Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 100 Part 5.djvu/905

 CONCURRENT RESOLUTIONS—OCT. 1, 1986

100 STAT. 4379

(2) to permit the orderly departure of "re-education camp" prisoners, Amerasian children, and other persons of special humanitarian concern to the United States. Agreed to September 30, 1986. SOVIET UNION—INCARCERATION OF UKRAINIAN

AND OTHER HELSINKI MONITORING GROUPS Whereas on August 1, 1975, the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe was signed at Helsinki, Finland, by 33 European states, together with Canada and the United States; Whereas the signatories of the Helsinki Final Act committed themselves under Principle VII to "respect human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief, for all without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion; Whereas Principle VII specifically confirms the "right of the individual to know and act upon his rights and duties" in the field of human rights, and Principle IX of the Final Act confirms the relevant and positive role organizations and persons can play in contributing toward the achievement of cooperation among nations; Whereas the signing of the Final Act raised the expectations of the peoples of the Soviet Union for greater observance by the Soviet Union of human rights, and engendered the formation of the Moscow, Lithuanian, Georgian, Armenian, and Ukrainian citizens' monitoring groups to inform the peoples of the Soviet Union and the world with regard to the Soviet Government's compliance with the Final Act; Whereas affiliated groups—the Psychiatric Abuse Commission, the Christian Committee, the Adventists Rights Group, the Catholic Committee, the Ukrainian Catholic Initiative Committee, and the Disabled Rights Group—later were established by citizens to address areas of specific concern; Whereas four members of Helsinki Monitoring Groups, Oleksiy Tykhy, Yuri Lytvyn, and Vasyl Stus of the Ukrainian Group and Eduard Arutunyan of the Armenian Group, died after years of inhumane treatment in Soviet labor camps; Whereas November 9, 1986, marks the tenth anniversary of the establishment of the largest such citizens group, the Ukrainian Public Group to Promote the Implementation of the Helsinki Accords; Whereas the establishment of this group coincides with the opening on November 4, 1986, of the Vienna Review Meeting of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe; Whereas the Ukrainian Helsinki Monitoring Group opened a new phase in the Ukrainian struggle for human and national rights, providing impetus for human rights activists to demand not only that the Soviet Government uphold the human rights guaranteed by the Soviet Constitution, the Helsinki Final Act, and other international human rights declarations and covenants, but also to assert that the Western democracies have a solemn responsibil-

Oct. i, 1986

[H con. Res. 332]

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