Chris Dodd: “I have brief remarks about this amendment. It is focused on two countries, Guatemala and Honduras. It is not worldwide.…”

“I have brief remarks about this amendment. It is focused on two countries, Guatemala and Honduras. It is not worldwide. It is designed to try to have documents declassified, dating back to a decade ago. Many people recall the tragedies of the conflict in Central America. It actually goes back more than two decades. In the case of Guatemala, it goes back 30 or 40 years. Civil wars have now been concluded. There are democratically led governments moving in a direction to try to address their underlying economic and social needs. The conflict that plagued these countries and ourselves cost the lives of thousands of people, as well as thousands more who were injured and brutalized in those conflicts. We are seeking with this amendment to declassify certain information that might allow us, in the case particularly of an American citizen who was brutalized in that conflict almost a decade ago, to gather necessary information so that those who perpetrated the crimes against her could be brought to the bar of justice.”