Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, I chaired a hearing of the Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Human Rights that examined the current conflict between the Republic of the Sudan and the Republic of South Sudan and the policy options for forestalling a full- blown war that are available to the United States and the rest of the international community. As we met yesterday, the two countries move ever closer to all-out war, and some strategy to avert this eventuality must be devised soon if it is not created already. Our hearing should reveal what such a strategy is or will be.

The United States is one of the guarantors of the peace process that ended the second North-South civil war in 2005, but it is not our responsibility alone to prevent what everyone believes would be disaster for two nations and their populations and likely for the welfare of their neighbors. The United Nations and the African Union certainly bear some responsibility for working to restore peace. However, no lasting peace will be likely if other interested parties fail to play a positive role in this crisis.

The Khartoum government is now talking about ``the spirit of jihad'' rising in the North. Jihad is often interpreted as a call for all true believers to help in the fight against one's enemy. Sudan reportedly reached out to the Arab League to initiate discussions on the current crisis, and the Arab League might be able to convince Sudan's leaders to calm down their rhetoric and help them see the negative end result of their warmongering. If Arab nations can support a workable plan to fulfill the provisions of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, CPA, that ended the second Sudan civil war, then they will have helped a nation led by people who consider themselves Arabs to create a sustainable future with peace and security.

China imports five percent of its oil from Sudan currently, and according to the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, that total could rise soon to 10 percent due to regional tensions in the Persian Gulf. Oil shipments from Sudan depend on both the southern supply and the northern pipelines. War between the two would have a significant impact on China's ability to continue importing Sudanese oil, and as a result, Beijing has been trying to mediate the current dispute. South Sudan President Salva Kiir Mayardit has been in Beijing this week for discussions on ending the dispute between the two countries.

But while all nations must join in the effort to end the Sudan-South Sudan conflict, the difficulty of achieving a lasting peace is evident from the long history of North-South enmity, mistrust and war. During colonial times, the northerners and southerners were treated differently, and when independence finally came in 1956, the continuing estrangement of Muslim northerners and Christian and animist southerners was established.

The first civil war that began in 1955 was the result of an Arab-led government in Khartoum that broke promises of inclusion and marginalized southerners. The massacre of northerners in the South only exacerbated the growing hatred between them. After 11 years of relative peace, the second civil war broke out in 1983 when the Sudan People's Liberation Army fought for the independence of the South. The CPA not only ended the second civil war, it set the South on the road to independence, which was finally achieved in 2011.

Unfortunately, the peace agreement which laid out the path to a sustainable peace, was never fully implemented. The genocide in Darfur distracted the international community from fulfilling the CPA, and nearly a year after South Sudan became a nation, there is no agreed- upon border, the Abyei region remains in dispute, citizenship remains in dispute for those in border areas and there is no agreement on how oil revenues are to be divided. With all these unresolved issues, significant tensions, and even some form of conflict was inevitable, especially between antagonists with a long history of mistrust.

The animosity between leaders from both sides does not bode well for peace talks or a peace accord that will be sustainable. Both sides have taken actions that have made the situation we now face more difficult to resolve, but a false equivalency will not help us achieve a lasting peace. Whatever the international community thinks of the South's capture of the oil junction town of Heglig, no nation will allow an antagonist to use a location as a staging ground for repeated attacks without retaliation. Sudan's government has been brutally oppressing Darfur, and more recently has relentlessly attacked Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile states for months. We have held multiple hearings on the destruction in Sudan since last August. To equate months of vicious attacks that have killed or displaced thousands with the short-term occupation of a strategic town will neither placate the North into ending its cruelty against its own citizens nor shame the South into withdrawing from the staging ground for assaults against it.

I have met both Sudan President Omar Bashir and South Sudan President Kiir. I found President Bashir to be obstinate and uncaring about the destruction his armed forces have unleashed on his own citizens. President Kiir has been single-minded in pursuing independence over Sudanese unity since he assumed leadership of South Sudan in 2005. There have been numerous cease-fires and peace accords between the North and South over the years--none of them enduring. If we cannot devise a means of achieving a lasting peace, we may gain a brief halt in the fighting, but the war will inevitably resume at some point.

Our witnesses yesterday provided Congress an update on what is happening on the ground in Sudan and South Sudan and help us understand more fully the situation we now face.

Mr. Speaker, this month marks 20 years since the start of the tragic conflict in Bosnia-Herzegovina. In remembrance, 11,541 red chairs lined the main street of Sarajevo during the first week of April, one for every man, woman and child killed in the beautiful Bosnian capital of Sarajevo when it was a city under siege by militant Serb forces in the surrounding suburbs and hillsides.

Like the memorial in Srebrenica commemorating the genocide three years later in which 8,000 people, mostly men and boys, were slaughtered by forces under the same overall command, the chairs were a sober reminder of how horrific and senseless the violence in Bosnia truly was. They are also a reminder of the international community's complicity in these crimes by its own inaction, when it had the means to intervene and save lives.

The result of the delayed response to aggression against Bosnia plagues the people of that country today. The realities of the conflict, including the ethnic cleansing, were accommodated by compromises in the Dayton Agreement needed to restore peace. While necessary then, today these compromises have allowed political leaders like Milorad Dodik in the entity of Republika Srpska to block at will progress on reforms needed for the county's stability, prosperity and integration. While I welcome positive developments which have taken place in Bosnia in recent months, above all the formation of a new government, it remains disappointing that movement forward is so painfully slow. The people of Bosnia, regardless of their ethnicity, certainly deserve better.

Today those responsible for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide continue to be prosecuted at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, located in The Hague, or in the war crimes courts of the countries concerned. This effort is important and warrants international support until the last crime is prosecuted.

Justice alone, however, cannot bring closure to Bosnia's war victims. That is why I introduced a few weeks ago H.R. 4344, which among other actions supports the work of the International Commission for Missing Persons in locating and identifying persons missing as a result of conflicts and supporting the investigation of genocide and mass atrocities. It is also why I now repeat my call made last year for a permanent memorial to be established at the site of the Omarska concentration camp in northeastern Bosnia, so that the survivors of the crimes associated with the ethnic cleansing of that region of the country may also have a place to remember those lost. Such memorials also serve as bulwarks against forces which try to excuse, minimize and even deny the crimes that took place.

As Chairman or Co-Chairman of the Helsinki Commission for most of the 20 years since the Bosnian conflict erupted, I have chaired dozens of hearings and introduced numerous pieces of legislation which have helped to document the atrocities, shape policy responses, and assist in post-conflict recovery. I have also visited the country on numerous occasions. I can assure the people of Bosnia that I and my colleagues on the Helsinki Commission will continue to work for their human rights and the democratic, prosperous future they deserve.

Mr. Speaker, yesterday I chaired a hearing that examined U.S. policy toward American exports to Africa as a part of U.S.-Africa trade. The original African Growth and Opportunity Act, or AGOA, was intended to be mutually beneficial for both African and American entrepreneurs, but the focus of the three administrations since its passage in 2000 has been on increasing African exports to the United States and the resultant job growth on the African continent.

This policy has neglected the job growth here in the United States that could be created through increasing U.S. exports to Africa. The purpose of the Increasing American Jobs Through Greater Exports to Africa Act of 2012, H.R. 4221, which I introduced together with Rep. Bobby Rush on March 20th, is to address this important component of U.S.-Africa trade by increasing U.S. exports to Africa by 200 percent over the next decade. This bill does not replace AGOA; it complements it by providing for a rebalancing that makes it beneficial to Americans as well as Africans. Senators Dick Durbin and John Boozman have introduced an identical version of the bill in the Senate--S. 2215.

The bill intends to achieve its ambitious, but achievable, goal by taking several steps, including the creation of a U.S.-Africa trade coordinator to ensure that all U.S. agencies involved in trade work in concert with one another. This legislation also calls for not less than 25% of available U.S. trade financing to be devoted to facilitating U.S.-Africa trade. Furthermore, it encourages the descendants of Africa in this country, who largely operate small and medium-sized businesses, to play a greater role in trade with the countries in Africa.

Small and medium enterprises in Africa and the United States have not benefited from AGOA to the extent that they could have or should have, and the bill addresses this deficit. U.S. companies can benefit from an expanding African market of businesses and consumers, and increased American production will create new, sustainable jobs.

Some have expressed concern that such an expansion of U.S. exports to Africa could flood African markets and damage their economies. However, many of these U.S. exports, such as in the agriculture sector, will enable African producers to become more efficient and profitable and create jobs for their workers as well. In trade, the best situation is one of observing the principle of comparative advantage: countries sell what they make most efficiently and buy what another country makes most efficiently. In this way, both buyer and seller countries benefit from trade by meeting each other's needs.

According to the U.S. International Trade Administration, the United States is the world's largest importer of sub-Saharan African goods, receiving 20.2% of the region's total global exports. On the other hand, during the height of the global recession in 2008 2009, our exports to sub-Saharan Africa plummeted by 45% from $78.3 billion to $42.8 billion. As of the end of 2011, the United States sold nearly $20.3 billion worth of goods to sub-Saharan Africa, while purchasing more than $74 billion worth of goods. Consequently, we had a trade deficit with the nations of sub-Saharan Africa last year of nearly $54 billion.

The African Development Bank estimates that one out of three Africans is considered to be in the middle class--that's 314 million Africans who have escaped poverty and can now buy consumer goods, including those from the United States. In order to reduce our trade deficit with the nations of Africa, there is room to engage in trade that increases economic opportunity for Africans and Americans. We just haven't taken advantage of the opportunities that exist. The United States has over the last decade taken many steps to enhance U.S.-Africa trade. African governments have taken steps to encourage trans-Atlantic trade as well. Still, both sides can do better.

More exports help the economy grow because they typically boost factory production, which can fuel more hiring and lead to greater consumer spending. Fewer imports subtract less from growth, largely because consumers are spending less on overseas goods and services. H.R. 4221 would contribute to job growth in the United States by facilitating increased sales to the emerging markets of Africa.

The rest of the world understands how valuable the nations of Africa have become as economic markets. Last month, this subcommittee held a hearing on the role of China in Africa that not only pointed out China's designs on selling their goods to Africa countries, but also illustrated the economic interest in Africa shown by nations as far- flung as Brazil, Turkey and South Korea. We in the United States must join in the more equal two-way trade the rest of the world envisions for their commerce with Africa.

Our witnesses yesterday discussed current administration policy toward U.S.-Africa trade, the U.S. business sector view on trade with Africa, and examined the realities of doing business in Africa by both a current and a prospective enterprise on the continent.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of my colleague Mr. Meeks' bill to award Raoul Wallenberg a Congressional Gold Medal in recognition of his heroic action in saving the lives of Jews in Hungary during the Holocaust.

Few people could be more deserving of a Congressional Gold Medal than Raoul Wallenberg, a Swedish diplomat stationed in Budapest with the American War Refugee Board, who, at great risk to himself, is credited with saving the lives of approximately 100,000 Jews. In the closing months of World War II, Wallenberg issued Swedish passports to Jews, and was instrumental in preventing the extermination of the Nazi- created Jewish ghetto in Budapest. Many moving stories are told of the depth of his personal concern for the Jews of Hungary, living under threat of death--and of his fortitude and tireless energy in resisting the monstrous plans of the Nazis.

Mr. Speaker, I'd also like to draw attention to H. Res. 610, a resolution I introduced, with my colleague Mr. Turner of New York, on the fate of Raoul Wallenberg. As Mr. Meeks' bill points out, ``the fate of Raoul Wallenberg remains a mystery.'' Yet in this mystery we have a few clues--he was arrested by Soviet forces in Hungary in 1945, and, without going into detail on the subsequent Soviet explanations of what happened to him in their custody, we can certainly say that they are incomplete, inconsistent, and unreliable. We have more than sufficient reason to suspect that the Soviet government has never dealt frankly In explaining what happened to Wallenberg. Most people knowledgeable about the case believe that the Soviet government executed Wallenberg. So my and Mr. Turner's resolution asks the President and Secretary of State to press the Russian government for a full and complete accounting of Wallenberg's fate. Certainly sixty-seven years after Wallenberg's disappearance, and twenty-two after the demise of the Soviet Union, this is long overdue.

I thank my friend Mr. Meeks for his bill to award Wallenberg the Congressional Gold Medal, and urge my colleagues to support it.

Mr. Speaker, yesterday I chaired a hearing of the Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Human Rights focused on U.S. policy regarding China's evolving role in Africa. China has become America's premier economic competitor in Africa, providing loans and making investments far beyond what the United States is currently prepared to provide.

China has been engaged with African governments since the 1950s and has always portrayed itself as a fellow developing nation that was interested in solidarity with its prospective development partners. In reality, the Chinese government always had plans to gain the support they hoped to create among the newly independent African governments. The stadiums, other buildings and roads constructed by the Chinese were intended to build support for China among the African bloc of developing nations in its competition with the then-Soviet Union. Later, the goal was building support for the People's Republic of China replacing Taiwan as the sole China in the United Nations.

Now they no longer have to compete with the Soviet Union, and they have their seat on the UN Security Council, from where they protect dictators such as Omar al-Bashir and Robert Mugabe. So what is their aim in their Africa policy?

Is China a development partner for Africa? In 2005, the China Development Bank created a $1 billion Africa Trade and Investment Fund, but the trade and investment initiatives funded cannot take place without the significant involvement of Chinese suppliers. It is difficult to quantify Chinese development aid to Africa because they refuse to disclose how much aid and investment goes to specific countries, although we do know that Chinese investment in Africa is estimated to exceed $10 billion. Because the loan details are not open to public scrutiny, it is feared that these loans may pose a danger to the debt sustainability of African governments.

Is China an economic competitor to African countries? Many believe that China is engaged in a short-term resource grab, which takes little account of local needs and concerns, whether developmental, environmental or with respect to issues like human rights. Coupled with Chinese manufacturing and trade efficiency, this approach suggests that African development gains are being challenged, if not undermined, by Chinese competitiveness.

China, which has increasingly attempted to lock up much of the supply of strategic minerals from African countries, is now the leading producer of what are known as rare earth elements or rare earth metals, which are used in various technological devices, such as superconductors, electronic polishers, refining catalysts and hybrid car components. As time goes on, these minerals will increase in importance in the 21st century economy. South Africa used to be the world's leading source for these minerals, but its production is dwarfed by what China produces, which now represents 95% of rare earth supplies. Chinese production often releases toxic wastes into the general water supply, and that would tend to discourage increased South African production absent what could be expensive environmental safeguards.

Is China the new colonizer of Africa? Some would say that label is an exaggeration. However, China exports small businesses and labor to Africa. There are an estimated 800 Chinese corporations doing business in Africa and 750,000 Chinese working or living for extended periods in African countries. When their original assignments are completed, these Chinese workers become entrepreneurs selling subsidized Chinese products to out-compete their African counterparts.

An increasing number of Africans are becoming skeptical of Chinese behavior in their countries. For example, the issue of Chinese business practices became an issue in the 2011 elections in Zambia. Some Zambians felt the Chinese were worse than the British colonialists in their behavior toward workers. Following the election there, incoming President Michael Sata said to Chinese investors: ``We welcome your investment, but as we welcome your investment, your investment should benefit Zambians and not Chinese.''

One of the most prevalent charges against China's involvement in Africa is that they don't support international conditionality on aid to African countries. Therefore, Chinese involvement is seen as undermining the concept of tied aid that is intended to promote good governance. Chinese officials counter that they prefer not to interfere in the internal affairs of African governments.

While much of the rest of the international community regarded Sudan as having committed genocide, or at least crimes against humanity in its Darfur region, China, a major economic partner with the government in Khartoum, refused at first to join in sanctions against Sudan. China abstained from the vote in September 2004 when the U.N. Security Council passed Resolution 1564 condemning the mass killing of civilians in the Darfur region, even though the measure stopped short of imposing oil sanctions. China even threatened to veto any further move to impose sanctions. It took concerted international pressure prior to the 2008 Beijing Olympics to force China to move closer to the international position on pressing Sudan to end its human rights abuses.

In a 2006 background report entitled, ``China's Influence in Africa: Implications for the United States,'' the Heritage Foundation stated that China has provided weapons that have prolonged African conflicts or entrenched dictatorships. In 2003, several Hong Kong firms were accused of smuggling illegal arms including Chinese-made AK 47s, machine guns and rocket-propelled grenade launchers into Liberia and neighboring Sierra Leone and Cote d'Ivoire, where rebels and mercenaries were involved in civil wars.

In 2004, the report continued, China sold Zimbabwe fighter aircraft and military vehicles for $200 million despite the U.S. and EU arms embargo against Zimbabwe. China also provided a military-strength radio-jamming device, which the Harare government used to block broadcasts of anti-government reports from independent media outlets during the 2005 parliamentary election campaign.

So what really are China's goals for its African engagement?

Mr. Speaker, on Sunday, March 25, Belarusan- Americans commemorated Belarusan Independence Day. On that date in 1918, during World War I, the Belarusan National Republic was declared. Although independence was short-lived and Belarus forcibly subjected to Soviet rule, it did mark an historically significant milestone in the aspirations of the Belarusan people for freedom and their own unique identity.

While Belarus became independent in 1991 with the dissolution of the Soviet Union, this independence today is under threat thanks to the dictatorial rule of Alexander Lukashenka, who has relentlessly squelched dissent, strangled democratic institutions and the rule of law, stifled human rights and political liberties, and refused to reform the Soviet-type state-dominated economy. This has made Belarus dangerously vulnerable to Russian influence and has greatly weakened its prospects for integration into the European family of nations.

The brutal crackdown that began 15 months ago with the fraudulent December 19, 2010 election persists. Its most recent manifestation is the barring of numerous opposition leaders, human rights activists and independent journalists from traveling abroad--yet another in a litany of violations of Belarus' OSCE commitments. Especially egregious is the continued imprisonment of democratic opposition leaders and activists, and human rights defenders Andrei Sannikau, Mikalai Statekevich, Zmitser Bandarenka, Ales Byalyatski, Syarhei Kavalenka, Zmitser Dashkevich, Pavel Seviarynets, and others, many of whom face inhumane conditions in detention. I'd like to add my voice to those of countless Belarusans and Belarusan-Americans calling for the immediate and unconditional release of all political prisoners in Belarus.

Mr. Speaker, in January the President signed into law the Belarus Democracy and Human Rights Act of 2011, which I authored. This law strengthens, in view of Lukashenka's crackdown, two earlier laws I wrote promoting democracy and supporting the Belarusan people in their struggle to replace the Lukashenka dictatorship with a representative government that will respect human rights and democratic values. But Congress's efforts on behalf of the Belarusan people can't end there-- I'd like to ask my colleagues to continue to raise Belarusan human rights issues with the administration, with foreign parliamentarians, and, whenever we encounter them, with officials of the Lukashenka dictatorship.

Thank you very much, Madam Speaker.

Late last month, two bioethicists--Dr. Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva--published an outrageous paper in the Journal of Medical Ethics, justifying the deliberate, premeditated murder of new- born babies during the first days and even weeks after birth.

Giubilini and Minerva wrote: ``When circumstances occur after birth that

would have justified abortion, what we call after-birth abortion should be permissible.''

Madam Speaker, they've just coined a brand-new phrase, ``after-birth abortion,'' which is the killing of newborns, the killing of little children--boys and girls--immediately after their births and up to weeks later. These bioethicists argue that if a newly born child poses an economic burden on a family or is disabled or is unwanted that that child can be murdered in cold blood because the baby lacks intrinsic value, and according to Giubilini and Minerva, it is simply not a person.

Giubilini and Minerva write: ``Actual people's well-being--'' and you and I, Madam Speaker, are actual people; adults are actual people according to them ``--could be threatened by a new-born, even if healthy child, requiring energy, money and care which the family might happen to be in short supply of.''

As any parents--especially moms--will tell you, children in general, and newborns in particular, require an enormous amount of energy, money, and boatloads of love. If any of those things, however, are lacking or pose what Giubilini and Minerva call a ``threat,'' does that justify a death sentence? Are the lives of new-born children and new- born babies so cheap? so expendable?

The murder of newly born children is further justified by Giubilini and Minerva in this renowned journal's article--why they carried it is certainly suspect--because new-born infants, like their slightly younger sisters and brothers in the womb, ``cannot have formed any aim that she is prevented from accomplishing.'' In other words, no dreams, no plans for the future, no ``aims'' that can be discerned, recognized or understood by adults equal no life at all.

This preposterous, arbitrary, and evil prerequisite for the attainment of legal personhood is not only bizarre; it is inhumane in the extreme. Stripped of its pseudo-intellectual underpinnings, the Giubilini and Minerva rationale for murdering newborns in the nursery is indistinguishable from any other child predator wielding a knife or a gun.

Giubilini and Minerva say the devaluation of new-born babies is inextricably linked to the devaluation of unborn children. Let me say that again. The devaluation of new-born babies, even into weeks of their lives outside their mothers' wombs, is inextricably linked to the devaluation of unborn children and is, indeed, the logical extension of the abortion culture. They also write this: that they ``propose to call the practice after-birth abortion rather than infanticide in order to emphasize that the moral status of the individual killed--'' that is to say the baby ``--is comparable to that of a fetus . . . Whether she will exist is exactly what our choice is about.''

So let's again get this right because the unborn child has been deemed to be a nonperson and can be killed at will. For the new-born child, who is very, very similar in almost every aspect except dependency and its not being a little bit more mature, the choice is, if it is unwanted, that the parents can order the killing, the execution, of that child.

Madam Speaker, these anti-child, pro-murder rationalizations remind me of other equally disturbing rants from highly credentialed individuals over the years. Princeton's Peter Singer suggested a couple of years ago--and I quote him in pertinent part:

There are various things you can say that are sufficient to

give moral status to a child after a few months, maybe 6

months or something like that, and you get perhaps a full

moral status, really, only after 2 years.

Break that down. Only after 2 years, Madam Speaker, should we really confer a sense of personhood to a child who is no longer a baby anymore because of this particular intellectual's perspective.

Dr. James Watson, the Nobel Laureate for unraveling the mystery of DNA many, many years ago, wrote in Prism Magazine:

If a child were not declared alive until 3 days after

birth, then all parents could be allowed the choice only a

few have under the present system. The doctor could allow the

child to die if the parents so choose and save a lot of

misery and suffering. I believe this view is the only

rational, compassionate attitude to have.

Compassionate to allow a newborn to die? I think not.

In like manner, Dr. Francis Crick, who received the Nobel Prize along with Watson said:

No new-born infant should be declared human until it has

passed certain tests regarding its genetic endowment and that

if it fails these tests it forfeits the right to live.

Madam Speaker, the dehumanization of unborn children has been going on for decades. What is less understood and appreciated is the dehumanization of new-born and very young infants. That too has been going on for years, but it has gotten in the last few years demonstrably worse.

Giubilini and Minerva's article must serve as a wake-up call. The lives of young children who are truly the most unprotected class of individuals in our society are under assault. Hard questions need to be asked and answered and defenders of life must be mobilized. I truly believe we have a duty to protect the weakest and the most vulnerable from violence; and now even the hospital nursery is not a place of refuge or sanctuary.

Madam Speaker, we must strive for consistency. I have been hearing about it for 32 years, and I've worked every single day of my congressional life on human rights issues, from human trafficking to religious freedom. I've written the Trafficking Victims Protection Act back in 2000 to combat modern-day slavery. I work against torture all over the world, wherever and whenever it rears its horrific head. That is especially in places like China, North Korea, and elsewhere.

But I am left to wonder why so many who claim to be proponents of human rights systematically dehumanize and exclude the weakest and the most vulnerable human beings from legal protection.

Why the modern-day surge in prejudice and ugly bias against unborn children and now, by logical extension, new-born children? Why the policy of exclusion rather than inclusion? They are indeed part of the human family. We should embrace them, love them, and protect them. Why is lethal violence against children, abortion, and premeditated killing of new-born infants marketed and sold as somehow benign or progressive, enlightened, and compassionate? Why have so many good people turned a blind eye and looked askance as mothers are wounded by abortion and their babies in the womb pulverized by suction machines 20 to 30 times more powerful than household vacuum cleaners or dismembered with surgical knives or poisoned with chemicals? Looking back, how could anyone in the House or the Senate or President Clinton justify the hideous procedure called ``partial birth abortion''?

Madam Speaker, since 1973, well over 54 million babies have had abortion forced upon them. Some of those children have been exterminated in the second and third trimester. These are known as pain-capable babies. Those kids have suffered excruciating pain as the abortionist committed his violence upon him or her. Why are some surprised that now the emerging class of victims, new-born kids, new- born children, are being slaughtered in Holland and elsewhere while a perverse proposal to murder any new-born children, sick or healthy, is advanced in an otherwise serious and respected ethics journal?

I urge Members to read this article. It will make you sick. It certainly is the opening salvo in an assault on new-born children.

In conclusion, Madam Speaker, children born and unborn are precious. Children sick, disabled, or healthy possess fundamental human rights that no sane or compassionate society can abridge. The premeditated murder of new-born babies, those who are 1 day old after birth, 2 weeks, 3 weeks old is now being justified as being morally equivalent to abortion.

I respectfully submit, Madam Speaker, that the Congress, the courts, the President, and society at large have a sacred duty to protect all children from violence, murder, and exploitation. We don't have a moment to lose. The child predators are working overtime to create more victims.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, last week, former Ukrainian Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko was sentenced to four years imprisonment in yet another politically motivated trial. This comes after the imprisonment--also the result of an unfair trial on specious charges--of his ally, former Prime Minister Yuliya Tymoshenko, who continues to languish in prison in ill health.

The sentencing of Mr. Lutsenko is a further confirmation that the regime of President Viktor Yanukovych is not taking its OSCE human rights and democracy obligations seriously. The imprisonment of opposition leaders Tymoshenko and Lutsenko prohibits their participation in October's parliamentary elections, raising serious questions about whether Ukraine will meet OSCE election standards. This could be especially troubling given Ukraine's assumption of the OSCE Chairmanship in January, 2013, two months after these elections. As Chairman of the Helsinki Commission, it is also of concern to me and my colleagues, who have long advocated an independent, democratic, and free Ukraine.

Mr. Lutsenko's conviction is disconcerting in that it starkly illustrates the deterioration of human rights, democracy and the rule of law under the presidency of Viktor Yanukovych, who has pressed the pause button on Ukraine's once-promising advance towards democracy--and increasingly it seems he is switching to the reverse button. Instead, what we now see is something increasingly reminiscent of the kind of authoritarianism that exists in Russia, Belarus and elsewhere in the post-Soviet space.

Ukraine's democratic backsliding is harming relations with the EU and the United States, and both have repeatedly made clear that for relations to improve, respect for human rights and the democratic process must improve. Most importantly, this now two-year deterioration negatively affects the Ukrainian people, who, following the Orange Revolution, had tasted the fruits of freedom, and are now increasingly experiencing the burden of its undoing.

It is time for President Yanukovych to show respect for the dignity of his own people by

putting an end to political prosecutions and other reprisals against those who oppose him and allow their full participation in political life. In order to find credibility with both the Ukrainian people and the international community, he must end restrictions on freedom of speech and association and reverse the debilitating corruption and judicial subservience to the executive which has so eroded the rule of law.

Mr. Speaker, the time has come for the Ukrainian authorities to stop their slide to authoritarianism and resulting isolation which will only harm Ukrainians who for so long--and at such great cost--have struggled for freedom, dignity and justice.

Mr. Speaker, it is with deep sorrow that I inform the House that our dear friend and colleague, Don Payne, has passed. He had colon cancer.

In a few moments a privileged resolution will be offered on the floor that recognizes and honors this extraordinary man who dedicated his entire life to public service, a man who made a significant difference in the lives of many in his district, in our State, in the Nation, and in the world.

Elected in 1988, after first serving as a Newark city councilman and Essex County freeholder, this high school teacher and coach-turned- politician went on to be the first African American ever to serve in Congress from the State of New Jersey.

Don fought tenaciously to combat the HIV AIDS pandemic and mitigate the loss of life and morbidity from TB and malaria on the subcontinent of Africa. He coauthored the Sudan Peace Act and worked tirelessly to end the genocide in both South Sudan and Darfur. As a matter of fact, he even risked his life in Somalia--was shot at--in the pursuit of peace.

I know firsthand, Mr. Speaker, how much he truly cared and how hard he worked for peace and reconciliation in war-ravaged nations. I served as the ranking member of the Africa Subcommittee when he chaired it, and he served as the ranking member when I chaired it.

Finally, let me just say that Don Payne also served as chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, and until his untimely death today, chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation. He was predeceased by his wife, Hazel. Don is also the proud father of three, grandfather of four, and great grandfather of one.

Donald Payne, Mr. Speaker, will be missed.

I yield to my good friend and colleague, Mr. Pallone.

Mr. Speaker, I do ask for a moment of silence to remember our dearly departed friend, Don Payne.

Mr. Speaker, I offer a privileged resolution and ask for its immediate consideration.

I thank you very much and appreciate the gentlelady for yielding. Let me join my distinguished colleagues in expressing our deepest condolences to Don Payne's family. He was truly a remarkable man. I had the privilege of sitting next to him for about 15 years as I was the chairman or he was the chairman of the Human Rights Committee, the Africa Committee as well. I was his ranking, he was my chairman, and we always worked in a very cooperative way. We always had mutual respect, and he had such a deep compassion for the people who have suffered so much on the subcontinent of Africa.

Don Payne was quiet, but always determined. Extremely thoughtful, a humanitarian in the extreme, and he fought for so many important issues. You know, it was not a slam dunk or in any way a given that PEPFAR, the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, would become law. Don was there working in a bipartisan way to ensure that sufficient funding, sufficient authorities were given to the U.S. Agency for International Development to mount a massive effort to combat the pandemic of HIV/AIDS. He did the same thing with malaria and the Malaria Caucus, and he did the same thing with tuberculosis, which sadly is an opportunistic disease that afflicts so many people who have

Mr. Speaker, a young Christian pastor sits today in prison in Iran--separated from his wife and young children, facing the death penalty--because he will not lie about his beliefs. He will not lie even to save himself.

He will not lie even to spare his family suffering. He is a man of extraordinary conviction. A man of decision. A man who knows what he believes. Youcef Nadarkhani will follow his conscience though it cost him everything.

Iranian courts have repeatedly asked him, on pain of death, to reject his Christian faith and say that he believes in Islam. He responds, ``I cannot.''

The resolution (H. Res. 556) on the floor this evening is not an attempt to say which religion is right. Rather, this is a resolution that affirms that Youcef Nadarkhani has the God-given right--even the responsibility--to believe as his conscience directs him.

No human government should interfere.

Iran is a member of the United Nations and signatory to both the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Both documents affirm that that every individual has ``the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion,'' which includes the ``freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance;''

Under international law voluntarily agreed to by Iran, Youcef Nadarkhani has the right to change his religion.

He was free to change from Islam to Christianity. He is free to change back.

But the government of Iran is NOT free to force him in either direction. Iran has made a commitment to leave men like Youcef Nadarkhani in peace. This resolution calls on Iran to follow international law.

Iran sets aside seats in its Parliament for Christians and permits hundreds of churches to function across the country. And yet it also cracks down on religious minorities, falsely seeing them as a security threat.

The most recent U.S. State Department Religious Freedom Report lists numerous cases of arrest and detention of Christians, both lay people and leaders. For instance:

On April 11, 2010, government agents arrested 19-year-old

Daniel Shahri, a Christian, on the basis of insulting Islam.

Shahri was able to contact his parents on April 14, 2010,

while being held in a prison in Isfahan. He was released on

April 24, 2010 on bail and awaits a trial date . . .

On January 8, 2010, the Fars Provincial Ministry of

Intelligence detained an unknown number of persons who were

reportedly Christians. Under interrogation the detainees gave

the names of those leading Christian groups in the area

leading to further arrest.

On December 24, 2009, Pakdasht security forces raided a

home-church gathering and arrested the 15 members who were in

attendance. All 15 were released in early January with orders

to return to sign documents. Upon returning three were

rearrested and held until March 17 when they were released .

. .

The report of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom underscores the danger to Muslim converts to Christianity in Iran and a recent increase in arrests. This report, issued in May 2011, indicates that:

Since June 2010, more than 250 Christians have been

arbitrarily arrested throughout the country. . . . In

December 2010 and January 2011 alone, approximately 120

Christians were arrested. . . . During the reporting period,

the number of incidents of Iranian authorities raiding church

services, harassing and threatening church members, and

arresting, convicting, and imprisoning worshippers and church

leaders has increased significantly. Christians, particularly

Evangelical and other Protestants, are subject to harassment,

arrests, close surveillance, and imprisonment; many are

reported to have fled the country. (emphasis added)

Tragically, Youcef Nadarkhani is not the only believer in prison. He is just the only one we know of who is facing the death penalty for apostasy.

Whatever the political conflicts between the United States and Iran, whatever the tensions over weapons--human rights do not change. Iran's signature on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights has not changed.

All nations, including Iran, must respect the consciences and religious freedom of their citizens--and not practice religious coercion.

Youcef Nadarkhani is not a political pawn. He is a person--a person being prayed for by citizens around the world.

Tonight, the U.S. Congress stands with him and with all people of conscience, calling on the Government of Iran to release him and ensure his safety.

Mr. Speaker, yesterday I chaired a joint hearing of the Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Human Rights and the Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere to focus on just one aspect--though a deeply troubling one--of the overall abysmal human rights record of the dictatorship in Cuba.

The hearing examined the ongoing violations of the human rights of Cuban political prisoners--from the arrest, prosecution, and persecution of political opponents of the Castro regime to the deplorable conditions of their imprisonment--to the terms under which they are released.

The announcement of the release of some prisoners in late December, in conjunction with the release over the past two years of more than three dozen political prisoners, has been described as a public relations move designed to portray a loosening of Cuba's political repression of opponents. Those of us who have had the privilege of knowing and working with Cuba's human rights champions for decades, and have heard first-hand of the brutality of the Castro government, are not so easily persuaded or deceived.

Cuba has been a totalitarian state with the Cuban Communist Party as the sole legal political party for more than half a century. Upon his seizure of power in Cuba in 1959, Fidel Castro promised a return to constitutional rule and democratic elections with social reforms. However, Castro's control over the military and government structures allowed his regime to crush dissent, marginalize resistance leaders and imprison or execute thousands of opponents. Between 1959 and 1962 alone, it is estimated that the Castro regime executed 3,200 people. Hundreds of thousands of Cubans fled an increasingly radical government. Those who remained in Cuba faced a repressive regime that denied basic human rights.

More than fifty years after Castro's assumption of power in Cuba, the U.S. Department of State human rights report on Cuba describes a government that still denies its citizens the right to change their government; threatens, harasses and beats its opponents through state security forces and government-organized mobs; sentences opponents to harsh and life-threatening prison conditions; arbitrarily detains human rights advocates and members of independent organizations, and selectively prosecutes perceived opponents and then denies them a fair trial.

Cuba's political prisoners are held, together with the rest of the prison population, in substandard and unhealthy conditions, where they face physical and sexual abuse. Most prisoners suffer from malnutrition and reside in overcrowded cells without appropriate medical attention. In fact, political prisoners face selective denial of medical care. Cuban prisons fail to segregate those held in pre-trial detention from long-term violent inmates, and minors are often mixed in with adults. Such are the conditions opponents of the Castro regime have faced over the years--some of them for decades.

Armando Valladares, who unfortunately couldn't join us yesterday, but who will appear at a future hearing, was a Cuban Postal Bank employee who was arrested for refusing to display a sign on his desk that promoted communism. Mr. Valladares was imprisoned in 1960 at age 23, and spent 22 years in prison. Like many freed political prisoners, Mr. Valladares moved to the United States.

In 1988, President Ronald Reagan appointed him to serve as the United States Ambassador to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, a position in which he served for two years. I was with Ambassador Valladares in Geneva when he succeeded in bringing Cuba before the commission for human rights violations and authorizing a U.N. fact- finding trip to Cuba to investigate prison conditions.

I have read Mr. Valladares' memoir--Against All Hope--a book that chronicles his experiences and that of others in Cuba's gulags. Mr. Valladares systematically describes the torture, cruelty, and degrading treatment by Cuban prison guards. Yet, like so many other heroic Cuban dissidents, he persisted and overcame.

Our surprise witness yesterday was the brilliant, humanitarian Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet. A medical doctor and courageous human rights advocate, Dr. Biscet was one of more than two dozen dissidents who were arrested and detained by Cuban police in August 1999 for organizing meetings in Havana and Matanzas. He was released after five days but was rearrested three more times. The second time he was arrested, later in 1999, he spent three years in prison. His third arrest in December 2002 resulted in a beating, but not imprisonment. Upon his fourth arrest in March 2003, he was sentenced to 25 years in prison. Along with more than 50 other dissidents, Dr. Biscet was released in March 2011 with the help of the Catholic Church. He has courageously remained in Cuba, where he continues to advocate for human rights. For his extraordinary bravery and commitment to freedom for the Cuban people, many of us have twice recommended Dr. Biscet for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Other political prisoners have not had the ability to choose where they live following their release. Normando Hernandez Gonzalez, an independent writer and journalist, was arrested in March 2003 along with 74 other dissidents in Camaguey and was sentenced to 25 years in prison. As a result of his serious abuse in prison, Mr. Hernandez eventually was diagnosed with several diseases of the digestive system and later tuberculosis. Due to his deteriorating medical condition, Mr. Hernandez was released from prison in July 2010 and taken to the Havana Airport, where he was briefly reunited with his wife and daughter before being forced to board an overnight flight to Spain. He later emigrated to Miami, where he currently resides.

I extend the gratitude of the subcommittee to our distinguished witnesses for joining us yesterday. My good friend and colleague Dan Burton, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Europe and Eurasia, testified about U.S. policy toward Cuba. In particular, we are deeply appreciative that Dr. Biscet took the serious risk that he will suffer retaliation for speaking with us publicly. The Castro regime should know

that there will be a price to pay if that should happen. It is our sincere hope that it does not, and that this hearing and the spotlight that it will shine on Cuban political prisoners will contribute to authentic freedom and respect for the human rights of all the people of Cuba.

I thank my great friend from California for his leadership, former Attorney General of California, one of the most decisive and

wonderful debaters in the House of Representatives and a great champion of life.

Mr. Speaker, President Obama's slick public relations offensive this past Friday contained neither an accommodation nor a compromise, nor a change in his coercion rule. It was, instead, a pernicious attack on religious freedom.

The Obama final rule promulgated on Friday is an unprecedented government attack on the conscience rights of religious entities and anyone else, and I repeat that, anyone else who, for moral reasons, cannot and will not pay for abortion-inducing drugs, such as ella, or contraception and sterilization procedures in their private insurance plans.

Mr. Obama is arrogantly using the coercive power of the state to force faith-based charities, hospitals and schools to conform to his will at the expense of conscience.

Mr. Obama's means of coercing compliance, ruinous fines of $2,000 per employee when faith-based organizations refuse to comply, and they will refuse to comply, will impose incalculable harm on millions of children educated in faith-based schools. It will also impose harm on the poor, sick, disabled, and frail elderly who are served with such extraordinary compassion and dignity by faith-based entities.

For example, Catholic Charities employs 70,000 employees. They will be hit with a fine by the Obama administration of $140 million per year. That's the fine. That's the penalty: $2,000 per employee.

Notre Dame has about 5,000 employees. That will be a $10 million fine on Notre Dame. And so it goes for those faith-based organizations.

Let me just say to my colleagues that vocal apologists of the Obama coercion rule say over and over again that the IOM, the Institute of Medicine, panel that reportedly researched and did recommend the coercion rule was somehow independent. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Journalist Kathryn Jean Lopez reported that the Human Life International organization looked into the members of the panel. You stack the panel, you get a predetermined outcome. They found that it was packed with pro-abortion activists.

For example, member Claire Brindis, member of the organization of NARAL Pro-Choice America; Angela Diaz, member of Physicians for Reproductive Choice and Health; Paula Johnson, chairwoman of Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts; Magda Peck, also on the board of directors, or was, of Planned Parenthood of Nebraska and Council Bluffs. She was chair of the board as well as vice chair. If you just stack an IOM or any other panel, you will get a predetermined outcome, and so they did.

Mr. Speaker, finally, the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act reasserts and restores conscience rights by making absolutely clear that no one can be compelled to subsidize so-called services in private insurance plans contrary to their religious beliefs or moral convictions. This legislation must be on the floor soon, and I hope the American people will realize how important this bill offered by Mr. Fortenberry is to conscience rights in America.

I thank my good friend for yielding.

announcement by the speaker pro tempore

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Human Rights, which I chair, examined U.S. policy options for dealing with the ongoing crisis in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, one of the priority countries in the United States' Africa policy as identified by the Administration and as confirmed by Congressional legislation and oversight over the past several years. This country is two-thirds the size of Western Europe and borders nine African countries. Its problems extend well beyond its borders.

Prior to yesterday, the Subcommittee last examined the situation in the DRC in a hearing in March of last year, when the storm clouds were gathering in advance of the November elections. The DRC is now struggling with the aftermath of those elections. Opposition political parties and civil society, especially the Catholic Church, appear unwilling to accept the results of the presidential and legislative elections. Opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi received 32 percent of the votes, but he believes he was cheated out of votes that would have made him the winner in the elections. He has staged a presidential swearing-in ceremony and announced that he will form a government. He also has called on supporters to march with him to government headquarters. However, government armed forces have surrounded his home since the presidential results were announced on December 9, and even his aides have been prevented from meeting with him.

Suspicion persists that this election was manipulated in favor of incumbent President Joseph Kabila. The Carter Center, which observed the vote, as well as the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the DRC (MONUSCO) and most of DRC's civil society, all cast serious doubt on the announced outcome of the election. According to the Carter Center, ballots were missing in some areas, while results for Kabila in other areas were

deemed ``unrealistic.'' Calls for new elections not only continue, but appear to be growing in intensity.

Perhaps government intimidation has minimized any uprising by a discontented population, or perhaps the Congolese have accepted that Kabila will do whatever it takes to ensure his victory. It could be that poverty and a lack of information among the population has restrained the widespread resort to protest. Still, there is significant instability throughout the country.

This calls into question the long-term stability of a country that is critical to U.S. interests, which includes the continued flow of strategic minerals. Congolese have reason to be skeptical that they will ever have a stable government that functions on their behalf. There has been one crisis after another since independence in 1960, caused by the selfish actions of predatory leadership. An estimated four million Congolese lost their lives in two wars from which they are still recovering.

Most Congolese remain poor, hungry and in danger of violence. Their government cannot provide the most basic necessities for their families. Public administration is virtually non-existent, with civil servants demanding payment from the public for even the most routine services. MONUSCO is handling security, and the World Health Organization is dealing with the country's public health issues. The challenge for the international community is to help build the capacity and political will of Congolese officials to assume the responsibility for caring for and protecting their citizens.

Since November, violence attributed to the Congolese military, the Rwandan rebel group the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) and local militia has caused more than 100,000 Congolese to become internally displaced persons or refugees. Local vigilante groups have clashed with the Rwandan rebels in North Kivu province and displaced about 75,000 from 30 villages in North Kivu province. Similar clashes in Ituri and northern Katanga have had a serious impact in those areas as well. This raises serious concerns for a potential humanitarian crisis.

Women continue to be targeted for abuse in DRC. A study that recently appeared in the American Journal of Public Health concluded that an average of 48 women and girls are raped every hour in this country. So before this hearing has ended, more than 100 females in DRC will have been raped.

However, there remains hope for DRC despite the current crisis. Even during the worst stages of the global financial crisis, the World Bank was predicting that DRC's economy would grow by seven percent annually over the next several years, making it one of the world's fastest growing economies. At the local level, Congolese reportedly have developed coping methods for an absent government. Women have developed rotating credit systems to compensate for an inaccessible banking system, and farmers have banded together to rent trucks to jointly take their produce to market.

According to the latest election results, the ruling party in DRC has lost 45 seats they previously held to opposition parties, with 17 other elections yet to be rerun after being annulled. This may help in establishing grounds for political reconciliation.

Since the early days of Congolese independence, the United States has been involved in the DRC and continues to play a significant role there. In FY2011, Economic Support Funds were targeted to support the Government of Congo's stabilization and recovery program through support to community recovery and reconciliation, conflict mitigation and resolution, and the extension of authority. International Military Education and Training funds focus on training Congolese officers on military justice, human rights and joint operations. The United States also provides significant humanitarian assistance to the DRC. The United States provided bilateral aid to DRC of more than $205 million in FY2008, $296 million in FY2009, $282 million in FY2010, and $215 million in FY2011. The Obama Administration requested more than $262 million for FY2012.