peace process. That is not the purpose of the request for the 120day delay. First of all, as I say, Israel is the major recipient of United States assistance now. That will continue.

The 120-day delay requested on the loan guarantee issue is not to link that question to anything else. It is simply to say this is not the time, we believe, to be debating this issue, to be discussing this issue. We want a 120-day pause, at which point the whole question of the loan guarantees will have to be discussed in the same way as it would have to be discussed if we were putting it to the Congress right now. So there is no linkage. Please understand that.

The second point is, yes, there are Soviet immigrants coming into Israel now and, yes, that is a financial problem, a problem of absorption for the Israelis. As you will probably recall, in the discussions that have taken place with regard to the request that the administration has made for a 120-day delay, the Secretary and the President put forward six points. One of those points is that at the end of the 120-day delay, the administration would be prepared to find ways to make up whatever the costs to Israel might be of the 120-day delay.

So, again, that is the best I can answer the question, aside from the fact that the substantial United States aid flows to Israel now obviously make a difference in terms of absorption of Soviet Jews coming to Israel in the form, once we have asked for a delay. Senator GRASSLEY. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

REFUGEE FUNDING

Senator KENNEDY. Thank you very much, Senator.

Just to recapitulate a point that Senator Simpson made, which I think put it in a sharp focus-and I would like to do so as well. The conferees on Labor-HHS appropriations have supported the President's request for $410 million to ORR. That figure assumed no increase in the level of refugee admissions. Yet the President has now proposed a 20-percent increase in admissions; as I mentioned, for my own State it is a 30-percent increase. However, the President proposes no increased funding for ORR.

So how does the administration plan to assure the States they will not be left holding the bag?

Mr. GERSTEN. Senator, are you addressing that to me?

Senator KENNEDY. Well, it seems that it landed with you. [Laughter.]

It goes to the end of the table.

Mr. EAGLEBURGER. I looked left in a hurry.

Mr. GERSTEN. Well, one of the difficult problems we have each year is estimating how many months the dollars will be able to cover. What the States have said to us over and over again is we know that you will have to have cuts, but let us know with some accuracy how many months you will be able to cover so that we don't pay for more months than the Federal Government is willing to cover in the refugee cash assistance and medical assistance programs.

We have taken this to heart. We have had several consultations

systems within HHS to make sure that we can be more accurate in our predictions. We feel that 8 months is a very accurate projection of the number of months. We are doing a number of things to try and expand the number of months that the cash and medical expenses will be able to cover.

We have suggested a shift in targeted assistance of $10 million so that there is $244 million instead of $234 million going to the cash and medical account. Other changes in the unaccompanied minors program and in State administrative costs which we are attempting to implement will be able to increase that 8 months some time over the course of the next year.

Senator KENNEDY. Well, members of this committee and their staffs have been working with the various voluntary agencies to find out how we can do more with less, and we are glad to work with the administration also, but I think you certainly got the sense from us up here that given the general economic climate that exists in many States, we just have to be very, very cognizant of these pressures or I think we do a great disservice to the whole program.

I am going to ask just for 6-minute rounds or 7 minutes just so that we can move on, because I know we are going to have to adjourn soon-and to the extent that our panel can respond quickly, I would appreciate it.

CONDITIONS IN PERU

Directing now toward Peru, I had a chance to attend the Foreign Relations Committee meeting with Mr. Fujimura last week and I thought he was enormously forthcoming, although still, I thought, in some of his responses left some concern to many of us.

The State Department last year pointed out that human rights abuses by Peruvian Government forces increased in 1990. There are widespread, credible reports of summary executions, arbitrary detention, torture, and rape by the military and the police. In July, noting that the human rights standards were strong and uncompromising, the administration found no pattern existed and instead proposed sending $34 million in military assistance to various security forces that the State Department had previously conceded were committing these crimes.

Are we aware of increasing security zones which are basically run by the military. We have got about 45 percent of the country that are in security zones-about 56 or 57 percent of the total population where you have military courts that are the primary jurisdictions for trials. Not a single Peruvian Army official has been arrested. Some have been accused, but none has actually been tried and indicted.

What can we expect in this country? Granted, all of us are very mindful that there probably is not a position which is more complex and difficult than being President of Peru. I will give you that for starters.

Mr. EAGLEBURGER. Mr. Chairman, I will try to be quick in my answer, but this is a subject on which I feel fairly strenuously, since when the question came of whether the administration would certify to the Congress that we ought to move with that money, I

am the fellow that made the decision. So if you want to shoot somebody, I am the one.

I spent some time with it and I thought about it hard, and I have sitting behind me Ambassador Schifter, who is the Assistant Secretary for human rights matters in the State Department and not known for his willingness to turn a blind eye to things that are done in contravention of our human rights standards. He has been to Peru twice and he has come back and assured me that, in his judgment, things are moving in the right direction.

The point, it seems to me, here is that the Congress and this administration has got to ask itself with regard to Peru, with a man who has been freely elected and who is and I hope, Mr. Chairman, you felt this way when you met with him-who is as dedicated as anybody in Latin America can be to trying to turn around a miserable situation in his country-the question is do we want to help him do it or do we want to sit and cluck at him over the obviously obscene things that have happened in the past, with a man who is intent on trying to change those things.

According to balanced people such as Ambassador Schifter who have been there and seen what he is doing, there are major changes taking place in what is still a difficult situation. The question we have to ask ourselves is, do we want to help him make it better or do we want to bang him over the head and take the money away and, at the same time, harm our narcotics efforts because we are unprepared to tell him, yes, it was bad in the past, but it has begun to change and you are the man who is trying to change it and we want to do everything we can to help you.

As I say, I would be glad to ask Ambassador Schifter now or afterwards, if you want to meet with him, but he can go through in substantial detail the many things that have changed for the better in Peru, and Dick Schifter is not known for his willingness to make these kinds of arguments or support these kinds of decisions.

Senator KENNEDY. Certainly, I would welcome-I am impressed with the President, I am impressed with his efforts. I find it difficult to justify why we are providing the military $34 million in terms of military help and assistance to a military which in many instances is accountable only to itself on that. But I understand, having said that, that there is an effort to try and at least find some common ground.

Mr. EAGLEBURGER. Ambassador Schifter would say that even on the military side, things have begun to improve. He had many meetings with the military when he was down there.

Senator KENNEDY. Well, I will look forward at another time to getting a chance to visit with him.

CONDITIONS IN KUWAIT

Just two final areas because the time is moving on, and that is the reports on the human rights abuses in Kuwait, and then I want to just save some time for the plight of street children, particularly in Guatemala and a number of the countries in Central and South America. I know there are limited programs now that are beginning to be targeted down there, some sponsored primarily by various church groups and organizations.

But the explosion of this phenomenon of street children with all of the attending kinds of abuses, particularly in some of the Central and South American countries-maybe Ambassador Lyman would make a comment and let us know how we can be helpful.

But could you, Mr. Secretary, talk a little bit about what is happening in Kuwait and what the administration is doing? Particularly, with regard to refugees inside Kuwait. What are the prospects in terms of their resettlement? Also, if we could get a comment on the street children?

Mr. EAGLEBURGER. I am not the man to talk about the Kuwaiti situation either, Senator. I think Ambassador Lyman knows more than I do about it.

Ambassador LYMAN. Well, Senator, of course, we have had many discussions with the Kuwaiti Government about that situation, and I think there is a decided improvement in bringing under control some excesses that occurred right after the liberation of Kuwait.

There has been an active role by the International Committee of the Red Cross visiting all detention centers, and there has been a great improvement in the processing and the whole way of dealing with judicial and arrest problems. Nevertheless, there is a great deal of animosity that exists within the society about people who are seen to be or suspected of being sympathetic during the Iraqi invasion, and many people have left or found their opportunities limited. Particularly a large number of Palestinians have felt constrained to leave Kuwait, and that is posing an issue for other countries.

We are pleased that progress has been made in the camp up along the border between Kuwait and Iraq, a now regularized program by the UNHCR to review the status of all the people there and to enable them to either go to another country or to return to Kuwait, and that is being done in cooperation with the Kuwait Government. So I think there have been a number of improvements. There are, of course, still some problems, serious ones.

PLIGHT OF STREET CHILDREN IN LATIN AMERICA

Senator KENNEDY. Well, we will be following these issues very closely. Now, maybe just on the street children?

Ambassador LYMAN. On the children, yes. First of all, there has been a great deal of improvement in the refugee situation in Central America in that many refugees, as such, have been able to go home. Nicaraguans and El Salvadorans who constitute a very large percentage of refugees in the area have been able to repatriate to their home country.

There are a large number of migrants throughout Central America, and there are problems within the society such as you mentioned, serious problems of street children. There are several programs that are designed to address that, some of which, of course, are under our AID program, and I would ask them to provide you further information.

But there is a regional program called SIREFCA which is designed to help countries deal more generally with problems of migration and development. We have contributed to that program; other donors have contributed to it. It is a rather unique effort to

try and deal regionally with this kind of problem. It is just getting underway. Some of the projects look very promising and we can give you more reports on it. I will also ask AID to follow up.

Senator KENNEDY. Yes, if you could provide some additional information on that.

Before leaving Peru, with the changes that have taken place, I am just wondering whether the army is permitting the various human rights organizations, whether it is Amnesty International or America's Watch or ICRC, to visit the barracks where a number of these individuals are being held. They had not, as I understand it, been permitted to do that. There have been allegations that this has been an area where there have been very substantial human abuse violations.

Mr. EAGLEBURGER. Mr. Chairman, this is one of the areas that Ambassador Schifter discussed with the Peruvian authorities and the military when he was there, and they have agreed, he tells me, with him to permit ICRC visits, as well as the local prosecutors to visit those places. It is one of the areas where we think there has been a major step forward.

Senator KENNEDY. And that is current or it is planned in the future? It is current now?

Mr. EAGLEBURGER. Yes.

Senator KENNEDY. OK. If you want to make a brief comment and then just supply information

Mr. SCHIFTER. I just want to say at the top level they have agreed to it. Now, it has to filter down. In other words, the Minister of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs said this is what they are going to be doing, so it has to be followed through

on.

Senator KENNEDY. If you could keep us abreast of it. Thank you very much.

COMPREHENSIVE PLAN OF ACTION FOR INDOCHINESE REFUGEES

Senator SIMPSON. Mr. Chairman, I would just take hopefully less than 6 minutes. I just have two questions. One is on the CPA, the comprehensive plan of action, if I can ask Ambassador Princeton Lyman. We are all aware of that, the CPA, and the attempts to preserve first asylum in Southeast Asian countries by discouraging boat departure and creating a screening process, again, case by case, and making assurances that third country resettlement will be available for true refugees, not political refugees or maybe even economic refugees, unless we change the definition. We have talked about that before.

But as we enter the third year of that, what is your assessment of the successes and failures of that, briefly? And then I have one other question.

Ambassador LYMAN. Senator, just briefly, I think we can point to considerable success in the CPA in that, with one exception, first asylum has been preserved throughout the region. We now have screening processes and appeals processes in each of the countries. Screening is now underway and proceeding more rapidly, and the