[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 20]
[Senate]
[Pages 28469-28471]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        SYRIA ACCOUNTABILITY ACT

  Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, on behalf of the majority leader, I call 
up the Syria Accountability Act.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will state the bill by title.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 1828) to halt Syrian support for terrorism, 
     end its occupation of Lebanon, stop its development of 
     weapons of mass destruction, cease its illegal importation of 
     Iraqi oil and illegal shipments of weapons and other military 
     items to Iraq, and by so doing hold Syria accountable for the 
     serious international security problems it has caused in the 
     Middle East, and for other purposes.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The time for debate is limited to 90 minutes,

[[Page 28470]]

with 30 minutes under the control of the Senator from Indiana, Mr. 
Lugar, or his designee, 30 minutes under the control of the Senator 
from Delaware, Mr. Biden, or his designee, and 30 minutes under the 
control of the Senator from Pennsylvania, Mr. Specter.
  Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, there is before the Senate the so-called 
Syrian Accountability Act, which imposes sanctions on Syria. It recites 
a long list of circumstances where the Syrians have not taken 
sufficient action to fight terrorism, and then it calls for Syria to 
take corrective action, and in the absence of that corrective action, 
authorizes the imposition of economic sanctions, and it leaves with the 
President of the United States the authority to waive those sanctions 
if it is in the national interest.
  Sanctions are imposed by Congress with some frequency. At first 
blush, this appears to be a straightforward affirmative vote, but I 
believe the matter is more complicated than that, and I have come to 
that view after having traveled to Syria almost every year since 1984, 
and after having had considerable contact with the Syrian Government. 
After considering the matter at some length, I have decided that I will 
vote in favor of the Syrian Accountability Act because the problems of 
terrorism are so serious and because I believe that Syria needs to do 
more.
  The bill itself has a long recitation of background circumstances, 
but the events today in Iraq, where our fighting men and women are 
being subjected to terrorist attacks, casualties and fatalities, and 
where the people of Iraq are being subjected as victims of terrorism, I 
believe it is a fair demand that more be done. That would include more 
by Syria.
  There are, according to reliable reports, official statements of the 
U.S. Government that terrorists are infiltrating into Syria, coming 
from Syria into Iraq. More has to be done on that subject.
  It has to be noted that Syria has responded with a number of 
affirmative actions to be of assistance to the United States in our war 
on terrorists. The officials of the State Department have acknowledged 
that after September 11, 2001, that information was provided by Syria 
on al-Qaeda, which saved U.S. lives.
  It is also to be acknowledged there has been some improvement on the 
Syrian-Iraqi border, but clearly not enough. There were reports just 
this morning from the State Department about the porous Syrian border 
and terrorists coming into Iraq, again exposing U.S. personnel and the 
Iraqis themselves to terrorist attack.
  It ought to be noted that Syria did join in the unanimous resolution, 
U.N. Resolution 1511, and that when Secretary of State Powell traveled 
to Syria in April of 2002, there was some helpful action taken by the 
Syrian Government on the southern border of Lebanon. But when Secretary 
of State Powell went to Syria in May of 2003 and urged the Syrian 
Government to oust the terrorists from Damascus, that request was not 
acted upon. Recently, Israel moved against terrorist training camps 
within a few miles of Damascus.
  While all of these matters are subjected to controversy, and there 
are disputes by the Syrian Government, I believe the balance of the 
evidence supports the conclusion that those were training camps.
  I believe it is important that the U.S. Government continues in its 
efforts to negotiate with Syria to try to improve the situation, and 
that we ought to be mindful that there are opportunities to have frank 
discussions with the Syrian officials which have led to some beneficial 
results and which ought to be pursued.
  I urge my colleagues in the U.S. Congress, pursuant to our duties, 
for example, on the Foreign Operations Subcommittee on which I serve, 
or on the Foreign Relations Committee, to travel to Syria to engage the 
Syrian leaders because I think it can be productive. I make reference 
to my own experience in that regard.
  I made my first trip to Syria in 1984. As I have said, I have been to 
Syria almost every year since. I first met President Bashar al-Assad in 
January of 1988 and found him to be willing to listen and willing to 
have a dialog. My conversation at that time with President Assad lasted 
for some 4 hours and 35 minutes, talking about a wide range of issues--
the Israeli-Syrian relations, the Iran-Iraq war, which was still in 
progress at that time, U.S.-Syrian relations, the situations with the 
Jews in Syria. At that time, working with then Congressman Solarz, I 
urged President Assad to allow the Jews to have free immigration out of 
Syria. There were many Jewish women in Syria who could not find 
husbands of the Jewish faith. President Assad said to me, in one of our 
meetings, he would release any Jewish woman where somebody came from 
the United States--there were large Syrian-Jewish groupings in the 
United States--to come to claim a bride, and anyone who wanted to marry 
a woman in Syria who was Jewish, if a suitor came, the woman would be 
released.
  I reported back to a number of Jewish-Syrian enclaves in the United 
States. Nothing much happened about that. Finally, a few years later, 
President Assad granted free rights for the Jews to leave Syria at 
their choice, something he had resisted, but something which he finally 
was persuaded to do.
  During the course of the discussions I had with President Assad, I 
urged him to participate in discussions with Israel. At first, he took 
the position he would not be a party to any discussions which were 
sponsored just by the United States but only if they were sponsored by 
all five of the permanent members of the Security Council.
  Finally, President Assad made a change and sent representatives to 
Madrid in 1991 to participate in those discussions. When Prime Minister 
Netanyahu was elected in 1996, Prime Minister Netanyahu initially made 
some statements that he was going to hold Syria accountable for 
Hezbollah on the southern Lebanon border. That resulted in a very tense 
situation with Syria realigning their troops along the Syrian border.
  Prime Minister Netanyahu knew I was about to travel to Syria and 
asked me to carry a message to President Assad and Foreign Minister 
Shara, that Prime Minister Netanyahu wanted peace and was prepared to 
personally engage in discussions and would urge President Assad to 
engage personally, but that was not a condition.
  I relayed that message to President Assad. While he was not willing 
to engage in negotiations with Prime Minister Netanyahu, it was later 
reported there was an easing of those tensions.
  On many occasions, I would urge President Assad to have discussions 
with the Israeli Prime Minister. I soon developed a relationship where 
I was able to take it in a somewhat lighter vein and said to him when 
our pictures--he met with me in his office, with the large traditional 
chairs and a small stand in between to hold the tea or coffee--I said 
tomorrow there would be a picture in the Damascus newspaper of our 
discussion, but that if he would meet with Prime Minister Shamir, which 
I urged in the early 1990s, the picture would appear on the front pages 
of the New York Times and the London Times and across the world.
  When the Nobel Peace awards were given to Prime Minister Rabin and 
Foreign Minister Perez and Chairman Arafat, I urged President Assad to 
engage in negotiations with Prime Minister Rabin. I said he would be 
honored at Oslo, and he responded in a light vein that he might be 
honored at Oslo but he would not be allowed back in Damascus. I told 
him I did not think that was true, and he commented notwithstanding 
what some might think, the public opinion in Syria was a matter of some 
substantial concern to him.
  I attended the funeral of President Assad in the year 2000, 
accompanying Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. On that occasion, I 
had a chance to meet his successor, President Bashar Assad. I visited 
Syria on two occasions, in 2002 and last year in 2003, and have had 
lengthy conversations with President Bashar Assad. They are 
conversations which are candid and sometimes critical.

[[Page 28471]]

  For example, at the Arab summit, when President Bashar Assad made a 
comment that Zionism was the same as nazism, I said I thought there 
ought to be a change in his attitude on that because there was no 
comparison between the brutality of nazism, their destruction, their 
attacking neighboring countries, their Holocaust, murdering 6 million 
Jews, and the aspirations of the Zionists to have a homeland in Israel. 
He listened and talked. To what extent there is an imprint, who knows. 
It is better to have it said than to have him thinking he can simply 
equate nazism and Zionism without an objection.
  President Bashar Assad also made a comment at the Arab summit that it 
was fair to target civilians in the Golan Heights, and I disagreed with 
him. He said, well, the civilians are armed. I said, they have to be 
armed because there are attacks on the borders. I urged him that the 
right response was to engage in diplomatic talks with the United 
States.
  The essential conclusions which I have reached are there is some 
substantial opportunity to deal with Syria. In Bashar Assad there is a 
new leader, a man in his late 30s, English educated, willing to meet 
with the House of Representatives or the Senate, willing to listen. 
Notwithstanding my many exhortations of President Hafez al-Assad and 
President Bashar Assad, they continue to harbor terrorists in Damascus. 
Both the father and the son respond that the people live there have 
been exiled from what was formerly Palestine, they cannot be in Israel 
so they live in Damascus. I responded I thought that was an 
insufficient answer.
  Although some progress has been made, I do believe Syria needs to do 
much more. Syria is the de facto controller of Lebanon, and Syria needs 
to do more to stop Hezbollah and their rocket attacks on Israel, with 
the tremendous armaments which Syria has. There are reliable reports 
about Syria developing bacteriological warfare, a lot of chemical 
warfare, and extending the range of their missiles, and some incipient 
efforts at nuclear weapons, so they would have to submit to 
international arms control regimes.
  Most of all, I believe Syria has to do much more in the fight against 
terrorism. President Bush has said, and I think accurately, he who 
harbors a terrorist is a terrorist himself; he who harbors a terrorist 
in the eyes of the law is an accessory before the fact.
  Today, the problem of terrorism is so acute there cannot be any 
halfway measures. Syria needs to do a great deal more on the border to 
stop terrorists from coming into Iraq.
  There are reports about al-Qaida being in Iraq. I am not vouching for 
any of those reports. I think we have to be very careful what we say 
about terrorism and who the terrorists are and where they come from, 
but there is no doubt Iraq has been a magnet for young men and young 
women who do not like the United States, who do not like U.S. support 
of Israel, who do not like what we have done in Iraq, and they are 
coming into Iraq. There are daily attacks on our men and women. There 
are daily attacks on the Iraqis themselves.
  There is a state of tremendous violence. Every day, when we look to 
the news media, we wonder if there is going to be another report about 
a helicopter being shot down or about United States soldiers being 
attacked or about Iraqi civilians being attacked. That means the effort 
against that kind of terrorism has to be absolute. That is why I 
believe the Syria Accountability Act is one which ought to be passed by 
the Senate.
  When the Syria Accountability Act was gaining in cosponsors, I wrote 
to President Bashar al Assad on September 17 of this year. I ask 
unanimous consent that the letter be printed in the Record at the 
conclusion of my statement.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See exhibit 1.)
  Mr. SPECTER. President Assad then asked his representative in the 
United States, in Washington, his charge d'affaires--they didn't have 
an ambassador--to come and talk to me, and we had a discussion as to 
what was going on. It seems to me, after considering the matter and the 
gravity of the risks which our fighting men and women are undertaking 
in Iraq, and the risks to the Iraqi people themselves, that it is an 
appropriate time to make a formal demand on the Government of Syria to 
do more.
  If they do more and if they join in the fight against terrorism, 
there is ample opportunity for the President of the United States to 
take the appropriate action pursuant to this resolution and to lift the 
sanctions.
  I thank my colleague from Alabama for sitting overtime into the lunch 
period. I yield the floor and note we will now go into a noontime 
recess, to reconvene at 2:15.

                               Exhibit 1


                                                  U.S. Senate,

                               Washington, DC, September 17, 2003.
     His Excellency Bashar Al-Assad,
     President, Syrian Arab Republic,
     Damascus, Syria.
       Dear President Assad: I write to inform you of growing 
     concern in the United States Senate about Syria and the fact 
     that the Syrian Accountability Act now has 76 co-sponsors. I 
     had discussed this proposed legislation some time ago with 
     your Ambassador to the United States. I had refrained from 
     co-sponsoring the Syrian Accountability Act on the premise 
     that we should try to work out the problems without resorting 
     to legislation calling for sanctions.
       Yesterday, Undersecretary of State John R. Bolton submitted 
     testimony to the House of Representatives' International 
     Relations Committee that Syria is permitting ``volunteers'' 
     to pass over your border into Iraq where those so-called 
     volunteers are intent on killing U.S. troops. This follows 
     Administrator L. Paul Bremer's statement on August 20th that 
     Syria is allowing ``foreign terrorists'' to cross Syria's 
     borders into Iraq.
       When you met with Secretary of State Powell last May, there 
     was an understanding that Syria would shut Damascus offices 
     of Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other terrorist groups. In June, 
     Secretary Powell stated that Syria's efforts to shut these 
     offices were ``totally inadequate''.
       The Bush Administration which had opposed the Syrian 
     Accountability Act now is neutral, taking no position.
       After extensive dealings with your father, President Hafez 
     al-Assad, since the 1980s and with you on our meetings in the 
     past several years, I have tried to assist in finding answers 
     to these difficult problems. With the Syrian Accountability 
     Act gaining so much support, it is my hope that your 
     Government will respond to the concerns outlined in this 
     letter before the U.S. Government resorts to sanctions.
       I call these matters to your personal attention with the 
     hope that prompt action can be taken by Syria to resolve 
     these problems. The United States greatly appreciated the 
     help that Syria provided to our intelligence services after 
     September 11, 2001 in our flight against el-Qaeda.
           Sincerely,
     Arlen Specter.

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