U.S. SENATOR PATRICK LEAHY

New Leahy Law Targets New Era Of War Criminals

 . . . Culminates 5-Year Effort To Keep Human Rights Abusers Out Of U.S.

 

(FRIDAY, Dec. 10) –  Foreign war criminals responsible for committing atrocities of torture, rape and murder against innocent civilians can no longer find safe haven in the United States under a measure authored by Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) that Congress has now approved and that President Bush soon will sign.

Five years after Leahy first introduced the Anti-Atrocity Alien Deportation Act, the bill Wednesday night cleared Congress with bipartisan support as part of the National Intelligence Reform Act, which will implement recommendations of the 9/11 Commission and other reforms.  The President has said he will sign the bill.  The Anti-Atrocity Alien Deportation Act updates the charter of the Justice Department’s Office of Special Investigations (OSI), which for years has investigated the cases of Nazi war criminals who sought refuge in this country, but which cannot investigate other war criminals. 

Leahy said, “Now we can pursue the new generations of war criminals and human rights abusers.  This is a signal to the world that the United States intends to be true to our commitment to the protection of human rights around the globe.”  Leahy is a leader on human rights issues and has also led in oversight of prison abuses and torture policy changes involving U.S. prisoners at detention facilities in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay. 

The bill expands the scope of aliens subject to deportation and inadmissibility to the United States to include those who have engaged in torture, genocide and religious persecution, among other atrocities, Leahy said.  The measure also extends the current provisions to include those criminals who ordered, assisted or otherwise participated in genocide. 

Estimates from Amnesty International suggest that nearly 150 alleged human rights abusers have been identified as living in the United States, but experts warn that the number could be as high as 1000. 

Leahy is the ranking Democratic member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which oversees the Department of Justice and has jurisdiction over federal immigration laws.  Leahy’s bill has passed the Senate in past years but had not before also passed the House.  The bill was offered as an amendment to the intelligence reform package by Reps. Mark Foley (R-Fla.) and Gary Ackerman (D-N.Y.).

“Criminals who wielded machetes and guns against innocent civilians in countries like Chile, Yugoslavia, Haiti and Rwanda have come here through the same doors that we have opened to deserving refugees.  This bill now locks those doors to human rights abusers who seek a safe haven here from the punishment they deserve for their offenses,” Leahy said.

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