Speech #1020027756

Mr. Speaker. last week. the Hunger Committee held a hearing to review the plight of the worlds refugees and to see whether we are investing enough to respond to the situation. We learned that we have not. The General Accounting Office testified that the number of refugees worldwide has more than doubled from 7 million to 15 or 16 million. That amount has now jumped to over 18 million with the refugee crisis in Iraq. Turkey. and Iran. During the same period. according to GAO. our overseas refugee relief has hovered at around $200 million and actually declined in real dollars. This is not to say that the United States is lagging behind others. We contributed about $10 billion at home and abroad for all kinds of refugee relief in the 1980s. The United States was also the largest donor to all but one of four major international refugee relief organizations. However. I believe that the growing refugee problem requires that we do even more to help. I. also. think that we can do so without adding to the budget deficit. Reallocating foreign aid from security assistance to refugee and food aid accounts can help to save lives and reduce human misery without straining our budget. The end of the cold war means that we can prudently make such a reallocation. May I also emphasize that this is not a debate about statistics--whether money or refugees. It is a plea to save human lives--one at a time. Right now. the international media have focused their cameras on the refugee crisis in Iraq. Thats as it should be. I would like to Include In the RECORD an article that describes the Kurdish refugee emergency by Lionel Rosenblatt. executive director of Refugees International. Mr. Rosenblatt testified at our hearing last week this is a case "of the failure of early warning and rapid international response to refugee crises." The House next week will authorize additional emergency relief but we must also explore how to establish an international emergency relief corps. which can help to prevent the deaths and suffering now taking their grim toll in the Kurdish encampments. Mr. Rosenblatt also urged that we not forget the "looming famine in the Hom of Africa that threatens to kill millions" and that "we must insure that the international community does not divert funds from that impending disaster. We should not rob the East Africans to pay for the refugees from Saddam." I could not agree more: (From the Christian Science Monitor. Apr. 19. 1991]