Speech #970142734

Speaker. I thank the gentleman from Iowa for yielding. I also rise in strong support of House Joint Resolution 373. which expresses the sense of the Congress that the Soviet Union should respect the rights of its citizens to practice their religion and to emigrate. The Soviet Union. in defiance of every recognized standard of humanitarian activity. and contrary to its solemn obligations under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. the International Convenant on Civil and Political Rights. the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe at Helsinki. and even the Constitution of the Soviet Union. has continued to subject the Jewish population of the Soviet Union to outrageous assaults on their personal dignity. their freedom to practice their religion. and their freedom to emigrate if they so choose. The Soviet Unions barbaric behavior contravenes its public declarations to accept internationally recognized duties and responsibilities in regard to a countrys own citizenry. The Soviet Unions oppression of the Jewish population transcends the political dimensions of communist ideology and focuses the worlds scorn not only on the bankrupt theories of Marx and Lenin. but on the specter of deepseated antiSemitism in Soviet Russia today.