Political Quotes

“Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I rise in support of H.R. 5139. The Office of High Representative in Bosnia and the International Civilian Office in Kosovo were established to help promote stable, multiethnic democratic governance in those countries in the aftermath of the vicious warfare they suffered throughout the 1990s. The United States has supported these missions and assigned American diplomats to help them with critical expert advice. Regrettably, these American diplomats could now face costly, politically motivated nuisance lawsuits based on their actions in the course of their official duties while helping those organizations and those nations. For other international organizations in which the United States participates by treaty or by an act of this Congress, the President may freely extend immunity from such lawsuits to officers and employees under the International Organization Immunities Act. However, due to the ad hoc nature of their establishment, these two offices are not automatically covered by this law. This brief bill seeks to rectify the issue by allowing the President to extend those privileges and immunities to those organizations and their employees. Congress has similarly amended the IOIA to extend immunities to other organizations falling in similar gray areas, such as the European Space Agency, the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States, and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, among just a few.…”