Extensions of Remarks E1693 EXTENSIONS of REMARKS
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September 9, 1997 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD Ð Extensions of Remarks E1693 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS REPRESENTATIVE WOLF'S TRIP tration to make TibetÐand the hundreds of the for profit relationship which developed TO TIBET Tibetan prisoners of conscienceÐan impor- between the Lippo Group and Mr. Web tant part of U.S.-China dialogue leading up Hubble (sic). Press reports of Mr. Hubble's to and during a planned presidential summit personal visit to East Timor have only fueled HON. NEWT GINGRICH this fall. He also urges U.S. churches, syna- this belief. I do not know if this is OF GEORGIA gogues and citizens to mount the kind of let- true. I do know, however, that we have IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ter-writing, prisoner-adopting campaigns no effective policy . in East Timor.'' Tuesday, September 9, 1997 that helped sustain Soviet dissidents. Tibet- Wolf gives himself a missionary's license ans don't have the kind of diaspora that kept to speak truth to the mighty. The appalling Mr. GINGRICH. Mr. Speaker, I would like to Soviet Jewry, Armenia, Poland and other conditions he describes vindicate his frank- submit for the CONGRESSIONAL RECORD two ar- captive nations on the U.S. agenda during ness and his importunities. His Northern ticles from the Washington Post about my Re- the Cold War. But they have an equal claim Virginia constituency may not relate to his publican colleague FRANK WOLF's recent trip on America's conscience, and their treat- anguish over such places as El Salvador, to Tibet. Gaining admittance only by conceal- ment provides a useful measure of the true Burma, Sudan, Bosnia, Chechnya and Ethio- ing his identity as a Member of Congress, nature of the Chinese regime. pia. But Wolf keeps both feet on the groundÐor rather on the highwayÐat all Representative WOLF observed first hand the [From the Washington Post, August 3, 1997] repression of human rights that stands in times. He is chairman of the House Appro- THE MAN WHO WON'T GIVE UP priations subcommittee on transportation, a sharp contrast to all that America stands for. (By Mary McGrory) post that gives him great power. And his The time has come for President Clinton to Frank Wolf, the Republican congressman constituent serviceÐwatching over the join with Representative WOLF and me in en- from Northern Virginia, has a conscience. He rights of the many federal workers who live couraging the new Chinese leadership to assumes that his fellow Americans do too, in Virginia's 10th DistrictÐis famous. move toward a freer and more open Tibet, and that if he tells them how bad things are His evolution from ``pothole politician'' to where individuals can worship without fear and in countries they seldom hear about, they watchman on the ramparts of world freedom unleash their creativity and talents in ways will do something about it. He is inevitably happened gradually. First, he went to Ethio- that will bring increased prosperity not only to considered naive. He doesn't mind. His faith pia in 1984 with Rep. Tony Hall (D-Ohio), a Tibet, but to China as well. As the world's in his fellow man comes from his faith in crusader against hunger who is Wolf's best God. He is a devout Presbyterian who be- friend in Congress and a fellow member of a beacon of hope and freedom, America must lieves passionately in good works and has House Bible study group. They went to Ro- do her part to encourage this transition. raised his five children to volunteer on be- mania together and saw misery that made [From the Washington Post, Aug. 22, 1997] half of the unfortunate. them come home and promote a bill against REPRESENTATIVE WOLF'S TRIP TO TIBET Wolf is just back from another of his trips Most Favored Nation (MFN) treatment for Northern Virginia Rep. Frank Wolf has to difficult, dangerous places. This time it the Ceausescu government. Since then, Wolf never been one for the typical junket. His ad- was Tibet, which has been groaning under has never looked back or lost hope. vocacy of human rights and religious free- the Chinese yoke. He slipped in on an ordi- At his press conference, he urged Ameri- dom in other countries has taken him to the nary tourist visa, which did not identify him cans to write letters to Tibetan political Siberian gulag, to Ceausescu's Romania and as a member of Congress. Tibetans risked prisoners. Based on the experience with So- to war-ravaged Chechnya. Now he is just their lives to tell him about the oppression viet prisoners of conscience, he says the Ti- back from TibetÐthe first House member to and religious persecution they are suffering. betans might not get the letters, but war- visit that oppressed land, he says, since Chi- His press conference afterwards at the Na- dens made conscious of outside observation nese forces moved in nearly 40 years ago. tional Press Club was packedÐperhaps be- might give better treatment. He wants more What Mr. Wolf found will not shock anyone cause it is August, and the news drought is congressional delegations in Tibet so that who has followed Beijing's brutal repression severe. He told an international audience Chinese overlords will know the world has of Tibetan culture, religion, language and that ``China is squeezing the life out of not forgotten. And he can see the day, when peopleÐa repression applied with what Sen. Tibet. It is unspeakably brutal.'' MFN will be denied to China. The American Daniel Patrick Moynihan has called Wolf's success in rousing the American people are way ahead of Congress, their ``Stalinoid dementia.'' We hope, though, that people is still to be seen, but he got China's president and the business community, ac- Mr. Wolf's report will awaken some Ameri- attention. The New China News Agency is- cording to polls. One showed overwhelming cans who haven't paid sufficient attention to sued a statement of outrage from a Tibetan opposition to MFN for China, 67 percent to 18 Tibet's slow suffocation. official who accused Wolf of being a trouble- percent. A vast land along the Himalayan top of the maker and a bad reporter: There is no reli- Wolf's inspiration is William Wilberforce, a world, Tibet is home to only 6 million peo- gious persecution and all is well with happy prominent 19th-century British politician pleÐno conceivable threat to China's billion- Tibetans. Wolf was, of course, delighted with who spent his life working to abolish the plus. But China has virtually sealed Tibet additional notice to his cause. slave trade. It took 34 years for Parliament off, keeping reporters and human rights ob- Some reporters may have been goaded into to outlaw it, a month after Wilberforce's servers out and even barring California Rep. attendance at the press conference by one of death. ``It just takes time,'' says Wolf. Christopher Cox, a member of the Repub- Wolf's typically reproachful, guilt-producing lican leadership. Mr. Wolf gained access, letters calling on the recipient to fulfill a f moral obligation by spreading the word along with an aide and a Tibetan-speaker, by HAPPY 30TH BAY COUNTY HOME joining a tour group and not advertising his about whatever ghastly situation he has just profession. (He dressed in ``traditional tour- observed. Last January, Wolf went to East BUILDERS ist garb,'' Mr. Wolf says.) Timor in Indonesia and brought back an ac- What he found, Mr. Wolf says, is repression count of killing that he thought President HON. JAMES A. BARCIA more brutal than he witnessed in Soviet Rus- Clinton should do something about. He later sia or Communist Romania. While Chinese in wrote to him in terms that show he has heed- OF MICHIGAN Beijing have won some measure of liberty, at ed the counsel of the 15th-century German IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES least in economic affairs, he says, ``there is mystic Thomas a Kempis: ``Fawn not upon Tuesday, September 9, 1997 no freedom in Tibet, period.'' People are the great.'' In Wolf's letter of May 29, he told watched and afraidÐyet, when they realized the president that he better shape up on East Mr. BARCIA. Mr. Speaker, when all is said Mr. Wolf and his associates were from Amer- Timor because people are making connec- and done at the end of a very long day, we ica, they were willing to risk imprisonment tions between U.S. inaction in that wretched look forward to going home for some rest from to describe their plight. Like their leader in land and the campaign scandal of the White our days' efforts. When we arrive at our own exile, the Dalai Lama, most Tibetans are not House raking in millions from Asians with private refuge, it is because of the great care seeking independence but only the freedom axes to grind. taken by professional home builders in the to speak their language and practice their ``Respectfully but with candor, Mr. Presi- Buddhism without being thrown in jail or dent, many believe your administration has construction and remodeling of this most im- having their children taken away. adopted or changed its policy with regard to portant place that we can truly relax. Mr. Wolf, like many members of Congress Indonesia and East Timor because of influ- Today, the Bay County Home Builders As- of both parties, urges the Clinton adminis- ence exerted by the Riadys and as a result of sociation is celebrating its 30th anniversary as · This ``bullet'' symbol identifies statements or insertions which are not spoken by a Member of the Senate on the floor.