[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 9]
[Senate]
[Pages 12624-12625]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



           BUSINESS COMMUNITY ASSISTANCE TO KOSOVAR REFUGEES

 Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I rise today to commend members 
of the American and international business communities who are 
providing resources and technical expertise to help the United Nations 
and other international relief organizations alleviate the suffering of 
hundreds of thousands of Kosovar refugees.
  Today, as we embark on the initial stages of a peace agreement, 
hundreds of thousands of Kosovar refugees remain scattered across the 
globe. Slobodan Milosevic and his troops have driven these victims out 
of their country, separated families, destroyed homes, and stripped the 
refugees of their personal identification papers. The United Nations 
High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) reports that over 800,000 people 
have been forced to flee Kosovo since the Serb Army intensified ethnic 
purges two and a half months ago.
  Refugee situations are always difficult. The Kosovar situation, 
however, has been exacerbated and complicated greatly by Milosevic's 
attempts at ``identity erasure.'' Servian soldiers have stripped the 
Kosovars of all identification documents and systematically destroyed 
civil records. Adding to the complexity of the situation, the refugees 
are spread over 30 different countries.
  Companies such as Hewlett-Packard, Compaq, Microsoft, Securit World, 
Ericsson, and ScreenCheck are partnering with the Red Cross, UNHCR, the 
International Organisation for Migration and other international 
organizations on projects that will register the refugees, provide them 
with identification documents, and reunite them with their families. 
These companies are providing technical expertise, equipment, personnel 
and other resources that are allowing the refugees to be registered and 
located much more efficiently and effectively than ever before.

[[Page 12625]]

  We are certainly witnessing a situation where the Internet and other 
recent technological innovations are providing solutions for real life 
problems. For example, Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, Compaq and Securit 
have developed and provided systems that allow refugees to be 
registered, added to an international database, and to obtain 
identification cards--all within minutes. Further, the Red Cross is 
working with Compaq and Ericsson to launch the Family News Network, 
which is the first Internet-based refugee tracing system.
  These companies are to be commended for their contributions to help 
restore the Kosovar community. It is my hope that in the future more 
members of the business community will enter into such beneficial 
partnerships to help address problems facing our country and our 
world.

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