Rep. Tom Cole
House of Representatives, USA
April 11, 2003

Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that France, Germany, and Russia can initially best contribute to the reconstruction of Iraq by the forgiveness of outstanding debt… (Introduced in House)

HRES 198 IH

108th CONGRESS

1st Session

H. RES. 198

Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that France, Germany, and Russia can initially best contribute to the reconstruction of Iraq by the forgiveness of outstanding debt between both Iraq and France, Iraq and Germany, and Iraq and Russia.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

April 11, 2003

Mr. COLE (for himself, Mr. HAYWORTH, Mr. HERGER, Mr. BARRETT of South Carolina, Mrs. MUSGRAVE, Mr. TIAHRT, Mr. SIMMONS, Mr. CHABOT, Mr. TURNER of Ohio, Mr. WELLER, Mr. GIBBONS, and Mr. SMITH of New Jersey) submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on International Relations

RESOLUTION

Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that France, Germany, and Russia can initially best contribute to the reconstruction of Iraq by the forgiveness of outstanding debt between both Iraq and France, Iraq and Germany, and Iraq and Russia.

Whereas France, Germany, and Russia have expressed a willingness and interest in assisting with the reconstruction of Iraq;

Whereas France and Germany previously encouraged debt relief as a matter of assisting other nation states;

Whereas both France and Germany have previously contributed to debt relief in the World Bank’s program for heavily indebted poor countries;

Whereas France, Germany, and Russia have administered a system of liberal export controls that allowed for the exportation of sensitive technologies to Iraq;

Whereas France, Germany, and Russia possess a developed trade relationship with Iraq; and

Whereas France, Germany, and Russia possess a mutual relationship of friendship with the United States and, in this spirit, have offered to assist in Iraq’s reconstruction: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved, That it is the sense of the House of Representatives that France, Germany, and Russia–

(1) should work with the World Bank, the European Union, and other multinational organizations to build a debt forgiveness program for Iraq to aid in matters concerning its reconstruction;

(2) work in conjunction with the United Nations to ensure that other countries recognize their role in economically supporting a terrorist regime in Iraq;

(3) recognize the responsibility that France, Germany and Russia bear for the transfer of technology to a terrorist regime in Iraq;

(4) work to build stronger internal export controls to ensure that militarily valuable technology will no longer be exported to terrorist regimes thus creating similar future debts;

(5) acknowledge the role that Iraq’s current debt could play in hindering its reconstruction;

(6) educate their populace as to the importance of debt forgiveness in assisting in the reconstruction of Iraq; and

(7) create a governmentally administered debt forgiveness program to assist Iraq in its reconstruction.

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:H.RES.198:

[PDFver here and here]