Political Quotes

“I want to thank my good friend and distinguished colleague Congressman Chris Smith of New Jersey for introducing this important resolution which congratulates Chinese democracy advocate Liu Xiaobo on the award. Congressman Smith--and I think all the colleagues in this House on both sides should know--is one of the greatest human rights advocates in the Congress, and his leadership on this issue and on human rights and religious freedom is really, I think, one of the finest that I have ever served with since I have been here in Congress. I also want to say parenthetically, why hasn't the Church in the West and in the United States also spoken out on some of these more profound issues of human rights and religious freedoms? The silence of the Church in the West is quite disturbing. On Friday, the award ceremony will be held with an empty chair, as my colleague Mr. Wu said, as a solemn reminder that this year's Nobel laureate remains languishing in prison. Chinese authorities have placed his wife under house arrest to ensure that she will not be able to accept the prize on his behalf. Since 1901, only three other Nobel Prize winners have been prevented from attending the ceremony to accept the prize. In 1935, Carl von Ossietzy, a German peace activist, was prevented from receiving the prize by the Nazi government. In 1975, Andrei Sakharov, a Russian nuclear scientist, was barred from leaving the Soviet Union to accept the prize.…”