Patrick Kennedy: “I just would like to commend the gentleman for his own visit to East Timor. There is nothing like seeing it in person…”

“I just would like to commend the gentleman for his own visit to East Timor. There is nothing like seeing it in person, to speak to Bishop Belo in East Timor, to visit with the people as the gentleman has, that gives one the strong feelings such as the gentleman has about it. Like the gentleman from Virginia, I have read a lot about it. But it was not until I visited and saw it myself and heard from the people dramatically about the overwhelming military presence in East Timor and the fear that everyone has going to bed at night, that they are not going to be woken up in the middle of the night, have a gun to their head and dragged out in the middle of the street, go to jail, never to be seen again. This is the constant state of fear and terror that the people of East Timor live under, given that occupation by the Indonesian Government; and I want to salute the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Wolf] for his strong words on this amendment.”