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Hands Off Sudan!

by Rep. Ron Paul

US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 23 JULY 2004
www.globalresearch.ca   3 August 2004

The URL of this article is: http://globalresearch.ca/articles/PAU408A.html


by Rep. Ron Paul, MD

Before the US House of Representatives, July 23, 2004

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to this incredibly dangerous legislation. I hope my colleagues are not fooled by the title of this bill, �Declaring genocide in Darfur, Sudan.� This resolution is no statement of humanitarian concern for what may be happening in a country thousands of miles from the United States. Rather, it could well lead to war against the African country of Sudan. The resolution �urges the Bush Administration to seriously consider multilateral or even unilateral intervention to prevent genocide should the United Nations Security Council fail to act.� We must realize the implications of urging the President to commit the United States to intervene in an ongoing civil war in a foreign land thousands of miles away.

Mr. Speaker, this resolution was never marked-up in the House International Relations Committee, on which I serve. Therefore, Members of that committee had no opportunity to amend it or express their views before it was sent to the Floor for a vote. Like too many highly controversial bills, it was rushed onto the suspension calendar (by House rules reserved for �non-controversial� legislation) at the last minute. Perhaps there was a concern that if Members had more time to consider the bill they would cringe at the resolution�s call for US military action in Sudan � particularly at a time when our military is stretched to the breaking point. The men and women of the United States Armed Forces risk their lives to protect and defend the United States. Can anyone tell me how sending thousands of American soldiers into harm�s way in Sudan is by any stretch of the imagination in the US national interest or in keeping with the Constitutional function of this country�s military forces? I urge my colleagues in the strongest terms to reject this dangerous resolution.

Dr. Ron Paul is a Republican member of Congress from Texas.


 

Whereas Article 1 of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (signed at Paris on December 9, 1948) states that `the Contracting Parties confirm that... (Engrossed as Agreed to or Passed by House)

108th CONGRESS

2d Session

H. CON. RES. 467

CONCURRENT RESOLUTION

Declaring genocide in Darfur, Sudan.

HCON 467 EH

108th CONGRESS

2d Session

H. CON. RES. 467

 


CONCURRENT RESOLUTION

Whereas Article 1 of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (signed at Paris on December 9, 1948) states that `the Contracting Parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish';

Whereas Article 2 of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide declares that `in the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) killing members of the group; (b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; and (e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group';

Whereas Article 3 of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide affirms that `[the] following acts shall be punishable: (a) genocide; (b) conspiracy to commit genocide; (c) direct and public incitement to commit genocide; (d) attempt to committed genocide; and (e) complicit in genocide';

Whereas in Darfur, Sudan, an estimated 30,000 innocent civilians have been brutally murdered, more than 130,000 people have been forced from their homes and have fled to neighboring Chad, and more than 1,000,000 people have been internally displaced; and

Whereas in March 2004 the United Nations Resident Humanitarian Coordinator stated: `[T]he war in Darfur started off in a small way last year but it has progressively gotten worse. A predominant feature of this is that the brunt is being borne by civilians. This includes vulnerable women and children . . . The violence in Darfur appears to be particularly directed at a specific group based on their ethnic identity and appears to be systemized.': Now, therefore, be it

 

Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That Congress--

 

Passed the House of Representatives July 22, 2004.

Attest:

Clerk.


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� Copyright REP RON PAUL AND US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 2004. For fair use only/ pour usage �quitable seulement.


 

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