United States.
  Six Cuban refugees who fought across the Florida straits came to 
within yards of the coast of the United States of America. Only a few 
feet from their destination, they leaped from the boat and attempted to 
swim to the shores of our country. They did so for the reasons that all 
of our ancestors and hundreds of thousands of other Cuban Americans 
came to the United States--with the belief that they could find freedom 
and security.
  It was with horror, I am certain, on their part, but also by other 
Americans who watched this spectacle unfold as Coast Guard boats 
intercepted the swimmers. Men attempted to swim for their lives and 
were never given lifejackets. Surrounded by Coast Guard boats that 
generated large wakes, imperiling the lives of those who would swim to 
shore, Coast Guard crewmen used pepper spray against some of the 
swimmers. They were then taken into custody in handcuffs. Welcome to 
America.
  It is essential that the Coast Guard, the Department of the Treasury, 
begin an immediate inquiry to revise these procedures to find out how 
this incident could have happened. Handcuffing refugees, using pepper 
spray, not helping those who were endangered on the high seas, 
subjecting them to the wake of large boats, allowing them to stay in 
the ocean for 15, 20 and, 30 minutes without assistance, no matter how 
you feel about Castro's government or immigration, no matter how you 
approach this issue, is not the role of the U.S. Coast Guard. It is not 
the policy of the U.S. Government. This is not how we treat refugees or 
people who are coming to our shores for freedom.
  It reminds us that the problems of Castro's government are not yet 
addressed. This crisis is not yet over. In the last 6 months, Amnesty 
International has reported that the total number of political prisoners 
in Cuba is now 350. In the last 6 months, there has been the arrest of 
four human rights dissidents petitioning their own government to 
recognize basic human rights. In just the last 6 months, the Cuban 
government has now passed laws making it a felony, punishable by 20 
years in jail, to cooperate with the U.S. Government or any of its 
agencies. Things are not getting better in Castro's Cuba. They are 
getting worse.
  As people flee that island for freedom, they deserve more and the 
people of the United States expect more than to have the agencies of 
this government used to continue an oppression, not at the hands of 
Castro but to threaten the lives of these refugees at the hands of our 
own agencies.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous consent, the Chair 
recognizes the Senator from Oregon.


                           AMENDMENT NO. 1119

  Mr. SMITH of Oregon. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, I will be brief. I rise to oppose the McConnell 
second-degree to the Silk Road amendment. I rise as a cosponsor of the 
bill.
  We are constantly called upon in this country to pick sides among 
parties with ancient feuds. The area of the Silk Road, as defined in 
this bill, is an area that has long been beset with communism, Islamic 
fundamentalism, and other interests which, frankly, are inimical to 
U.S. interests.
  Section 907 picks a side. I think it is founded on the best of 
motives but with the worst of results. At the end of the day, if we 
want to be honest brokers in this fight, it does not help us to be 
sanctioning one party at the table.
  This isn't about oil; this isn't about some of the interests of the 
oil companies that want to develop in the Caspian; this is about being 
evenhanded; this is about getting beyond the status quo, which simply 
is not working.
  In my view, it is appropriate to give the President the discretion to 
make a recommendation as to whether or not this sanction should 
continue. If he determines that it is working, fine, leave it in place. 
If not, I fear we will forever be caught up in picking sides on the 
Senate floor in conflicts we cannot ultimately end. I believe the U.S. 
posture in this very sensitive and important region of the world should 
be fair to both sides.
  There are atrocities, human rights violations, on both sides. I wish 
there were just good guys and bad guys; unfortunately, there are plenty 
of both on both sides. In the end, I ask us to take a more evenhanded 
approach, support the Brownback bill and, ultimately, I believe, be 
more effective in this very sensitive negotiation in trying to foster 
peace, trying to foster development, trying to foster democracy in a 
part of the world that has known little of any of that.
  I thank the Chair and yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Chair recognizes 
the Senator from Illinois.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, if there is no objection, I ask unanimous 
consent that the Senator from California, who has asked for 5 minutes, 
go before me and that I then be recognized for 10 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from California is recognized.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I rise in support of the McConnell 
amendment. I thank the Senator for offering his amendment because, 
frankly, without it, a number of us will have problems supporting the 
underlying amendment by Senator Brownback.
  The Brownback amendment addresses a very important issue of 
revitalizing trade in that area of the world, and the problem with it 
is that it gives the President the authority to waive section 907 of 
the Freedom Support Act. The McConnell amendment strikes that portion 
from the Brownback amendment and, therefore, makes it a fine amendment. 
But without the McConnell amendment, I am afraid we are doing some very 
great harm and damage to human rights and to common decency.
  Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act was enacted to place 
restrictions on United States government-to-government assistance to 
Azerbaijan until that country lifts its blockades of Armenia and 
Nagorno-Karabakh.

[[Page 14816]]

  I have very strong concerns about ending section 907, which is 
essentially what we are doing, because we know the administration's 
position on that. Doing that would reward the Azeri Government for 
taking no steps in lifting their blockade.
  The blockade they have put on has prevented the transportation of 
basic human necessities, such as food and medicine, from reaching the 
suffering people of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. I don't believe the 
United States should stand by and allow the Armenian people to live 
with a devastated economy, without a real commitment from Azerbaijan 
that they are taking steps to end the blockade.
  Let me be clear about section 907 and what it does not do. It is not 
a sanction. In fact, the United States has normal trade relations with 
Azerbaijan. Section 907 does not prevent humanitarian aid from reaching 
Azerbaijan. It doesn't prevent the Overseas Private Investment 
Corporation, the Export-Import Bank, and the Trade Development Agency 
from functioning in Azerbaijan.
  The only thing section 907 requires--and that is why I don't 
understand why Senator Brownback wants to, in effect, repeal it--is 
that the Azeri Government ``take demonstrable steps to cease all 
blockades against Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.'' That is not a high 
hurdle to clear. If the Azeri Government cannot even take steps--small 
steps--to end this blockade, I believe it has no right to the 
assistance that will be provided in the underlying Brownback amendment.
  I understand Mr. Brownback's amendment is well intentioned, and I 
enjoy working with him on many issues that affect the world. But 
because it would repeal section 907, I think if he were to accept 
Senator McConnell's amendment, we would have a good underlying bill.
  In closing, I wanted to read into the Record a brief comment made by 
Senator Paul Sarbanes in his minority views that he put into the 
Record. I serve on the Foreign Relations Committee, and I know Senator 
Sarbanes believes strongly in this.
  This is what he said:

       Under current law, all Azerbaijan must do in order for 
     section 907 to be lifted is to ``take demonstrable steps to 
     cease all blockades against Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.'' 
     This is an entirely reasonable expectation, especially given 
     the basic purpose of this bill, which is to promote trade and 
     economic cooperation between the countries of the region.

  He points out:

       For nearly a decade, the government of Azerbaijan has 
     prevented the transport of food, fuel, medicine, and other 
     vital commodities to Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, causing 
     immense suffering.

  So I ask the question of my friend, Senator Brownback--in a 
rhetorical way, since he is not here--why would he want to do something 
that would only increase the suffering? Under the McConnell amendment, 
we cure this problem from his bill.
  Senator Sarbanes says:

       During winters, much of the Armenian population has had to 
     live without heat, electricity, or water. Schools and 
     hospitals have been unable to function, and most Armenian 
     industries have been forced to close down, crippling the 
     economy and producing widespread unemployment and poverty.

  We all want to see progress in the world. We want to see trade and 
jobs created. But we don't want to see more human suffering. I think if 
we go along with the Brownback amendment, without the McConnell 
amendment, we will be doing a disservice to the world.
  I know I have a little time left. I have no further comment, and I 
yield the rest of my time to Senator McConnell.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I commend the Senator from California. 
I think she has it exactly right. The issue is whether, in the absence 
of a peace agreement between Azerbaijan and Armenia, the United States 
will have completely normal relations with Azerbaijan. I would like to 
see normal relations between our country and Azerbaijan. I would also 
like to see normal relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan. If all the 
leverage is removed in advance of an agreement, it seems to most of us 
that it makes the agreement less likely.
  So I commend the Senator from California. She is absolutely correct 
on the merits. We hope the second-degree amendment will prevail.
  Mr. DURBIN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois is recognized for up 
to 10 minutes.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, with my colleagues' indulgence, I ask 
unanimous consent that I may follow the Senator for no more than 10 
minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I have a request on this side of the 
aisle for 10 minutes at that point, and then right after that would be 
acceptable to the Senator from Kentucky.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, let me say at the outset that I agree with 
Senators McConnell and Boxer. Senator Brownback calls for normalizing 
relations with Azerbaijan. Certainly that makes sense. We want to move 
toward the day when we have those normal relations. But we cannot 
overlook the fact that, for over 10 years, Azerbaijan has in fact 
imposed the blockade on Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, at great 
suffering to the people of that region.
  It has stopped the transport of food, fuel, medicine, and other vital 
commodities to Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.
  Our foreign policy is basically premised on the belief that if we are 
going to have normal relations with Azerbaijan, they have to have 
normal relations with Armenia.
  As Senator McConnell said, Senator Brownback has a vision for the 
future that we may share someday, but first we must address the 
concerns that Senator McConnell addresses in his amendment. I support 
him. I think it is a very sensible approach. To waive section 907 in 
the absence of any progress toward lifting the blockade would reward 
the Government of Azerbaijan for failing to remove it.
  Keep in mind that even though we have this section 907 restriction, 
we provide humanitarian and democracy-building assistance to 
Azerbaijan, and in fact the businesses of the United States do business 
there involving a lot of international agencies. But before we really 
normalize relations, let us demand a normalization of relations when it 
comes to the treatment of the Armenian people.
  I don't need to remind anyone in this Chamber of the long and sad 
history of the Armenian people and the genocide which they endured. 
They have asked us to stand by them until they can resolve this 
peacefully. I think the United States is right to do so.
  I object to the approach used by Senator Brownback and fully endorse 
the efforts by Senator McConnell.


funding to send latin american students to the u.s. army school of the 
                                americas

  Mr. President, while the budget caps did not allow adequate funding 
for this bill, I want to complement Senator McConnell and Senator Leahy 
on the bill they have produced within the constraints they faced. I am 
particularly pleased that the bill includes funding for microcredit 
programs, with the expectation that the Agency for International 
Development will spend more for microcredit programs than last year. I 
am pleased that funding for the United Nations Population Fund is 
included in the bill. I am delighted that Foreign Military Financing 
funds for Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania have been increased. These 
additional funds will help the Baltic countries meet their Membership 
Action Plans as they aspire to join NATO.
  This bill contains International Military Education and Training 
(IMET) funds that are used for Latin American students to attend the 
U.S. Army School of the Americas. The school is the Army's Spanish-
language training facility for Latin American military personnel, 
located at Fort Benning, GA. The school is a relic of the cold war with 
a horrendous legacy of teaching torture and assassination. It deserves 
to be closed for what it has taught in the past, what it stands for in 
Latin American democracies today, and what its counter-insurgency 
training at such a tainted institution may lead to in the future.

[[Page 14817]]

  I had planned to offer an amendment to delete IMET funding for the 
school. However, I felt that my colleagues here in the Senate had not 
heard enough about the school, so I will not offer my amendment today. 
I introduced a bill, S. 873, to close the school. Our colleagues in the 
House have also introduced such a bill, H.R. 732, which now has 137 
cosponsors.
  Let me tell you why I think this school should be closed. I think you 
need only to look at the yearbook of the School of the Americas. Let me 
tell you what you will find. It is not surprising that among the 
graduates of the School of the Americas is the top of the list of the 
worst human rights abusers in Latin American current history. Listen as 
I read some of the graduates from the School of the Americas at Fort 
Benning, GA, an institution supported by U.S. taxpayers. These were 
people trained at the expense of the United States to return to Central 
America and lead. Listen to the people included:
  19 Salvadoran soliders linked to the murder of 6 Jesuit priests, 
their housekeeper and her daughter in El Salvador in 1989;
  48 of 69 Salvadoran military members cited in the U.N. Truth 
Commission's report on El Salvador for involvement in human rights 
violations;
  Former Panamanian dictator and convicted drug dealer Manuel Noriega 
and nine other Latin American military dictators;
  El Salvador death squad leader Roberto D'Aubuisson;
  Two of the three killers of Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador;
  Mexican General Juan Lopez Ortiz, whose troops committed the Ocosingo 
massacre in Chiapas in 1994;
  Guatemalan Colonel Julio Alpirez, linked to the murder of U.S. 
citizen Michael Devine in 1990 and Efrain Bamaca (husband of Jennifer 
Harbury) in 1992;
  124 of 247--50 percent--of Colombian military officials accused of 
human rights violations in the 1992 work ``State Terrorism in 
Colombia'', compiled by a large coalition of European and Colombian 
non-governmental organizations;
  Two of the three officers prosecuted by Guatemala for masterminding 
the killing of anthropologist Myrna Mack in 1992, as well as several 
leaders of the notorious Guatemalan military intelligence unit D-2;
  Argentinian dictator Leopoldo Galtieri, a leader of the so-called 
``dirty war,'' during which some 30,000 civilians were killed or 
``disappeared'';
  Haitian Colonel Gambetta Hyppolite, who ordered his soldiers to fire 
on a provincial electoral bureau in 1987;
  Several Peruvian military officers linked to the July 1992 killings 
of nine students and a professor from La Cantuta University;
  Several Honduran officers linked to a clandestine military force 
known as Battalion 316 responsible for disappearances in the 1980's;
  10 of the 12 officers responsible for the murder of 900 civilians in 
the El Salvadoran village of El Mozote; and
  Three of the five officers involved in the 1980 rape and murder of 
four United States churchwomen in El Salvador.
  This school is not the victim of a few isolated incidents of 
wrongdoing by its graduates. This list shows that human rights 
violations are endemic among its graduates, with far in excess of 200 
murderers and other human rights violators on its past rolls.
  Yet last week, when the commandant of the school, Col. Glenn R. 
Weidner, came to brief Senate staff on the school, he said ``it doesn't 
take much to get on this list,'' that has been read in the Senate. I 
would say to the colonel what it takes is murder, rape, and torture. 
And the list is long and convincing.
  I would also say to him that these 225 graduates have been confirmed 
by the Congressional Research Service. I did not include in my bill the 
other allegations of the School of the Americas graduates that could be 
independently confirmed. Can the school claim innocence in the actions 
of its graduates? Many do not think that is possible. For example, just 
a few months ago the Guatemalan Truth Commission report faulted the 
school's counterinsurgency training as having ``had a significant 
impact on human rights violations during the armed conflict,'' a 
conflict that killed 200,000 people.
  How, in the name of democracy, can we keep this school open?
  I am not proposing that we hold U.S. foreign military training 
programs accountable for all of the actions of these graduates. We know 
from experience that people can be brutal with or without training. But 
why in God's name do we continue this?
  Colonel Weidner also said that those wanting to close the school were 
isolationists, opposed to engaging in Latin America. Nothing could be 
further from my point of view. The question is how we engage.
  Let me also say to those who suggest that these comments somehow are 
a reflection of criticism of the military of the United States that 
this school should close. The Army should support its closing. I think 
the men and women in uniform who serve this country do a wonderful job. 
But this school has not produced the kind of graduates for which we can 
take credit and pride. I believe it is an insult to American Army 
officers to have their own country's reputation sullied by an 
institution that has been associated with horrible crimes and human 
rights abuses committed by its graduates.
  We should remove the albatross of their association from them and 
from our country by closing the School of the Americas.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Hutchinson). The Senator from Kentucky.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, is there an amendment pending? I 
believe there is.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. There is an amendment pending by Senator 
Wellstone.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
Wellstone amendment be temporarily laid aside so we may dispose of some 
managers' amendments that have been cleared on both sides of the aisle.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


               Amendments Nos. 1127 Through 1145, En Bloc

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I send the managers' amendments to the 
desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Kentucky (Mr. McConnell) proposes the 
     managers' amendments numbered 1127 through 1145, en bloc.

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendments be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendments en bloc are as follows:


                           amendment no. 1127

       On page 11, line 12 strike everything after the word 
     ``loans'' and through the word ``provision'' on line 22.
       On page 18, line 21, after the colon insert the following:
       ``Provided further, That notwithstanding any other 
     provision of law, of the funds appropriated under this 
     heading, $10,000,000 shall be made available for political, 
     economic, humanitarian, and associated support activities for 
     Iraqi opposition groups designated under the Iraqi Liberation 
     Act (Public Law 105-338); Provided further, That not less 
     than 15 days prior to the obligation of these funds, the 
     Secretary shall inform the Committees on Appropriations of 
     the purpose and amount of the proposed obligation of funds 
     under this provision:''.
                                  ____



                           amendment no. 1128

       On page 7, line 13 strike the language beginning with ``but 
     shall be'' through line 16 ``Appropriations''.

  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I fully support this amendment that is 
included in the manager's package to strike language from S. 1234, the 
foreign operations appropriations bill, which would have suspended the 
availability of fiscal year 2000 funding for the Inter-American 
Foundation until the General Accounting Office completes an 
investigation of alleged civil and criminal wrongdoing by employees at 
the Foundation. I want to thank the managers of the bill and the 
chairman of the committee for their willingness to remove this 
language.
  I think it is important to explain for the record why this language 
was included in the committee-reported bill

[[Page 14818]]

and what led to the amendment to strike.
  Several months ago, the GAO contacted the Appropriations Committee 
asking permission to investigate information provided to their fraud 
hotline regarding allegations of contract and hiring regulatory abuses 
at the Foundation. GAO forwarded a report on these issues to the 
committee on May 20, 1999. During the course of that investigation, 
additional anonymous allegations were made to GAO investigators by 
employees of the Foundation, and the GAO requested permission from the 
committee to brief the Board of the Foundation on those allegations. 
However, the committee initially decided that the GAO should 
investigate these additional allegations, and included language in the 
bill to restrict the Foundation's funding until the investigation was 
completed.
  When apprised of the language included in the bill and the 
committee's intention to direct GAO to investigate these additional 
allegations, I raised the issue with Chairman Stevens and asked him to 
reconsider this approach. After discussing the matter, we agreed that 
additional information on the nature of the allegations should be 
sought in order to determine the appropriate course of action.
  Last week, members of my staff and the Appropriations Committee staff 
met with representatives of the General Accounting Office to discuss 
their findings regarding the administrative investigation which was 
completed on May 20, as well as the additional allegations. Based on 
the information received at that briefing and GAO's characterization of 
the additional allegations as administrative in nature, we determined 
that the more appropriate way to proceed would be to accede to the 
GAO's request to brief the Board of the Foundation on these matters and 
allow the Board members to determine what further action, if any, 
should be taken.
  Chairman Stevens and Chairman McConnell advised me that, by referring 
the matter to the Board, the committee would view this investigation as 
complete, and GAO would not be requested to conduct any further 
investigations of these matters. This amendment, therefore, removes any 
restrictions on IAF funding as well as any language that contemplates 
further GAO involvement in this matter, aside from advising the Board 
of their findings and the existence of additional allegations.
  Mr. President, I fully support the decision to permit the General 
Accounting Office to brief the Board of the Foundation about 
allegations of misconduct at the Foundation. I believe that this is the 
appropriate and normal course of action in this type of matter, and I 
thank Senators Stevens and McConnell for agreeing to refer this matter 
to the Foundation's Board.
  As my colleagues know, allegations of this sort are generally 
referred to an agency's inspector general for investigation and action, 
if necessary. Since the Foundation does not have an inspector general 
at this time, advising the Board or perhaps the Audit Committee of the 
Board (which functions as the Foundation's Inspector General) is the 
appropriate course of action, instead of pursuing a congressionally 
directed GAO investigation.
  In addition, I sponsored and the Senate earlier adopted an amendment 
to S. 886, the foreign relations authorization bill, which requires the 
inspector general of the Agency for International Development to 
function in that capacity for the IAF, as well as the African 
Development Foundation. Hopefully, this will provide IAF with the 
oversight and investigatory authority to discover and deal with issues 
of this sort in the future, if necessary.
  When our staff members were briefed by the GAO, they were advised of 
the specific nature of these so-called ``criminal'' allegations. The 
GAO characterized the allegations as administrative in nature, stating 
that, even if substantiated, these types of activities would very 
rarely draw criminal penalties and would instead be dealt with by a 
request for reimbursement or a reprimand, at most. In addition, it is 
important to know that most, if not all, of these allegations have 
already been reviewed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and their 
investigation found all of them to be unsubstantiated--a conclusion 
which the FBI addressed in a letter to the Foundation's Board Chair 
earlier this year.
  Mr. President, I would never attempt to thwart any legitimate effort 
to uncover and eliminate fraud, unethical activities, or any type of 
misconduct in government or government-affiliated agencies. In this 
instance, however, I an concerned that these allegations about an 
individual at the Inter-American Foundation were designed to accomplish 
one end--the removal of that individual from effective employment at 
the Foundation because of his very successful efforts over the past 
several yeas to bring accountability, order, and legitimacy to an 
agency whose programs had been fraught with waste and abuse.
  The individual involved discovered serious deficiencies and 
improprieties regarding the Foundation's grant-making program and the 
lack of oversight exercised by the Foundation program offers charged 
with overseeing Foundation grant organizations and contractors 
overseas. For example, this individual found that the Foundation had 
made grants to organizations in Ecuador involved in the kidnapping of 
U.S. citizens. This individual also took decisive action when it was 
discovered that the Foundation provided financial support to an 
organization in Argentina that engaged in acts of serious civil 
disobedience, including the seizure of public buildings and the 
blockage of roadways.
  This individual also exposed fraudulent activities of overseas 
contractors of the Foundation, including the extortion of funds from 
Foundation grantee organizations. Finally, he established personnel 
time and attendance policies at the Foundation to correct rampant 
absenteeism and non-performance of duties.
  This individual's successful efforts to make the Foundation's 
employees and Board accountable for their actions and decisions 
involving U.S. taxpayer dollars have caused some of these people to 
engage in a vendetta to remove him from his position at the Foundation, 
or at least minimize his effectiveness in that post.
  Mr. President, regardless of the outcome of the Board's review of 
these latest retaliatory allegations against this individual, I believe 
there should be a thorough investigation of the Board and employees of 
the Foundation to ensure that the above-mentioned activities are no 
longer occurring. I also believe it would be prudent to determine 
whether improper hiring or personnel practices, misuse of government 
funds or equipment, theft or loss of government funds or property, 
conflicts of interest, or other improprieties or mismanagement--
allegations similar to those falsely made against the individual 
involved in this matter--exist anywhere in the organization. These are 
matter that should be reviewed at the earliest opportunity by the AID 
inspector general, who will soon be serving as the inspector general 
for the Foundation.
  Let me serve notice that I will continue to monitor activities at the 
Foundation with respect to the handling of this matter, and I will do 
everything in my power to ensure that the matter is resolved fairly and 
in a manner consistent with the handling of similar allegations in any 
other agency of government.
  Again, I thank my colleagues for concluding the committee's 
involvement in this issue and referring the matter to the Foundation 
for appropriate administrative review.


                           amendment no. 1129

       On page 7, line 22, after the colon, insert the following: 
     ``Provided further, That funds made available to grantees may 
     be invested pending expenditure for project purposes when 
     authorized by the President of the Foundation: Provided 
     further, That interest earned shall be used only for the 
     purposes for which the grant was made: Provided further, That 
     this authority applies to interest earned both prior to and 
     following enactment of this provision: Provided further, That 
     notwithstanding section 505(a)(2) of the African Development 
     Foundation Act, in exceptional circumstances the board of 
     directors of the Foundation may waive the $250,000 limitation 
     contained in that section with respect to a project: Provided 
     further, That the

[[Page 14819]]

     Foundation shall provide a report of the Committees on 
     Appropriations before each time such waiver authority is 
     exercised:''.
                                  ____



                           amendment no. 1130

  (Purpose: To provide up to $5,500,000 to establish an International 
          Health Care Center at Morehouse School of Medicine)

       On page 8, line 6, after the word ``AIDS'' insert the 
     following: ``and including up to $5,500,000 which may be made 
     available to establish an International Health Center at 
     Morehouse School of Medicine''.
                                  ____



                           Amendment No. 1131

       On page 22, line 5, before the word ``Ukraine'' insert the 
     words ``Government of''.
       On page 22, line 6, after ``1999'', insert the following: 
     ``, including taking effective measures to end corruption by 
     government officials''.
                                  ____



                           Amendment No. 1132

       On page 22, line 15, before the period, insert the 
     following: ``Provided further, That of the funds made 
     available for Ukraine, $3,500,000 shall be made available for 
     the destruction of stockpiles of anti-personnel landmines in 
     Ukraine''.
                                  ____



                           Amendment No. 1133

       On page 10, line 10, after the colon, insert the following:
       ``Provided further, That the proportion of funds 
     appropriated under this heading that are made available for 
     biodiversity activities should be at least the same as the 
     proportion of funds that were made available for such 
     activities from funds appropriated by the Foreign Operations, 
     Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 
     1995 (P.L. 103-306) to carry out sections 103 through 106 and 
     chapter 10 of part I of the Foreign Assistance Act of 
     1961:''.

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, the purpose of this amendment is to 
reaffirm that protecting biodiversity is a key goal of our foreign 
policy. It is also to clarify language on page 23 of the Appropriations 
Committee report--Report 106-81, which incorrectly refers to fiscal 
year 1994. The year should have been 1995.
  The United States, the birthplace of the global environmental 
movement, has led the way in supporting efforts to protect the 
incredible variety of plants and animals around the world. Yet because 
of shrinking budgets and changing priorities in Congress and at AID, 
our efforts to preserve the Earth's biodiversity have diminished. The 
consequences of this are profound, for ourselves and even more so for 
future generations. We cannot afford to neglect an area of 
environmental protection that so directly affects the lives of American 
families and American industries.
  AID's biodiversity activities include efforts to save species and 
ecosystems from extinction or degredation. Only 1.5 million of the 
estimated 10-50 million species have even been named and classified. 
Far fewer have been studied for their potential uses to humanity. Yet 
the destruction of natural habitats is leading to 100 extinctions every 
single day. AID also promotes genetic diversity. Genes that could have 
been lost to environmental destruction now improve and protect crops 
all over the world, and especially here in the United States.
  In the United States, we reap the benefits of the world's biological 
diversity every day. Atmospheric pollution is reduced by tropical 
rainforests. Our cattle and crops are crossbred to improve their 
genetic traits. The pharmaceutical benefits alone are amazing. Diseases 
common in this country are cured with medicines that come from plants 
from around the world. The worldwide market for drugs derived from 
plants is $40 billion. Who knows what new species will be discovered, 
leading to medicines that will benefit tomorrow's sick? No one does, 
which is why we cannot let a newly discovered species containing a 
possible cure for cancer, or AIDS, or even the common cold, go the way 
of the dinosaurs.
  AID has led the way worldwide in supporting biodiversity, by working 
effectively with U.S. and foreign nongovernmental organizations, and 
foreign governments. For example, the Philippines, with its coral reefs 
and tropical forests, is one of the most biodiverse places in the 
world. It is also one of the most threatened. But through effective 
management, AID has helped place over 1.2 million acres of forest land 
under community stewardship and away from harm. AID has implemented 
similar projects elsewhere, working with governments to protect their 
own valuable resources.
  Despite successes such as these, our biodiversity efforts are 
threatened. Since 1995, AID expenditures for biodiversity have 
decreased by nearly $50 million, a nearly 50 percent reduction in just 
four years. Much of this decline is due to the steady reduction in our 
foreign aid budget. But even from this shrinking pie, biodiversity gets 
a thinner and thinner slice every year. In 1995, biodiversity spending 
was 5.1% of development assistance expenditures. By 1996 it was down to 
4%. Then in 1998, expenditures were reduced to only 3.3%.
  These disproportionate cuts have devastating consequences. The 
Philippines project I just mentioned will completely run out of funding 
next year. In Madagascar, a country that AID made one of its top 
biodiversity priorities over a decade ago, AID cut its biodiversity 
funding by $900,000. In some ways Madagascar was lucky, because AID had 
originally planned to cut $1.5 million dollars. And this is a country 
that AID says is ``Africa's most important biodiversity priority.''
  Obviously, we have many other development assistance priorities--in 
public health, in education, in family planning, in justice reform, to 
name a few. But we need a more balanced approach. I have spoken out 
more times than I can count in support of more funding for foreign aid. 
Foreign aid not only helps promote American interests abroad, but also 
provides direct benefits here at home. But even given the shrinking 
funds we devote to foreign aid, we must ensure that funding to protect 
biodiversity does not continue to suffer disproportionate cuts. We 
should resume the proportion of development assistance funding for 
biodiversity to the proportion it received in 1995. That is what my 
amendment would do.
  I also want to be very clear about what we mean by ``biodiversity.'' 
We mean ``activities designed to support the conservation and 
sustainable use of biological diversity--biomasses, ecosystems, 
species, or genetic diverity--by identifying needs, by designing, 
implementing and monitoring conservation and management actions; 
through research and training; or through institutional strengthening, 
policy interventions and program development.'' This is consistent with 
AID's definition of these activities.
  Finally, we need to ensure that AID's Office of Environment and 
Natural Resources receives strong support. This office performs a vital 
function in the design, implementation and evaluation of conservation 
activities. Yet funding for it has been cut steadily since 1995, from 
$25.6 million to $6.9 million in 1999. That it totally unacceptable, 
and it seriously undercuts AID's capacity to exert leadership in this 
area.
  Mr. President, I want to commend AID for its leadership in this area. 
I also want to ensure that it continue's to exert that leadership. That 
requires adequate resources, and I intend to work with AID to balance 
the many competing development assistance programs to achieve that 
goal.


                           amendment no. 1134

       On page 32, line 12, delete everything beginning with 
     ``For'' through ``expended'' on page 33, line 7, and insert 
     in lieu thereof the following:
       ``For the cost, as defined in section 502 of the 
     Congressional Budget Act of 1974, of modifying direct or 
     indirect loans and loan guarantees, as the President may 
     determine, for which funds have been appropriated or 
     otherwise made available for programs within the 
     International Affairs Budget Function 150, including the cost 
     of selling, reducing, or canceling amounts owed to the United 
     States as a result of concessional loans made to eligible 
     countries, pursuant to parts IV and V of the Foreign 
     Assistance Act of 1961 (including necessary expenses for the 
     administration of activities carried out under these parts), 
     and of modifying concessional credit agreements with least 
     developed countries, as authorized under section 411 of the 
     Agriculture Trade Development and Assistance Act of 1954 as 
     amended; and concessional loans, guarantees and credit 
     agreements with any country in sub-Saharan Africa, as 
     authorized under section 572 of the Foreign Operations, 
     Export Financing and Related Programs Act, 1989 (Public Law 
     100-461); $43,000,000, to remain available until expended; 
     provided that any limitation of subsection (e) of Section 411 
     of the Agricultural

[[Page 14820]]

     Trade Development and Assistance Act of 1954 to the extent 
     that limitation applies to sub-Saharan African countries 
     shall not apply to funds appropriated hereunder or previously 
     appropriated''.
                                  ____



                           AMENDMENT NO. 1135

 (Purpose: To express the sense of Congress regarding which office in 
   the Department of State is appropriate for managing United States 
                         interests in Ukraine)

       On page 128, between lines 13 and 14, insert the following 
     new section:


 sense of congress on management of united states interests in ukraine

       Sec. 580. (a) Findings.--Congress makes the following 
     findings:
       (1) Ukraine is a major European nation as it has the second 
     largest territory and sixth largest population of all the 
     States of Europe.
       (2) Ukraine has important geopolitical and economic roles 
     to play within Central and Eastern Europe.
       (3) A strong, stable, and secure Ukraine serves the 
     interests of peace and stability in all of Europe, which are 
     important national security interests of the United States.
       (4) Ukraine is a member State of the Council of Europe, the 
     Organization on Security and Cooperation in Europe, the 
     Central European Initiative, and the Euro-Atlantic 
     Partnership Conference, is a participant in the Partnership 
     for Peace program of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, 
     and has entered into a Partnership and Cooperation Agreement 
     with the European Union.
       (5) The Government of Ukraine has clearly articulated its 
     country's aspirations to become fully integrated into 
     European and transatlantic institutions, and, in pursuit of 
     the attainment of that aspiration, the government of Ukraine 
     has requested associate membership in the European Union with 
     the intent of eventually becoming a full member of the 
     European Union.
       (6) It is the policy of the United States to support the 
     aspiration of Ukraine to assume its rightful place among the 
     European and transatlantic community of democratic States and 
     in European and transatlantic institutions.
       (7) In the United States Government, the responsibility for 
     management of United States interests in Ukraine would be 
     most effectively performed by the officials who perform the 
     responsibility for management of United States interests in 
     Europe, and a designation of those officials to do so would 
     strongly underscore and most effectively support attainment 
     of the United States objective to build a Europe whole and 
     free.
       (b) Sense of Congress.--It is the sense of Congress that 
     the Secretary of State should designate the Assistant 
     Secretary of State for European Affairs to perform, through 
     the Bureau of European Affairs of the Department of State, 
     the responsibilities of the Department of State for the 
     management of United States interests in Ukraine.
                                  ____



                           amendment no. 1136

  (Purpose: To reduce the amount appropriated for contribution to the 
                 International Development Association)

       On page 38, line 10, strike ``$785,000,000'' and insert 
     ``$776,600,000''.

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, many people, including myself, were deeply 
disappointed by the World Bank's June 24th decision to approve a 
$160,000,000 loan to fund the controversial Western Poverty Reduction 
Project.
  We recognize the strong views about this issue and I have agreed to 
accept this amendment, but with some reluctance.
  The Western Poverty Reduction Project has drawn criticism from 
Members of Congress, the Clinton administration, other governments and 
international human rights and non-governmental organizations. A 
$40,000,000 component of this project which would fund the resettlement 
of some 58,000 poor Chinese farmers into an historically and culturally 
distinct Tibetan and Mongolian area is the primary source of concern.
  The $9 million cut in IDA funds which would result from the Helms 
amendment is the United States contribution to this portion of the 
project.
  I share Senator Helms' concern that the project may put additional 
pressure on Tibetans and other ethnic minorities in the region who are 
already struggling to overcome economic and cultural marginalization 
under Chinese rule.
  There are also serious questions about the project's impact on the 
environment. It is my understanding that the Bank did not follow its 
own procedures in considering the environmental impact of this loan.
  The United States Executive Director at the Bank voted against the 
loan and I supported that vote.
  While many of us are not happy with the June 24th decision, the fact 
is we voted on this loan just as we have on countless other loans over 
the years. We participated in the Board's democratic voting process, as 
established by the Bank's charter and agreed to by its shareholders, 
just as we always have. The United States was instrumental in 
establishing the Bank's voting rules.
  What made this vote different, however, is that we lost.
  With some 18 percent of the voting power on the Board, the 
overwhelming majority of the time the view of the United States 
prevails on the World Bank's Board and at other international financial 
institutions. We have become accustomed to getting our way.
  However, in the rare instances when we do not, dismissing the 
process, reneging on our financial obligations and walking away from 
our responsibilities is not an appropriate response. This is what this 
amendment does.
  By cutting our contribution to IDA, which provides critical 
assistance to the world's poorest countries, this amendment compromises 
the democratic procedures at the Bank and damages United States 
credibility. It also invites other shareholders to cut their 
contributions to the Bank whenever they do not get their way. Taken to 
its logical conclusion, the damage to the Bank's ability to carry out 
its mission would be immense.
  We have see how we can influence this project by simply staying 
involved. United States intervention and persistent international 
pressure has already changed the way the Bank will proceed with this 
loan.
  Under World Bank President James Wolfensohn's leadership, the Board 
made the highly unusual and commendable decision to delay disbursement 
of the $40,000,000 until the Bank's independent inspection panel 
conducts a thorough review and determines whether the project meets the 
Bank's environmental and resettlement standards.
  In addition, the Chinese Government has pledged its support for the 
review and stated that the press and government officials will have 
access to the region. Concerns about whether the project area will be 
open to experts unaffiliated with the Bank or the Chinese Government 
still need to be addressed.
  It is expected that the Western Poverty Reduction project will be 
completed in 2005. By approving this amendment today and reducing our 
contribution to IDA we forfeit our leverage to influence the project 
and ensure that the Bank's environmental and resettlement standards are 
met over the next six years.
  Mr. President, the plight of the Tibetan people is a clear example of 
what occurs when the principles of democracy are consistently and 
blatantly violated. In an effort to support their struggle, this 
amendment also compromises those same principles. It will weaken the 
United States' ability to ensure that the rights of Tibetans and other 
ethnic minorities are protected as the Bank moves forward with the 
project.


                           amendment no. 1137

       At the appropriate place in the bill, insert the following 
     new section:

     SEC.   . CONGRESSIONAL NOTIFICATION WITH RESPECT TO 
                   ACQUISITION OF USAID FACILITIES.

       (a) Funds appropriated under the heading ``Operating 
     Expenses of the Agency for International Development'' may be 
     made available for acquisition of office space exceeding 
     $5,000,000 of the United States Agency for International 
     Development only if the appropriate congressional committees 
     are notified at least 15 days in advance in accordance with 
     the procedures applicable to reprogramming notifications 
     under section 634A of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22 
     U.S.C. 2394-1).
       (b) As used in this section, the term ``acquisition'' shall 
     have the same meaning as in the Foreign Service Building Act 
     of 1926.
                                  ____



                           Amendment No. 1138

               (Purpose: Regarding assistance for Haiti)

       Beginning on page 92 delete Section 560 and insert in lieu 
     thereof the following:


                          ASSISTANCE FOR HAITI

       Sec. 560. (a) Sense of Congress.--It is the sense of 
     Congress that, in providing assistance to Haiti, the 
     President should place a priority on the following areas:
       (1) aggressive action to support the institution of the 
     Haitian National Police, including support for efforts by the 
     leadership and the Inspector General to purge corrupt and

[[Page 14821]]

     politicized elements from the Haitian National Police;
       (2) steps to ensure that any elections undertaken in Haiti 
     with United States assistance are full, free, fair, 
     transparent, and democratic;
       (3) a program designed to develop the indigenous human 
     rights monitoring capacity;
       (4) steps to facilitate the continued privatization of 
     state-owned enterprises; and
       (5) a sustained agricultural development program.
       (b) Report.--Beginning six months after the date of 
     enactment of this Act, and six months thereafter, the 
     President shall submit a report to the Committee on 
     Appropriations and the Committee on Foreign Relations of the 
     Senate and the Committee on Appropriations and the Committee 
     on International Relations of the House of Representatives 
     with regard to--
       (1) the status of each of the governmental institutions 
     envisioned in the 1987 Haitian Constitution, including an 
     assessment of whether or not these institutions and officials 
     hold positions on the basis of a regular, constitutional 
     process;
       (2) the status of the privatization (or placement under 
     long-term private management or concession) of the major 
     public entities, including a detailed assessment of whether 
     or not the Government of Haiti has completed all required 
     incorporating documents, the transfer of assets, and the 
     eviction of unauthorized occupants of the land or facility;
       (3) the status of efforts to re-sign and implement the 
     lapsed bilateral Repatriation Agreement and an assessment of 
     whether or not the Government of Haiti has been cooperating 
     with the United States in halting illegal emigration from 
     Haiti;
       (4) the status of the Government of Haiti's efforts to 
     conduct thorough investigations of extrajudicial and 
     political killings and--
       (A) an assessment of whether or not substantial progress 
     has been made in bringing to justice the persons responsible 
     for these extrajudicial or political killings in Haiti, and
       (B) an assessment of whether or not the Government of Haiti 
     is cooperating with United States authorities and with United 
     States-funded technical advisors to the Haitian National 
     Police in such investigations;
       (5) an assessment of whether or not the Government of Haiti 
     has taken action to remove and maintain the separation from 
     the Haitian National Police, national palace and residential 
     guard, ministerial guard, and any other public security 
     entity or unit of Haiti those individuals who are credibly 
     alleged to have engaged in or conspired to conceal gross 
     violations of internationally recognized human rights;
       (6) the status of steps being taken to secure the 
     ratification of the maritime counter-narcotics agreements 
     signed in October 1997;
       (7) an assessment of the degree to which domestic capacity 
     to conduct free, fair, democratic, and administratively sound 
     elections has been developed in Haiti; and
       (8) an assessment of whether or not Haiti's Minister of 
     Justice has demonstrated a commitment to the professionalism 
     of judicial personnel by consistently placing students 
     graduated by the Judicial School in appropriate judicial 
     positions and has made a commitment to share program costs 
     associated with the Judicial School, and is achieving 
     progress in making the judicial branch in Haiti independent 
     from the executive branch.
                                  ____



                           amendment no. 1139

       On page 24, line 18, strike all after ``(h)'' through the 
     period on page 25, line 2, and insert the following:
       Of the funds appropriated under this heading that are 
     allocated for assistance for the Central Government of 
     Russia, 50 percent shall be withheld from obligation until 
     the President determines and certifies in writing to the 
     Committees on Appropriations that The Government of Russia 
     has terminated implementation of arrangements to provide Iran 
     with technical expertise, training, technology, or equipment 
     necessary to develop a nuclear reactor, related nuclear 
     research facilities or programs, or ballistic missile 
     capability.
                                  ____



                           amendment no. 1140

       On page 22, line 24, after the word ``Armenia'' and before 
     the period insert the following: ``: Provided, That of the 
     funds made available for Armenia, $15,000,000 shall be 
     available for earthquake rehabilitation and reconstruction''.
                                  ____



                           amendment no. 1141

     (Purpose: To earmark Foreign Military Financing funds for the 
                              Philippines)

       On page 37, line 11, before the period insert the 
     following: ``Provided further, That of the amount 
     appropriated under this heading, $5,000,000 shall be 
     available only for the Philippines''.
                                  ____



                           amendment no. 1142

       On page 12, line 6, insert a new section:


                                lebanon

       Of the funds appropriated under the headings ``Development 
     Assistance'' and ``Economic Support Fund,'' not less than 
     $15,000,000 shall be made available for Lebanon to be used, 
     among other programs, for scholarships and direct support of 
     the American educational institutions in Lebanon.
                                  ____



                           amendment no. 1143

       On page 13, line 5, after the word ``Appropriations'' 
     insert the following words: '', the Committee on Foreign 
     Relations of the Senate, and the Committee on International 
     Relations of the House,''; and
       On page 98, line 16, after the word ``Appropriations'', 
     insert the following words: '', the Committee on Foreign 
     Relations of the Senate, and the Committee on International 
     Relations of the House,''.
                                  ____



                           amendment no. 1144

  (Purpose: To earmark funds for the independent states of the former 
    Soviet Union for the REAP International School Linkage Program)

       On page 21, line 22, before the period insert the 
     following: ``: Provided further, That of the amount 
     appropriated under this heading, not to exceed $200,000 shall 
     be available only for the REAP International School Linkage 
     Program''.

  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, REAP International operates a school 
linkage program between North Dakota and the Russian Republic of 
Buryatia. In the past, this program has resulted not only in the 
establishment of close personal relationships, but also provided 
community based assistance and sustainable development to this 
important region of the Russian Far East. REAP International's school 
linkage program between North Dakota and Buryatia is all the more 
critical when one considers the setbacks that the U.S.-Russia 
relationship has suffered in the wake of NATO's actions against Serbia. 
In addition, the failure of the Russian economy has left many Russians 
disillusioned, and there are those in the Russian leadership who would 
take advantage of that disillusionment in order to reverse the free 
market reforms already underway in Russia. We must not let that happen. 
One way to prevent it is to help Russian youth to understand and reap 
the benefits of a stable, free market economy through student exchange 
programs.
  Student exchange programs often promote long-lasting relationships 
between institutions and communities. Does the Senator agree that these 
programs also play an important role in strengthening ties between 
countries?
  Mr. McCONNELL. Yes.
  Mr. DORGAN. REAP International's school linkage program with 
Buryatia, Russia focuses on economic development activities, vocational 
and entrepreneurial training, and the enhancement of civic 
institutions. These types of activities are important in stabilizing 
communities in the Russian Far East. Is this type of stability not 
vital if Russia is to move ahead with economic reforms?
  Mr. McCONNELL. I concur in the Senator's assessment that stability is 
a necessary prerequisite for the transition to a market economy, 
something we all hope Russia is able to achieve.
  Mr. DORGAN. And would the Senator also agree that the development of 
the Russian Far East is vital to the overall future development of 
Russia's market economy, and therefore it is critical that we support 
efforts to foster sustainable development and stability in this 
important region?
  Mr. McCONNELL. I certainly agree with that.
  Mr. DORGAN. I thank the Chairman for his comments and support.


                           amendment no. 1145

   (Purpose: To restrict United States assistance for reconstruction 
efforts in the Balkans to United States-produced articles and services)

       On page 128, between lines 13 and 14, insert the following 
     new section:


  restriction on United States assistance for certain reconstruction 
                     efforts in the balkans region.

       Sec.  . (a) Prohibition.--
       (1) In general.--Except as provided in subsection (b), none 
     of the funds appropriated or otherwise made available by this 
     Act for United States assistance for reconstruction efforts 
     in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia or any contiguous 
     country may be used for the procurement of any article 
     produced outside the United States, the recipient country, or 
     least developed countries, or any service provided by a 
     foreign person.
       (b) Exception.--Subsection (a) shall not apply if--
       (1) the provision of such assistance requires articles of a 
     type that are produced in

[[Page 14822]]

     and services that are available for purchase in the United 
     States, the recipient country, or least developed countries, 
     or if the cost of articles and services produced in or 
     available from the United States and such other countries is 
     significantly more expensive, including the cost of 
     transportation, than the cost from other sources; or
       (2) the President determines that the application of 
     subsection (a) will impair the ability of the United States 
     to maximize the use of United States articles and services in 
     such reconstruction efforts of other donor countries, or if 
     the President otherwise determines that subsection (a) will 
     impair United States foreign assistance objectives.
       (c) Definitions.--In this section:
       (1) Article.--The term ``article'' means any agricultural 
     commodity, steel, communications equipment, farm machinery, 
     or petrochemical refinery equipment.
       (2) Federal republic of yugoslavia.--The term ``Federal 
     Republic of Yugoslavia'' means the Federal Republic of 
     Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) and includes Kosovo.
       (3) Foreign person.--The term ``foreign person'' means any 
     foreign national exclusive of any national of the recipient 
     country or least developed countries including any foreign 
     corporation, partnership, other legal entity, organization, 
     or association that is beneficially owned by foreign persons 
     controlled in fact by foreign persons.
       (4) Produced.--The term ``produced'', with respect to an 
     item, includes any item mined, manufactured, made, assembled, 
     grown, or extracted.
       (5) Service.--The term ``service'' means any engineering, 
     construction or telecommunications.
       (6) Steel.--The term ``steel'' includes the following 
     categories of steel products: semifinished, plates, sheets 
     and strips, wire rods, wire and wire products, rail type 
     products, bars, structural shapes and units, pipes and tubes, 
     iron ore, and coke products.

  Mr. CAMPBELL. Mr. President, today I intend to support the Manager's 
amendments package to the Fiscal Foreign Operations Appropriations bill 
for fiscal year 2000, which includes a modified version of a bill I 
introduced on June 10th, S.1212, the Kosovo Reconstruction Investment 
Act of 1999. I am pleased to have Senators Rick Santorum and Robert 
Byrd join me as original cosponsors of this amendment.
  I also want to thank the Chairman of the Foreign Operations 
Subcommittee, Senator McConnell, and the Subcommittee's Ranking Member, 
Senator Leahy, for their assistance and support of this amendment.
  While this amendment's language is a compromise, and is not as strong 
as S. 1212 which I introduced earlier this month, it is an important 
first step in the right direction. I will continue to work with my 
colleagues in the coming months to help promote American taxpayers, 
workers and key industries as the U.S. begins to spend billions of 
dollars to rebuild Kosovo and, as expected in the future, the rest of 
Yugoslavia.
  This amendment will help American workers and companies get the first 
best shot at those Kosovo reconstruction opportunities that are being 
paid for with U.S. foreign aid funds. As a result, a large portion of 
the American taxpayer's dollars destined for the Kosovo reconstruction 
effort will be invested in the purchase of American made goods and 
services whenever possible.
  This legislation will benefit both the people of Kosovo and American 
workers. The people of Kosovo will have reconstructed homes, hospitals, 
factories, bridges, powerplants and telecommunication systems. The 
American people will benefit as a significant portion of their hard-
earned taxpayer dollars come back to the U.S. in the form of new orders 
for American made goods and services. New jobs will be created. With 
this legislation we can make the best out of a looming, costly, and 
long term burden on our nation's budget.
  This will be especially important for some of our key industries, 
such as agriculture and steel, that are facing hard times here at home. 
Other hard working Americans from industries like manufacturing, 
engineering, construction, high tech and telecommunications will also 
enjoy new opportunities to produce goods and services destined for 
export overseas.
  For example, our ranchers and farmers, many of whom are being 
severely harmed by a combination of tough competition at home, cheap 
imports and closed markets overseas will benefit. This bill will help 
provide them with the opportunity to strengthen their share in Europe's 
Southeastern markets.
  Our steel workers, many of whom are also in a tough situation, will 
benefit as U.S. made steel is used to reconstruct, homes, hospitals, 
factories, bridges and other necessary infrastructure. American steel 
would also be used as American made construction equipment and tractors 
are delivered to the Balkans. American engineers, contractors and other 
service providers will play a key role in rebuilding telecommunications 
and other necessary infrastructure projects.
  The American taxpayers have already borne the lion's share of waging 
the war in Kosovo. Our pilots flew the vast majority of the combat 
sorties. In addition, the Foreign Operations Supplemental 
Appropriations bill that passed last month provided $819 million for 
humanitarian and refugee aid for Kosovo and surrounding countries. It 
has been estimated that peace keeping operations will cost an 
additional $3 billion in the first year alone. This is just the 
beginning. In the future, American taxpayers will be spending tens of 
billions of dollars more as we participate in what apparently is an 
open-ended peacekeeping effort.
  Without this legislation those countries who largely sat on the 
sidelines while we fought will be allowed to sweep in and clean up. The 
American taxpayers' dollars should not be used to profit Western 
European conglomerates. The American people deserve better. This Kosovo 
Reconstruction Investment Amendment will help remedy this situation.
  Yet another problem this bill would help alleviate is our exploding 
trade deficit which is on track to an all time high of approximately 
$250 billion by the end of this year. In March of this year alone, the 
U.S. posted a record one month trade deficit of $19.7 billion.
  Furthermore, many of the other industrialized countries that 
regularly distribute foreign aid do not do so with no strings attached. 
For many years now, countries like Japan have also required that the 
foreign aid funds they distribute be used to buy products produced by 
their domestic companies.
  The degree to which the Japanese government uses ``tied aid'' to the 
benefit of Japanese companies and boost their exports was underscored 
by a recent quote that can be found in the June, 1999, issue of the 
``Look Japan'' magazine. When referring to Japanese efforts to help 
neighbor countries recover from the Asian economic crisis, Oshima 
Kenzo, the Director of the Economic Cooperation Bureau at Japan's 
Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated:

       This enormous machine of Japanese aid has barely begun to 
     move. Aid to Asian countries in crisis is something that must 
     be done on an ``all-Japan'' basis . . . The purpose of aid to 
     Asia is primarily to provide relief to Asian countries, but 
     it has a secondary aspect of reenergizing the Japanese 
     economy too, so there are many domestic hopes riding on this 
     as well.

  While my original Kosovo reconstruction language in S. 1212 included 
tougher ``Buy America'' provisions, this amendment's compromise 
language will allow U.S. foreign aid funds to be used to purchase goods 
and services produced in ``least-developed countries.'' This is 
something we can do while still serving the purpose of this amendment. 
For example, U.S. steel workers will still have the first shot at 
producing steel for the Kosovo reconstruction effort since countries 
such as Japan, South Korea and Brazil, all of whom have been taking a 
heavy toll on the U.S. steel industry here at home, most definitely are 
not ``least developed countries.'' American telecommunications, heavy 
equipment manufacturers and a wide variety of other U.S. industries 
will also benefit.
  If America's Airmen, Sailors, Marines and Soldiers are good enough to 
wage a war, then America's hard working taxpayers, including steel and 
manufacturing workers, engineers and contractors are good enough to 
help rebuild shattered countries. If we are called on to put the 
Balkans back together, we should do it with a fair share of goods and 
services made in America.
  I urge my colleagues to support the adoption of this amendment.
  Mr. McCONNELL. As I said, this is a list of managers' amendments that 
has been cleared on both sides of the aisle:

[[Page 14823]]

  McConnell-Leahy amendment to move the Iraqi provision;
  McCain amendment to strike Inter-American Foundation language with a 
statement;
  Leahy-McConnell amendment on African Development Foundation 
provision;
  Stevens-Coverdell amendment on AIDS;
  McConnell-Leahy on Ukaine corruption;
  Leahy-McConnell amendment on Ukraine demining;
  Leahy amendment on biodiversity;
  Leahy amendment on debt restructuring;
  Roth amendment on Ukraine;
  Helms amendment on IDA-China;
  Helms amendment on USAID construction notification;
  Helms-DeWine amendment on Haiti;
  Leahy-McConnell amendment on Russia-Iran;
  McConnell amendment on Armenia;
  Helms amendment on the Philippines;
  Abraham amendment on Lebanon;
  Thomas amendment on technical correctional reports;
  Dorgan amendment on Russia exchanges; and
  A Campbell amendment on Buy America.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendments 
en bloc.
  The amendments (Nos. 1127 through 1145), en bloc, were agreed to.
  Mr. LEAHY. I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. McCONNELL. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent Senator 
Lautenberg be shown as a cosponsor of the Roth amendment on the 
Ukraine.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. LEAHY. I understand the Senator from Illinois will be recognized. 
Then the Senator from Minnesota is going to be recognized. I ask 
unanimous consent I then be recognized.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________