Y4. F76' :P 17° CRISIS IN EAST PAKISTAN 92-1 HEARINGS BEFORE THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON ASIAN AND PACIFIC AFFAIRS OF THE COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES NINETY-SECOND CONGRESS COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS THOMAS E. MORGAN, L. H. FOUNTAIN, North Carolina MORGAN F. MURPHY, Illinois RONALD V. DELLUMS, California Pennsylvania, Chairman WILLIAM S. MAILLIARD, California PETER H. B. FRELINGHUYSEN, New Jersey J. IRVING WHALLEY, Pennsylvania EDWARD J. DERWINSKI, Illinois CONTENTS LIST OF WITNESSES Gottlieb, Prof. Gidon, New York University School of Law....... Dorfman, Robert, professor of economics, Harvard University-----. Reprint from Congressional Record, June 11, 1971, of speech by Hon. Cornelius E. Gallagher, entitled "An American Response to the Pakistan (III) 35 CRISIS IN EAST PAKISTAN TUESDAY, MAY 11, 1971 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON ASIAN AND PACIFIC AFFAIRS, Washington, D.C. The subcommittee met at 2:05 p.m. in room 2172 Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Cornelius E. Gallagher (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. Mr. GALLAGHER. The subcommittee will come to order. We are rather short on members, because we are knee-deep in the SST debate on the floor. We will proceed as the members come in. We are beginning hearings today into the situation in East Pakistan with particular emphasis on the related problems of refugees and famine. I think it would be useful to briefly summarize events leading to what may be one of the worst human tragedies in modern times. In November 1970 a cyclone and flood killed thousands in East Pakistan and crippled the main port of Chittagong. The recent fighting has prevented most crops from being planted. Because East Pakistan is a food deficit region in the best of times, as many as 30 million people may starve, according to reports said to have been submitted to the Agency for International Development and the World Bank. Right now, refugees are streaming from East Pakistan into India at the rate of 60,000 each day, swelling the already strained Indian food supply by an estimated 1.5 million new mouths to feed. The refugees and the potential famine are the result of civil war which broke out on March 25, 1971. While the politics of Pakistan and the subcontinent are not the focus of this hearing, it is important to remember that in the election for a National Constitutional Assembly in December 1970, the Awami League captured 167 of the 169 seats contested in the East. This gave them an absolute majority of the 313 seats contested in all of Pakistan. While the government of Yahya Kahn now is in apparent control of the cities, those who embrace autonomy for Bangla Desh claim the countryside. Factually, the countryside of East Pakistan is the equal of the countryside of South Vietnam in providing natural surrounding for insurgency and the fighting thus far has produced reports of savage atrocities on both sides. Putting this together, we seem to have a situation which is potentially equal, in terms of human misery, to a combination of Vietnam and Biafra. Because of our military aid to the central government it appears that our arms, in conjunction with those supplied by other governments, are being used to defeat the people who won the election. While these and other questions are as important as they seem to be unanswerable at this point, our focus is the immediate threat to the |