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unteers all around the world. What we're going to talk about today is a problem that is systemic, institutionalized, and a fact of state policy.

We do not want it reduced to random policy or to violence that occurs from time to time. We want to state that this is governmental policy against human beings. Today, in our campaign against torture, Amnesty International represents the tortured people of the world, and we would like to turn their screams into shouts of encouragement and support so that they'll never have to suffer these things again.

To do a campaign like this is to risk perversity. Perversity because the nature of this subject is such that you really don't want to talk about it and it's embarrassing even bringing in its details. But you've asked us to do that and we intend to do that. And at the other end of the spectrum is also the perversity to speak of these horrors. And not to do something about them would also be a perverse act. We want to be effective so that the screams and the agonies of those who have been hurt by their governments will cease, so that tomorrow they might sleep a little better, they might feel a little better.

I will name some of the offenders now. Envision behind each one of these countries individuals, individuals that might be your sons and daughters, that might be your parents, might be somebody down the street, and notice the old governments and new governments, governments of the north and of the south, governments of the rich and of the poor, and governments that claim high morality and governments of friends and governments of foes, and of the nonaligned.

I begin with Afghanistan, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Mexico, Namibia, Pakistan, Paraguay, Philippines, Peru, Republic of Korea, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Syria, Taiwan, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, Uruguay, U.S.S.R., Zaire, and Zimbabwe.

If we could, Mr. Chairman, I would ask that all the people who have suffered torture by their governments gather together in one voice so that one voice could be turned into a song that might become a moral trumpet to the Earth, so that in some way those who have suffered might yell out to the people who have hurt them that they must begin to confront torture at every level. They would say that they'd not want any torturer to enter another country and if they did the victims should be able to sue them.

They'd like to ask their own countries to apologize to the world for what they have done to them, and they'd ask help for the wounded and the raped and the dismembered and the confused. In fact, what must happen here if anything is to be effective in these hearings, is in effect, the moral and political will be built in such a way as to not only stop torture but to abolish it as we did slavery. I would ask you of Congress, who represent the decency of the American people in all its depth, use the deep-seated morality of this country to press the State Department, the Defense Department, all our people abroad, so that not one citizen anywhere in the world, not one U.S. citizen in particular, would ever be near this heinous crime of torture, and if they do that they would report it.

You know, in this dialog between torturers and those who are decent, it's hard to find the torturer, nobody admits to it; the governments don't admit to it. So how do you start a dialog when there's nobody on the other side? And nobody admits to it? How do you break through in such a way that you in fact find the torturers because they never identify themselves. And so that's what this campaign is about; we want to identify them and let people know how we can stop this heinous practice.

So finally, I'll say, let's help the victims of torture. Let's prosecute the torturer wherever he or she lives; let's not let them into our borders; let's not sell shock batons to violating countries.

Before my deputy joins me in this presentation, I'll tell you a personal story which is embarrassing but I'd like to ask Members of Congress to bear with me. When I was a young kid, I asked my mother what it would be like to reach adulthood, and she said to me that if one day I could learn to hear the weeping and the wailing of the poor, then I'd be a grown man. And I put that same challenge to you, to Members of Congress to hear the weeping and the wailing of the tortured, then comes full maturation; then you can face your constituencies and say that you've done all that you can; that you've used the power of Government to help people and to never let one of these people who have hurt someone else get away with it.

Thank you for having me here, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. YATRON. Thank you very much, Mr. Healey. Mr. Cox, are you also going to testify?

Mr. Cox. Yes; we just wanted to very briefly summarize the steps that we are asking this Congress to take as part of this struggle to end torture.

Mr. YATRON. OK, you may proceed.

Mr. Cox. Thank you very much. These are specific steps that we believe will affirm the U.S. Government's abhorrence of torture, an affirmation that is very much needed, but they will do more than that. We believe they will also place additional pressure on governments to stop practicing secretly what they dare not defend openly. That pressure is very much needed, but we believe these steps would do more than that as well.

These are steps we believe, if taken seriously, will in fact, based on our experience, protect and save human lives, countless lives of men and women around the world. If the implementation of these recommendations will not automatically result in a world where to use the news phrase "children are no longer tortured," we believe very strongly that their implementation will result in a world where fewer children are tortured and that's the reason we bring them with urgency to your attention.

We are aware, of course, that Congress has already enacted legislation that incorporates human rights into U.S. foreign policy, but we are also aware-I might add painfully aware-that that legislation has been sorely ineffective and that the administration and Congress have been reluctant to enforce the laws that establish that the United States will not conduct business as usual with torturers. And so, we would like to say first, that if the human rights laws are to once again generate hope, rather than breed cynicism, they must be implemented.

We are calling on the U.S. Congress to affirm through a concurrent resolution its absolute condemnation of torture. To be meaningful, such a resolution must state clearly, once again, that the practice of torture is by definition a gross violation of human rights, that it is unacceptable under all circumstances, and that determining its existence will trigger the implementation of the laws that link human rights violations and bilateral and multilateral assistance.

Furthermore, we would like such a resolution to make clear that in cases where the allegations of torture are widespread and numerous, the United States will not simply accept a denial of the obvious but will pressure the offending governments to take specific meaningful steps to abolish torture, and we have outlined 12 steps that any government serious about ending torture will have taken or will be willing to take to see that it is ended. I would like to have put in the record excerpts from our briefing on the campaign against torture which outline in detail what those steps are.1 Thank you.

Second, we would like the Congress to make such a declaration or resolution credible by passing legislation that specifies and increases the responsibility of the government and in particular the State Department, to regularly act against torture.

Ambassadors, for example, should be instructed to investigate allegations of torture, to raise the issues of secret and incommunicado detention, to stress the importance of access of family, lawyers and doctors to detainees and to intervene, above all, in individual cases that come to their attention.

We would like to see this work reported semiannually to the Congress and in the annual Country Reports, we would like to see specific mention of the steps the governments are or are not taking to halt or prevent torture, again using the 12-point program that I've already mentioned. Again, these steps are sometimes simple, but in our experience working against the violations of human rights, we know that these steps can in fact save lives.

Third, when it is decided, as it recently was in this House with regard to El Salvador, that a country will receive U.S. aid despite such gross violations of human rights as widespread torture and murder, there must be and there should be legislation to mandate a detailed explanation of the other steps that the United States is taking to combat these attacks on the security and integrity of the person.

With all due respect, we find it shameful that Congress would allow U.S. aid to be given without the requirement of specific measures to end the torture and the murder carried out by the government receiving such aid.

Finally, we believe that it is Congress itself that must take the responsibility for determining which governments practice torture and are therefore gross violators of human rights. It is meaningless to have laws requiring aid reductions to gross violators of human

1 See app. 1.

rights if no one is willing to say, no one dares to name, who those violators in fact are.

To do this, we feel that Congress must have the capacity for independent data gathering, including increased ability to undertake onsite investigations, and to intervene in individual cases. And we strongly recommend that adequate funds be appropriated and a staff be hired for this purpose. We believe that such appropriations, which would focus on protecting the security of the person, would complement the recently established structures that are designed to promote democracy.

And once again, in addition to helping this body determine the truth about torture, such congressional investigations would themselves reduce torture and would in fact save individual lives. There are other recommendations included in our written testimony which have already been mentioned with regard to monitoring the transfer of equipment used in torture, that have to do with the treatment of refugees, in particular the need to insure that people are not returned to situations where they are likely to be tortured and which have to do with providing funds to help in the rehabilitation of those victims. But in the interest of time, Mr. Chairman, I will not go into great detail. Some of that will be the subject of later testimony during these hearings.

I will only add that we know there are those who will argue, perhaps not in these hearings but certainly after these hearings, that these and the other measures to combat torture that we are recommending can only be taken when they do not threaten other legitimate national security interests. We would, therefore, like to take this occasion to emphasize our firm belief that it is never in the interest of true national security that the United States be or be perceived to be on the side of torture.

We are also aware that there are those who will argue that realistically there is really little or nothing that can be done to stop acts of torture by other governments, whether they are friendly or not. This argument too is, of course, not a new one. More than 40 years ago, when reports began to appear of the incredible tortures and killings being conducted as policy by the Nazis, I'm sure there's no need to remind this body that there were those who denied the fact and many others who urged caution and quiet and yet others who said that nothing could be done.

Today, of course, we know differently. Today, 40 years later, we find it possible to admit that much more could have been done; that the silence of so many was unforgiveable, that lives could have been saved. We feel it is important, as was done not too long ago in this city, to look back at the holocaust and remember those who were lost.

We also think it's important to raise, discuss, and debate what could have been done at that time, but it is equally important to ask the question, which I'm sure will be asked repeatedly during these hearings, what can be done at this time, and this is the question that we pose to this body.

We know that there are men, women, and children who are being tortured today, in 1984, in at least one-third of the nations of this world. We know from our own experience that some of that

torture can be stopped. The question is, what will be done to stop it?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The joint prepared statement of Messrs. Healey and Cox follows:]

JOINT PREPARED STATEMENT OF JOHN G. HEALEY, DEPUTY DIRECTOR, AND LARRY COX, DEPUTY EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL, U.S.A.

THE REALITY OF TORTURE

Today more than one third of the world's governments systematically

torture prisoners. Amnesty International's recently published report,

Torture in the Eighties, excerpts of which I ask to submit for the record,
cites allegations of torture and ill-treatment of prisoners in 98
countries. Governmental abuse is not confined to the left or the
right, the East or the West. Hundreds of thousands of citizens have
been brutalized from security headquarters in Spain to prison cells
in Iran, from secret police centers in Chile to interrogation houses
in Afghanistan.

I would like to read a partial list of those countries from which
Amnesty International receives persistent reports of torture. Behind
every name are the damaged individuals who have suffered in ways most
of us can only begin to imagine. Afghanistan, Brazil, Chile, Colombia,
El Salvador, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, India, Indonesia,
Iran, Iraq, Libya, Mexico, Namibia, Pakistan, Paraguay, the Philippines,
Peru, the Republic of Korea, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Syria,
Taiwan, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, Uruguay, the USSR, Zaire, and Zimbabwe.
Despite universal condemnation the practice of torture as a tool

of state policy remains widespread. Amnesty International is committed
to do all it can to end the practice. Last month Amnesty International
launched a special two-year Campaign for the Abolition of Torture. The
work for the release of prisoners of conscience, fair and prompt trials
for all political prisoners, and an end to executions and torture forms
the core of Amnesty International's work. We commend this committee's

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