Speech #990263789

Both appropriations committees in both Houses have always funded this program. this resolution will be another effort on behalf of the Congress to indicate our concern and interest. Senate Concurrent Resolution 143 calls upon the Government of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam to permit the immediate resumption of the U.S. High Commissioner for Refugees Orderly Departure Program for Vietnam and to permit the orderly departure of "Reeducation camp" prisoners. Amerasian children and other persons of special humanitarian concern to the United States. From 1979 to January 1. 1986. the Orderly Departure Program has enabled more than 100.000 persons to leave Vietnam without facing the numerous hazards of departure by sea. The decision by the Socialist Republic of Vietnam to suspend the interviewing and processing of all applicants in Vietnam for resettlement in the United States has threatened to interupt the flow of departures from Vietnam by those eligible for admission to the United States as refugees or immigrants and should be widely condemned by all nations. Each week. my office receives dozens of requests for assistance in reuniting families tragically separated at the end of the Vietnam war. Children call wanting to aid their parents. now elderly. ill and alone in Vietnam. who long to see their grandchildren before they die. Wives ask for the release of their husbands from reeducation camps after being punished for over 11 years for the crime of supporting the previous government. parents want to be reunited with their sons and daughters. now teenagers and in need of the supervision and support of their families. Surely the pain and suffering of these separated families should move any reasonable government to at least allow the reunification of these families and the reopening of the screening and interviewing of those persons whom the United States and other responsible governments have indicated they are willing to accept for resettlement under various immigration or refugee programs. Mr. Speaker. there is strong bipartisan support for the Orderly Departure Program for Vietnam in the Congress.