Speech #860222493

Mr. President. I introduce. for appropriate reference. a bill to enable the United States to participate in the resettlement of certain refugees. On the whole. I believe that House Joint Resolution 397 the chief measure now pending before the Judiciary Committee is soundly conceived. However. in view of our commitments to World Refugee Year. I hope that the bill which is finally enacted can be improved in a few minor ways. I am in favor of the 25percent matching formula contained in House Joint Resolution 397. But I am bothered by the fact that we had no refugee legislation on the books during most of World Refugee Year. In the bill which I am introducing. therefore. the 25percent formula is rewritten so that we commit ourselves to parole into the United States. during the course of the act. 25 percent of the number of refugees resettled by other countries from July 1. 1959. the opening day of World Refugee Year. to the terminal date of the act. This provision would have the effect of bringing in. at most. another several thousand refugees. Because of the small numbers involved. I believe we can afford to err on the side of being generous by making our 25percent commitments retroactive to the opening date of World Refugee Year. One of the wonderful things about World Refugee Year was that nations which had previously not accepted handicapped refugees opened their doors to limited numbers of them and made special provision to assist in their rehabilitation. Australia. for example. committed itself to take 600 handicapped refugees. Canada agreed to take 100 refugees suffering from TB. Brazil offered to admit 100 TB refugee families. New Zealand took 50 handicapped refugees. Sweden took several hundred. the United Kingdom took 210 families of hardcore refugees. and so on. Of the refugees admitted to this country under the bill I am submitting. 500 numbers are allocated. to be used at the discretion of the Attorney General. for refugees who. because of age or physical handicap. are listed as difficult to resettle in the rosters of the United Nations High Commissioner. but who (a) are not institutional cases. (b) suffer from no contagious diseases. (c) can. in the opinion of the sponsoring voluntary agency. be made selfsupporting with some assistance or are members of family units which can be considered selfsupporting. House Joint Resolution 397 limits admissions to refugees under the mandate of the United Nations High Commissioner. I agree that this is where the primary emphasis ought to be. However. I feel strongly that the High Commissioners definition of what constitutes a refugee is in certain respects arbitrary and that we ought to make some provision in our act for refugees not accepted for protection by UNHCR. UNHCR. for example. has refused to grant refugee status to almost twothirds of all Yugoslav refugees who have escaped into Germany. Austria. and Italy in recent years. The High Commissioners eligibility criteria are based on the concept of political persecution. Refugees from Hungary. Poland. and the other Iron Curtain countries are automatically granted eligibility because UNHCR accepts the fact that they have escaped for political reasons. In the case of the Yugoslavs. however.