Norma Torres: “I want to begin my remarks as I started out earlier by thanking the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Callahan) for his…”

“I want to begin my remarks as I started out earlier by thanking the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Callahan) for his ongoing efforts to working with me on funding for the School of the Americas provided in the foreign operations bill. I would point out that this year's bill contains similar language to what we adopted last year conditioning funding for the school on a certification report to be presented in January of 1999. Now, one positive outcome of last year's requirements is the establishment of screening procedures at U.S. embassies for all candidates to U.S. military training programs, including the School of the Americas. Our embassy personnel are now required to do a double-check of the candidates once the host country has done an initial screening. The new screening process if carried out properly can certainly prove valuable to weed out those individuals with questionable backgrounds. Yet I am compelled today with my colleagues the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Kennedy) and the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Yates) to offer this amendment to prohibit any of the funds in this bill to be used for the school. I was disappointed in the certification report presented this past January wherein the Defense Department contended that the conditions to allow funding to the school had been met.”