Providing for Consideration of H.R. 1950, Foreign Relations Authorization Act, Fiscal Years 2004 and 2005 CONGRESSMAN ADAM B. SCHIFF OF CALIFORNIA IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES Tuesday, July 15, 2003 Mr. SCHIFF. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlemen for yielding me this time. I wish to speak today on three amendments before the Committee on Rules, two of which were approved for the debate today and one which was not. I want to thank the Chair of the Committee on Rules for his work in supporting an amendment by the gentleman from California (Mr. McKeon) that would urge reconsideration of Mexico's extradition policy which currently precludes the extradition of Mexican nationals to face charges in the United States that may carry life imprisonment or the death penalty. The addition by the Mexico Supreme Court of the life imprisonment clause fundamentally means that, for the most serious crimes in the United States, we are unable to extradite those who flee south of the border to seek refuge. That is not in our interest. It is certainly not in the interest of the people of Mexico to have fugitives from justice free south of our border. Second, I want to thank the committee for their approval of an amendment that I offered calling attention to the problem that we have had in our nonproliferation efforts to obtain the assistance of Russian scientists, to bring Russian scientists into the United States for the purpose of improving our nonproliferation joint efforts. These have met obstacles, in part understandable as a result of September 11, but we cannot allow the September 11 visa changes to get in the way of our broad security interests by bringing these scientists in who are working on nonproliferation itself. But most significantly, I want to comment about the one that got away and that was an amendment that I had offered calling for an investigation into the claim that Iraq was trying to obtain uranium from Niger, the claim that made it into the State of the Union address. There is a request on the Senate side, it is a bipartisan request, that the Inspector General of the CIA and the Inspector General of the State Department work together on an independent investigation of how that claim rose to the level of the State of the Union, now something the White House says was not substantiated and did not belong in that address. This is, I think, critical for three reasons. First, the Congress made the most important decision it can undertake, the decision to authorize the use of force on the basis of our intelligence. Second, in the ongoing war on terrorism, it is essential that we have good intelligence if we are to prevent another September 11. If we have a problem with our intelligence agencies, we have got to find out about it and now. Finally, our standing, our credibility around the world, the willingness of other nations to cooperate with the U.S. in the war on terrorism will be dependent on whether they feel they can rely on what we represent to them about our intelligence and the quality of our intelligence. As this is perhaps the most graphic example of intelligence gone awry, it is something that merits our most serious investigation and attention. I recognize that the intelligence committees in the Senate and the House are working on this issue, and they are doing good work. However, as the Senate concluded on a bipartisan basis, this investigation by the two IGs does not detract from what the Senate committee or the House committees are undertaking, but in fact supplies that information to both committees. This is complementary to the work that is already going on and I think it is essential.