A concurrent resolution condemning the Government of the Republic of the Sudan for its participation and complicity in the attacks against innocent civilians in the impoverished Darfur region of western Sudan.

Mr. President, on Tuesday, the Foreign Relations Committee

discharged a resolution which speaks to the situation in Darfur, Sudan. I am alarmed by reports of atrocities there. I am worried that genocide may be unfolding.

We need to make a determination about what is going on in Darfur and respond accordingly. Administration officials have termed it ethnic cleansing. This would be horrific in and of itself. But we also have to ask whether or not Khartoum's actions are an intent to destroy in whole or in part a particular ethnic or racial group or groups. If so, what should we do about it? These are questions we must answer right away.

As you know, the administration has been heavily involved in negotiations between the government in Khartoum and southern Sudanese rebels. If an agreement is reached, it will bring an end to twenty years of civil war between the Muslim north, and non-Muslim south.

It will end 20 years of attacks against Muslims in the Nuba mountains and southern Sudanese; 20 years during which the government of Sudan targeted civilians either with its military forces, or through government allied militias; 20 years during which 2 million people have died; 20 years during which millions were displaced both within Sudan and beyond its borders.

The war sparked outrage among members of the international community because of the brutality of attacks against men, women and children. Some cast the war as Muslim versus Christian. I think this captures only a fraction of the story. Arab militias took southern, non-Muslims, black Africans captive as slaves. They pursued a scorched earth policy in southern villages. Muslims living in the Nuba Mountains, who happen to be black, were victims of attacks as well. One is left to wonder if the real cause of the attacks wasn't good old fashioned racism. And while the United States continues to spend valuable diplomatic time and political capitol to bring an end to the north-south conflict, history is repeating itself in western Sudan.

Early last year, ethnic minorities living in western Sudan took up arms to protest Khartoum's arming of Arab militias in the region, and what they believed was economic marginalization by the government in Khartoum. The wisdom of this course of action on the part of the rebels may be debatable. What is not debatable is the disproportionate response of the government--ethnic cleansing in Darfur by means of a well orchestrated campaign of attacks aimed specifically at non- military persons who belong to the same ethnic groups as the rebels.

Khartoum is employing the same tactics in Darfur that they used against those living in southern Sudan: Aerial bombardment of civilians with helicopter gun ships and planes, and attacks by government supported Arab militias known as janjaweed, which employ scorched earth tactics against villages inhabited by black Africans. We are receiving reports of a variety of abuses perpetrated by the janjaweed--routine rape of women, murder of men, the wanton burning of children--from credible sources working in Darfur. In my view, these deliberate attacks and atrocities against civilians constitute crimes against humanity.

President Bush's statement on Sudan issued on April 7, while helpful, was inadequate. He condemned the atrocities in Darfur, but the statement does not speak to the ethnic nature of the attacks. We all know that ethnic cleansing has the potential to turn into genocide. By failing to highlight this very dangerous dimension of Khartoum's campaign, the president failed to speak to the most alarming aspects of the crisis.

The statement says that President Bush expressed his views condemning the atrocities directly to Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir. Since U.S. officials have acknowledged that the actions constitute ethnic cleansing, describing them as well ``organized,'' and ``comprehensive,'' I sincerely hope the President took Bashir to task about the particular evil of such actions. Given the vagueness President Bush's statement, however, one is left to wonder.

Our Ambassador to the U.N. Human Rights Commission, Rich Williamson, has said that 30,000 people are dead as a result of the conflict. One million people--25 percent of the population--are displaced, according to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, UNHCR.

All of them are in dire need of assistance because on top of razing entire villages and firebombing civilians, in addition to burning crops, raping women, torturing men and throwing children into burning huts, on top of all the misery the government has heaped on the people of Darfur for months, Khartoum has refused to allow humanitarian relief organizations free, unfettered, regular access to the region. According to the State Department, it takes aid workers 2 months to get visas. And this is an improvement--it used to take 3 to 4 months.

After pursuing a scorched earth policy in Darfur for months--burned crops, stolen cattle and poisoned wells--the government's latest outrage is cynically ordering people to return to their homes. The few agencies on the ground in the area indicate that people cannot venture even 100 yards outside the displaced persons camps without being attacked. Even if they are able to make it home safely, there is absolutely no likelihood of people surviving in communities that literally no longer exist. At this point, return is not an option and Khartoum is well aware of this.

And the attacks by the janjaweed continue despite the April 8 cease- fire agreement.

Over 100,000 people have fled across the border into Chad. They too are still subject to attack from the janjaweed. UNHCR is in the midst of attempting to relocate refugees farther from the border to enhance their safety. Only half of refugees are living in camps in more secure locations. The other half are making do the best they can. A report issued by Refugees International indicates that many refugees are living in the open with no food, water or shelter.

According to UNHCR's public documents, it needs $27 million to address the needs of refugees in Chad. It has less than half of that on hand. Soon the rainy season will make roads impassible, preventing the delivery of food and shelter materials. The World Food Program is attempting to stockpile food in advance of the rains, but they have a 35 percent funding shortfall as well. We have contributed significant funds, but we and the rest of the international community need to do even more.

Congress needs to do more as well. S. Con. Res. 99 speaks to the nature of the violence and urges the President to do two main things:

First, develop a plan to deliver humanitarian aid to the nearly 1 million people who have been driven from their homes that does not necessitate permission from the government of Sudan. I hope that this plan includes immediate use of the commodities we are holding in the Emerson Trust stockpiles. I would also encourage the administration to come up with a way to deliver food through neighboring countries, including Chad.

Let me also say that I expect and welcome a request in the forthcoming supplemental for money to meet the humanitarian needs engendered by the crisis in Darfur.

Second, it urges the Secretary of State to develop options to increase sanctions on Sudan if the attacks in Darfur do not stop immediately.

I co-sponsored this resolution because I think that these are important steps. They are only steps however. If we do not see any change on the ground by the end of May, we should go even further than this resolution suggests.

We should amend the Sudan Peace Act, which was aimed at jump-starting the north-south peace process, so that it is relevant to the situation in Darfur. Three changes are essential. First, the act, Public Law 107- 245, imposes sanctions on the government of Sudan if the President determines that it is not making a good faith effort to negotiate a peace agreement. The act should be amended to require that the President certify that neither the government nor government allied militias have attacked civilians in Sudan 30 days from the enactment of the act and every 90 days thereafter. If the President cannot certify such, then the sanctions in section 6, paragraph 2 should be triggered.

The same certification should apply to humanitarian access. This is already in the legislation, however the requirement is obviously not explicit enough

for the White House. Despite the restrictions placed on the non- governmental organizations attempting to go into Darfur, on April 21, the President certified the government of Sudan had not unreasonably interfered with humanitarian efforts. Making the law more explicit may prevent another such mistake.

Finally, we should add a requirement that our permanent representative to the U.N. Security Council pursue a Security Council Resolution condemning the government of Sudan for its actions in Darfur, and calling for accountability for those who are found responsible for orchestrating and carrying out the atrocities.

Mr. President, the administration has said that it will not attempt to secure the north-south peace agreement at the expense of the people in Darfur. I agree. In fact, a north-south agreement will be meaningless in the face of ethnic cleansing in western Sudan. I believe that we must ratchet up the pressure on the Government of Sudan, and our partners in the international community to bring an end to the criminal acts of the government in Khartoum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of Calendar No. 497, S. Con. Res. 99.

Mr. President, I wish to make a brief comment. First, I ask unanimous consent that the committee-reported amendment be agreed to, the concurrent resolution, as amended, be agreed to, the amendment to the preamble be agreed to, the preamble, as amended, be agreed to, the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table en bloc, and that any statements relating thereto be printed in the Record, with no intervening action.

Mr. President, I do want to draw attention to this terrible tragedy unfolding in the Darfur region of Sudan. I have had the opportunity to travel to the Sudan a number of times, many times over the last several years, and care greatly for the people there, as do all of our colleagues who are in this Chamber today.

I thank Senator Brownback for his tremendous leadership on this issue. He will come to the floor later today to comment on this important resolution. He has shown steadfast commitment throughout for the people of southern Sudan.

I also thank Senator Feingold. He and I have had the opportunity to work together for many years on the Africa Subcommittee and have worked together to draw attention to the terrible civil war in Sudan, which has displaced millions of people. A million people have died over the last 20, 22 years.

I also thank my colleague from Tennessee, Senator Alexander, who now chairs the African Subcommittee, as well as Chairman Lugar and Senator Biden, and all the colleagues who have worked on this issue.

The international community estimates that 1 million--1 million-- Sudanese in the Darfur region have been displaced by the ongoing attacks by government-backed militias. At least 110,000 Darfur Sudanese have sought refuge in Chad. But even there the militias have been able to cross the border and attack the refugee camps. It is an ongoing tragedy.

The outgoing United Nations humanitarian coordinator in Khartoum says the continuing atrocities are nothing short of genocide.

Since the violence began in February of last year, up to 30,000 Darfur natives have been killed. The U.N. coordinator warns that the raping, looting, and mass destruction being perpetuated is ``more than just a conflict.'' He warns that, ``It is an organized attempt to do away with a group of people.''

On Monday, a U.N. mission returned from a 6-day inspection of Darfur. The team concludes that many of the violations they investigated may constitute war crimes and/or crimes against humanity. Their report, due to be completed by the end of this week, is expected to confirm many of the accounts of mass murder, multiple rapes, aerial bombings, and ground attacks.

The crisis only threatens to worsen. Later this month, the rainy season will begin. Aid experts tell us the massive yearly flooding may seriously hinder their efforts to distribute desperately needed aid and medical supplies. Amnesty International warns that the impending rains are a ticking timebomb in the countdown to disaster.

The situation in Darfur is dire. I take a special interest in the plight of the Darfur people because of my own contact with the Sudanese. I have traveled extensively throughout southern Sudan. I have had the opportunity to perform medical mission work in that part of the world in a hospital in a little village called Lui. I have visited the Nuba Mountains in central Sudan, the Blue Nile region north of there, as well as Pabong, which is one of the oil regions in which there has been a lot of displacement.

Recently, in August, I was in southern Sudan, where I had the opportunity again to operate and perform surgery and serve the community there in this hospital in Lui, the only medical facility in about a 150-mile radius of that small village.

Through these travels, I have had the opportunity to take care of patients who have come in with war-torn injuries, and who are suffering from the plight of this civil war, a brutal war--the innocent people there who are being shattered day in, day out, by civil war.

I wanted to share with my colleagues the suffering of the people of southern Sudan and thus wholly endorse this resolution. We have all worked together--Senators Brownback, Feingold, Biden, Lugar, Helms, and many others--to enact a Sudan Peace Act in the past. That bill, indeed, provided a framework for peace negotiations in Sudan.

This past September, shortly after we were in southern Sudan, I was heartened by the cease-fire by the Khartoum government and the Sudanese rebels. Peace, it seemed, at that point in time might finally come. But now my hopes are wearing thin. The government of Khartoum absolutely must take responsibility for its complicity in the systematic murders and atrocities being committed in Darfur by the Janjaweed.

On Tuesday the U.S. Agency for International Development delivered the first of four aid airlifts planned for the week. The Agency is providing thousands of blankets and temporary shelter and medical supplies and food. But even with the best, the most hopeful, the most optimistic projections that the Darfur crisis can be controlled, the most optimistic say it will continue for another 18 months, even if Khartoum right now starts cracking down on the Janjaweed militias. Hence, there is not time to waste. Literally millions of lives are in the balance. We must draw the worlds's attention to the crisis in Sudan.

This week's elections of Sudan to a third term on the United Nations Human Rights Commission is a travesty. It undermines the credibility of the Commission but, more importantly, it signals to the Sudanese people that the highest human rights body in the world has abandoned them and ignored their plight.

I stand alongside the administration in its unqualified disapproval of Sudan's inclusion in the U.N. Human Rights Commission. By approving S. Con. Res. 99, however, this body rightly condemns the actions of Khartoum and Darfur. We put Khartoum on notice that the Senate will continue to scrutinize and hold accountable acts of commission or omission by the Khartoum government that violate their citizens' human rights.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, that completes leader time. That should not take away from morning business.

Mr. President, I know that all of my colleagues have been reading the recent reports of increasing violence in Iraq. What once seemed to be a small insurgency could possibly be developing into a larger revolt. And this rapidly growing and violent opposition to the United States presence in that country is placing American service members at great risk. It is also threatening our goal of securing a stable and democratic Iraq. Taken together, I believe that this situation makes it all the more clear what many of us have been urging all along--that we need to internationalize our efforts in Iraq now. Today, I am submitting a Sense of the Senate resolution urging the President to do just that.

As my colleagues know, there are well over 100,000 United States servicemen and -women currently stationed in Iraq. And while our troops are going through rotations that are scheduled to leave this number somewhere around 100,000, I would point out that the recent upsurge in violence in that country has prompted U.S. Central Command Chief General John Abizaid to ask his military staff to examine options for sending more U.S. troops to Iraq.

Despite claims by some in the Bush administration that this is not a necessity, it is certain that with this increasing instability, the demands on our troops will continue to grow. That could very well mean that at some point we will need to send more troops to Iraq.

This is all coming at a time when arguably, the dangers to our troops have never been greater. Twelve Marines were killed in a single day of hostile action last weekend. Four American contractors were brutally slain and mutilated last week. And the situation appears to be getting worse.

Let me be clear. This is not a statement on the abilities of the United States military. Our troops--and I know there is complete consensus about this--have and continue to perform with the utmost professionalism, patriotism, and heroism. Nobody can dispute that. And this Senator, for one, remains committed to ensuring that they have every tool at their disposal, every resource that they need, to come home safely and as expeditiously as possible. My resolution, first and foremost, reaffirms these facts.

But with more than 600 U.S. service members killed and more than 2,988 wounded since March 2003, the time has come for us to be honest about our needs in Iraq. We need an international security presence in that country. NATO would be the ideal body to provide such an international presence. It has played an important role in efforts to restore and maintain order in Bosnia, Kosovo, and Afghanistan. And plain and simple, the presence of international troops would reduce the risk to U.S. military personnel. My resolution would urge the President to instruct the Secretary of Defense to begin consultations with NATO with this goal in mind.

My resolution would also urge the President to instruct the Secretary of State to begin consultations with the United Nations Security Council concerning a UN Security Council Resolution for Iraq. While NATO can help handle the security concerns in Iraq, we need a UN presence in that country with respect to efforts to build stable and democratic institutions.

After all, let's be honest, we have a serious lack of international credibility for being in Iraq right now. This lack of credibility is impeding our abilities to secure our political goals in that country. It is preventing the international community from rallying behind us in our attempt to build a stable and democratic Iraq--a goal that we all share. And it is preventing us from gaining the legitimacy we need among average Iraqis which is so vital to the success of our efforts.

Some might even argue that with the June 30th deadline approximately 12 weeks away, we are moving backwards in terms of our readiness to hand over control to an interim Transitional Iraqi Government.

This fear was illustrated perfectly by an official from the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in an article in today's New York Times. Let me quote from that article, which occurs in the context of allied and Iraqi security forces' loss of control in the southern Iraqi cities of Najaf and Kufa: ``An official in the occupation authority said Wednesday that . . . months of efforts to win over the population with civil projects and promises of jobs have failed with segments of the population.''

That same official was quoted in the article as saying that ``Six months of work is completely gone . . . there is nothing to show for it.'' According to the same article, ``government buildings, police stations, civil defense garrisons, and other police installations built up by Americans had been overrun and stripped bare'' in those cities. I ask unanimous consent that this article be printed in the Record.

This all highlights an important fact--that without getting the legitimacy we need to function in Iraq, we will be lacking the most basic foundations for ensuring the success of our efforts--efforts for which we have already allocated more than $110 billion American taxpayer dollars.

The answer for all of this is simple, and I believe that it has been from the beginning. We must engage NATO and the UN with the goal of their playing significant roles in Iraq. And we must do it now. NATO can help immensely with sharing the security burden. And a UN mandate will grant us the legitimacy we need to function in Iraq. It will also grant our long time allies, with whom we have been at odds over this war, the domestic legitimacy they need to play a part in building Iraq's future.

We now have a choice. We can continue to argue whether these steps should have been taken before the war. Or, we can join together in urging these steps be taken now. Our men and

women in uniform deserve it. The American taxpayer deserves it. The Iraqi people deserve it. And our national security and the security of the world deserve it.

I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

Mr. President, I rise to join my colleagues in expressing my continued grave concern about the situation in Darfur, Sudan. For months now, Members of Congress have come to the floor to express their outrage at the situation in Darfur. All credible evidence indicates that what is unfolding in Darfur is genocide. Already, an estimated 30,000 civilians have been killed. More than 130,000 refugees have fled to Chad, and more than 1 million people have been displaced.

Numerous credible reports document the widespread use of rape as a weapon against female civilians. Entire communities have been razed, mosques destroyed, and wells poisoned, guaranteeing that a grave humanitarian crisis will continue to unfold for many months or even years. And now reports indicate that terrified survivors are being forced to return to their homes, which have been utterly destroyed, in a context of serious insecurity by Government officials who apparently view their own suffering citizens as something like a source of embarrassment.

Those of us who have followed developments in Sudan for many years see a horrifying familiarity in this crisis. The Government of Sudan has deliberately provoked a humanitarian catastrophe before in an attempt to repress dissent, and so for months now Members have come to the floor to speak out about this crisis.

I have written and spoken to administration officials, to U.N. officials, and to European officials to call for action and a firm unified message to Khartoum. I have raised the issue, as have

many colleagues, in numerous Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearings. This April, my colleague, Senator Brownback, and I introduced S. Con. Res. 99 condemning the actions of the Sudanese Government. I have joined many of my colleagues in supporting Senator DeWine's effort to direct urgently needed funds to Darfur for humanitarian relief, and I am a cosponsor of S. Con. Res. 124 acknowledging the genocide that is unfolding in Darfur, and I commend the leadership of Senators Corzine and Brownback, the sponsors of this legislation.

This is a tremendously difficult and complex situation. I commend the Secretary of State for traveling to Darfur to raise the profile on this issue. I commend the efforts of the USAID to respond to the urgent humanitarian needs in CHAD and IDPs in Darfur.

The administration can and must do more. First, the President needs to put in charge a senior official who can speak authoritatively to Khartoum and to key regional players, someone who is focused on Sudan exclusively each and every day. It is almost inexplicable that this has not been done to date.

Since our former colleague, Senator Jack Danforth, left his post as the President's special envoy for Sudan to serve as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, it appears that no one has been in charge of this issue on a day-to-day basis while this genocide unfolds. What kind of signal does this send about our seriousness? We need someone senior, with knowledge of the African and Arab worlds, put in place today to coordinate U.S. policy and deliver authoritative U.S. messages on a daily basis, to seize on fleeting opportunities, eliminate any confusion, match available resources with urgent needs, and constantly hold the Sudan Government's feet to the fire.

We also need serious thinking today about how to improve the security situation in Darfur. To date, the Government of Sudan has utterly failed to honor its commitments to disarm the janjaweed and to stop their brutal campaign.

Our strategy cannot simply consist of waiting for them to act. This is the same regime that orchestrated this misery in the first place. We cannot leave them in the driver's seat. So even as we push diplomatically for meaningful action from Khartoum, even as we do the hard work of building a strong, unified multilateral coalition to send a clear message about the serious consequences that will result from continued intransigence, we must develop plans to help people in spite of the Government of Sudan's policies. That means finding a way to provide security for Darfur's vulnerable populations and for the humanitarian organizations working to assist them.

We need to be working now to collect testimony and evidence so that those responsible for atrocities in Darfur can be held accountable for their crimes. This must not be an afterthought. It is a central part of our obligation. And in addition to appropriately and sensitively collecting testimony, we should be making plans today to develop strategies to reach the survivors of rape in Darfur with medical assistance, counseling, and community-based support strategies to help address issues of stigma.

Ultimately, we need to think about underlying issues of political disenfranchisement that stoked the initial conflict in Darfur. The North-South peace process made real progress, and I applaud the efforts of the many African, European, and American diplomats who worked so hard to help the parties come to agreement. But the process only created real political space for two entities, the Government of Sudan and the Sudanese People's Liberation Movement of the South. Neither the South nor the North are monolithic. We need to think today about political accommodations that can give the disenfranchised a voice in determining their own destiny.

I share the outrage of my colleagues. But I know that the people of Darfur--the malnourished children, the victims of rape, the broken families struggling to survive--this people need more than our outrage. They need our action.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded and I be permitted to speak as in morning business.

Mr. President, I rise today to speak on an issue that too easily comes off our agenda in America and around the globe. We accepted S. Con. Res. 99 which condemns the Government of the Republic of Sudan for its participation and complicity in the attacks against innocent civilians in the impoverished Darfur region of western Sudan. I think it is not enough just for us to be condemning in this situation. It has all of the makings of turning into a humanitarian crisis that rivals or at least approaches the kinds of problems we saw in Rwanda.

While we will take a stand in recognizing it as a problem, I think it is absolutely essential that we maintain attention and focus when there are so many events in the world that draw us away.

The United Nations, international humanitarian and human rights organizations, as well as our own Government, agree that the campaign by the extremist, theocratic Sudanese Government and their militia allies against Muslim civilians of African ethnicity in Darfur, western Sudan, over the last 14 months has driven over 1 million civilians from their home. We have the risk of another tragic genocidal action in place.

The 1 million Muslim civilians displaced within Darfur, Sudanese citizens victimized by their own Government, cling to life as displaced, homeless persons living in the open or in pathetic and inadequate camps, in constant fear of further attacks and depredation.

Their physical condition is severely weakened, food supplies are exhausted, and the international community so far has been unable to get critically needed food assistance into the interior, due to deliberate interference and

obstruction by the Khartoum government. These individuals, these Muslim civilians, are fleeing systematic attacks by their own Government, Sudanese armed forces, and their militia allies, the ``janjaweed.''

The horrors which civilian families in Darfur are fleeing include the cold-blooded murder of unarmed civilians; pillage and burning of villages; organized, systematic rapes of women--wives, daughters, sisters; rape used as a deliberate weapon of terror and political control; and the deliberate destruction of farms, the irrigation systems, and food stockpiles on which this already impoverished region depends; in other words, deliberately manufactured starvation that will lead to the kind of real potential for genocide that we have seen in other places on the African Continent. We must stay alert. We must keep the focus of public opinion on this issue.

Last is a key point. Even though from 10,000 to as many as 30,000 civilians have died so far in Darfur since February, 2003, the final death numbers for 2004 and 2005 may prove far higher because of the actions that are being taken and the lack of ability for the international community to actually participate and provide assistance for the unbelievable inhumane conditions.

This is all in the context of a very difficult environment-- underdeveloped, impassable roads, huge swings in the nature of the weather. It is an incredibly complex and debilitating human situation which needs to be brought to attention. While genocide may not yet have occurred in Darfur, the elements are in place. The possibility of such horrors should not be far from our minds. That is why I speak out about it on the Senate floor, and I will do it over and over. This needs to be made into something about which we have a positive sense of responsibility, both here in the United States and in the international community.

U.N. Secretary Kofi Annan has compared the genocide in Rwanda 10 years ago to events that are now unfolding. It will not be enough to go back and look, after the fact, to this kind of inhumanity to man.

We will have, later this year and next, an occasion to vow yet again, in the wake of another deliberately inflicted mass murder and disaster, to say: Never again. But we can do that now as opposed to after the fact. I hope all of us in this body, those of us who are part of the Foreign Relations Committee and are very focused on these issues, will make sure it stays a priority, although that is very hard in the complex world we have. So I hope by speaking out today and as we go forward that this Darfur situation will not fall off the radar screen.

This is a real risk of genocide evolving. I think it absolutely essential that our Government stand up, stand tall, be outspoken, make sure we are not tolerant of the developments that are so readily reported in that part of the world. It is important that we recognize it and keep it in the limelight so world public opinion can stop this kind of action before it happens.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.