Jim Inhofe: “While I do have the utmost respect for him, I would have to say that one of the problems we had, getting into this mess…”

“While I do have the utmost respect for him, I would have to say that one of the problems we had, getting into this mess to start with, was the grossly exaggerated figures that were used. I believe the Senator used the number 100,000--100,000 has been batted around quite often. I am going to read into the Record at this point from Robin Cook, the Foreign Secretary--this is October of 1999. He is under pressure to answer claims that ministers misled the public on the scale of deaths of civilians in Kosovo: At the height of the war, western officials spoke of a death toll as high as 100,000. President Bill Clinton said the NATO campaign had prevented 'deliberate, systematic efforts at ethnic cleansing and genocide'. Emilio Perez Pujol, a pathologist who led the Spanish team looking for bodies in the aftermath of the fighting, said: I calculate that the final figure of dead in Kosovo will be 2,500 at the most. The U.N. report came out and said the figure is closer to 2,000. There is a big difference between 2,000 dead and 100,000.”