The Congressional Record is a unique source of public documentation. It started in 1873, documenting nearly all the major and minor policies being discussed and debated.
“SUDAN AID WORKER” mentioning the U.S. Dept of State was published in the Senate section on pages S3717-S3718 on April 15, 2005.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
SUDAN AID WORKER
Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, as my colleagues know, I have a special interest in Sudan. I have spent much time there on an annual basis for the last several years participating in various types of work--mission work, some medical work, as well as a Senator.
Three weeks ago, a USAID team member working in the Darfur region of Sudan was shot and wounded. By now, most Americans know the Darfur region is a huge region, about the size of France, in the western part of Sudan, a vast country in and of itself.
This USAID worker was traveling in a clearly marked four-vehicle convoy on a road that was considered safe and secure. The convoy was ambushed, and the 26-year-old aid worker was shot in the face. As a result of that attack, she has lost vision in her right eye and has had and will continue to have to undergo facial reconstruction.
First and foremost, our thoughts and prayers go out to this courageous and compassionate young woman and to her family whom we all know must be in tremendous grief. What happened is a tragedy that deeply troubles us all.
I am informed that the shooting was not random. The attackers intentionally targeted the humanitarian convoy in order to intimidate the world. For 2 years, the jingaweit death squads have terrorized the people. With the backing of the Government, these criminals have killed nearly 50,000 innocent Darfur Africans.
A British Parliamentary report issued last month says as many as 300,000 Sudanese may have died since the Khartoum Government started the fighting 2 years ago.
The exact numbers, as always, are difficult to confirm. Access to these areas is very limited. Khartoum simply does not want the world to know what those numbers are.
It was just last August that I made a trip to the region. I was denied permission by Khartoum to travel to Darfur properly. Nevertheless, I went and spent time just to the west, in the adjacent country of Chad, and went along that Chad-Darfur border. I wanted to see with my own eyes so I could come back and report, which I did, my observations in a part of the world where, to my interpretation, to our interpretation, there is genocide occurring.
We visited refugee camps on that Chad-Sudan border. We met with survivors. They told us the heartrending stories of women and girls being abused, mass rapes, land destroyed, crops destroyed, villages burned, water supplies actively polluted. As a product of all that, there is the forced displacement, moving out of villages, out of homes of over 1.2 million people.
It is clear, as I mentioned, that what is going on--the destruction, the death, the killing--is genocide. This body has said that. The jingaweit are killing the Darfur people because they are ethnically different and because they do not support Khartoum.
Since October of last year, the State Department has formally recognized the conditions in Darfur as genocide. Congress has also acted, placing sanctions on Sudan's Government and authorizing about
$100 million in aid.
This week, at a special international donors conference for Sudan, the United States pledged $1.7 billion in aid over the next 2 years, more than any other country. As a condition of that aid, the Khartoum Government must demonstrate that it is taking action to stop, to end, to terminate this killing.
The United States, under President Bush's leadership, has led on this issue from the beginning. The United States has provided over 70 percent of the supplies going to the survivors now in Darfur and eastern Chad, and the United States has been providing assistance to the region, indeed, for years.
Robert Zoellick, our Deputy Secretary of State, is currently traveling in the region to observe the situation on the ground. What he will see when he is there and what he will report back, I am sure, when he comes back to us, no doubt, will deeply disturb him, as it did me and others in this body who have traveled to that region.
In the last Congress, I worked with a number of our colleagues--
Senators Brownback, Feingold, Biden, Lugar, and before that, former Senator Helms and many others--to enact a bill called the Sudan Peace Act. That bill provided the framework for the peace negotiations in Sudan between the northern and southern regions.
In addition, last year, we in this body voted unanimously to urge the Secretary of State to take appropriate actions within the United Nations to suspend Sudan's membership on the U.N. Human Rights Commission.
While I am heartened by the aid pledges made this week by the international community, a lot more work absolutely must be done. Global pressure must be brought to bear.
I urge the United Nations to formally recognize the reality of the crisis in Darfur. What is happening there is genocide. The Khartoum Government will not stop this killing until it is faced with stiff international pressure.
Every day the world fails to act, Khartoum gets closer to its genocidal goal, and every day the world fails to act, it compounds its shame. We must not let this happen. We cannot fail the Darfur people. They are pleading for our help, and, indeed, they are pleading for their lives.
Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so ordered.
____________________
