Parsky, Gerald, Assistant Secretary of Treasury. Robinson, Honorable Charles W., Deputy Secretary of State__ IMPLEMENTATION OF HELSINKI ACCORDS THURSDAY, JANUARY 13, 1977 CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES, COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE, Washington, D.C. The Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe met at 2 p.m., pursuant to notice, in room 6202, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Dante B. Fascell, chairman, presiding. Present: Commissioners Fascell, Simon, Fenwick, Buchanan: Pell, Leahy, Case, Leigh and Poor: R. Spencer Oliver, staff director; Alfred Friendly, Jr., deputy staff director. Chairman FASCELL. The Commission will come to order. Fellow Commissioners, ladies and gentlemen, the CSCE Commission today begins hearings on compliance with the Helsinki Final Act and preparations for the Belgrade follow-up meeting this fall. Our inquiry is a proper forum for expert opinions on how CSCE states interpret their obligation to give life to the Helsinki accords. We will also explore the paramount issue today confronting the Helsinki signatories: what must be discussed and resolved when the 35 governments sit down at Belgrade? In its brief but active history, the CSCE Commission has become sensitive to another important question, how to convince the signatory governments that it is in the interest of them all to take seriously the challenge of implementing the provisions of every Basket. Such a task is complicated by the attitudes of several CSCE states whose sensitivities to interference in domestic affairs have been highlighted by debate over the meaning of the Final Act. Our immediate business is to look at Basket II. whose scope is greater than mere questions of trade and commerce, because in many ways politics is economics. Basket II was designed to enhance economic cooperation among CSCE states in a way to loosen restraints inhibiting dealings between the Soviet bloc and the West. It spells out ways to remove obstacles to increased Socialist country trade with the West, mutual provisions for industrial and commercial cooperation, an expanded East-West dialog between sellers and buyers, and sophisticated proposals for information exchange and visits back and forth between scientists and technicians. There is even a detailed sanction for East European and Soviet tourists to drive West for a vacation and then return home without getting into trouble. It takes people to do all this, together with governments. Thus, in many respects these Basket II features are matters of human rights as much as economics. They suggest government initiatives to pave the way for increased contacts between people whose activities beforehand (1) were circumscribed by government restrictions. They mirror the widely-shared opinion in the West that the Helsinki provisions were meant to reiterate and insure human freedoms by setting down a standard for government behavior not only with other states but their own populations as well. The witnesses invited by the Commission to testify on Basket II have been asked to address this broad aspect of human rights and freedoms as they describe their direct experience in matters affecting East-West economics, trade, and scientific cooperation. Our witnesses are Secretary of Commerce Elliot Richardson, Deputy Secretary of State Charles Robinson, Assistant Secretary of State Gerald Parsky; Donald Kendall, Chairman of the U.S.-U.S.S.R. Trade Council; Milton Rosenthal, Chairman of the United StatesRomanian Economic Council; Edward Wilson, Executive Secretary, United States-Hungary Economic Council; and Dr. John Hardt, Library of Congress Specialist in Soviet Affairs. Each of these distinguished persons is prepared to share past experiences in government and private enterprise. They will offer suggestions on resolving problems of trade with eastern CSCE states. They know how the U.S. Government deals with Basket II problems and how it can improve the overall trade picture by exploiting Basket II provisions and they will share their thoughts on the proper, practical relationship between trade initiatives and/or Government-stated obligations to assure that the Helsinki call on all signatory states to respect human rights is fully heeded. Do any of my fellow Commissioners care to make a remark at this point? Representative SIMON. I do not. Chairman FASCELL. We have a statement from Senator Pell who is cochairman, who unfortunately could not be here because of conflicts. I believe he has a Rules Committee meeting of the Senate. He has a short statement which he would like to have me read. Senator Pell's statement follows [reading]: Like Basket I and III, Basket II sets down benchmarks for governments to follow as they take unilateral, bilateral and multilateral steps to increase the economic well-being of all European states, the U.S. and Canada. It is quite a broad spectrum of ideas. The theory behind Basket II, I think, was that promoting economic cooperation and sharing the benefits of man's knowledge and industry might lead us from the political tensions which still seem to pit blocs of states against each other. Baskets I, II and III together have this potential, but these hearings are bound to produce differing opinions on how best to apply these provisions. Still, we should try to find a consensus view of what opportunities Helsinki offers us and how best to take advantage of them. This endeavor will certainly be helpful to us and to the new Administration. As we noted in the Commission study mission report, Europeans have placed emphasis on probing Eastern Europe and the U.S.S.R. on possibilites for trade improvement, more so than perhaps the U.S. has been able to do. Our initiatives have been circumscribed, say many observers, by how the 1974 Trade Bill affects our overall trade and commercial relationships with the Soviet bloc. So perhaps we should take this opportunity to ask whether we might overcome the Trade Bill impass without compromising our own priorities on human rights. Our interest in human rights is strong, as it should and must be. It is inextricably a part of the Carter Administration's foreign policy. Guaranteeing human freedoms, and the specific obligation of governments to do this, are an integral part of the Final Act. Our hearings may be the opportunity for finding the right formula for expanding economic relationships while seeing to it that states give due priority to underwriting respect for human rights. We have to do this, for the United States Government seems not to have agreed within itself on what to do at Belgrade. On the other hand, there are strong Soviet signals that the Communist countries want the Belgrade follow-up meeting limited to uncontentious discussion by each country of what it has done to comply with the Final Act, no more. Do we want to go along with this concept? Should we be prepared to table initiatives of our own at Belgrade, or even now with our closest allies? What Basket II proposals can we make without compromising our foreign policy interests, and how should we answer the Soviet Basket II challenge for European conferences on transportation, the environment and energy? These are among the important questions, it seems to me, that require our careful analysis even before we sit down in June at the Belgrade preparatory meeting. As for future Commission hearings, I hope they will examine Basket I and especially Basket III very closely. They are not only the most ambitious parts of the Helsinki Final Act but the ones most likely to cause the greatest stir at Belgrade. So ends Senator Pell's statement. I will say that we do have plans for additional hearings to follow up what we commence here today. Our first witness today is the distinguished gentleman who is the Senior Specialist in Soviet Affairs with the Library of Congress, Dr. John Hardt. Dr. Hardt, in the record prior to your testimony, we will place a summary of your biographical background so that everybody will have knowledge of your vast years of experience in the area which you are discussing. I know you have a prepared statement. We will be delighted to hear from you. [The biographical background follows:] JOHN PEARCE HARDT-SENIOR SPECIALIST, CONGRESSIONAL RESEARCH SERVICE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (1971-PRESENT) PROFESSIONAL LECTURER IN ECONOMICS, INSTITUTE OF SINO-SOVIET STUDIES, GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY (1966-PRESENT) Prior professional activity: 1959-71-Various positions with Research Analysis Corporation; and Operations Research Office, Johns Hopkins University, including Head, Strategic Studies Division. 1958- Editor, Association for Comparative Economic Studies Bulletin. ACES arranges a panel for each American Economic Association meeting published in AEA. 1972-74-President of Washington Chapter of American Association for Advancement of Slavic Studies (AAASS). 1968--Consultant to Secretary of Defense, Clark Clifford on U.S. Base Study ("Wood Study"). 1956-65-Lecturer, Economics, University College (Pentagon Program), University of Maryland. 1956-59-Staff Specialist on Soviet Economy, specializing in electronic power and nuclear energy matters, CEIR, Inc., Washington, D.C. 1953-55-Air University Fellow and Consultant on Soviet Economy, Air University, Maxwell AFB, Montgomery, Alabama. 1951-52-Consultant, Research Program on the USSR, Ford Foundation. 1946-48-Associate in Economics, University of Washington. 1942-46-Captain. U.S. Army. Education: Ph.D. Columbia University, 1955, Dissertation: Economics of Soviet Electric Power Industry. Certificate, Russian Institute, Columbia 1950. A.M. Columbia, 1950. M.A. University of Washington, 1948. B.A. University of Washington, 1945. |