Title

Sofia CSCE Meeting on the Protection of the Environment

Thursday, September 28, 1989
SD-628 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington D.C., DC 20002
United States
Members: 
Name: 
Hon. Dennis DeConcini
Title Text: 
Chairman
Body: 
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
Name: 
Hon. Steny Hoyer
Title Text: 
Chairman
Body: 
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
Name: 
Hon. Timothy Wirth
Title Text: 
Commissioner
Body: 
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
Name: 
Hon. Alfonse D'Amato
Title Text: 
Commissioner
Body: 
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
Witnesses: 
Name: 
Richard Smith
Title: 
Head of U.S. Delgation
Body: 
Sofia Meeting
Name: 
Gary Waxmonsky
Title: 
Director of Bilateral Programs
Body: 
Office of International Activities at the Environmental Protection Agency
Name: 
Liz Hopkins
Title: 
Coordinator
Body: 
Commission on Sustainable Development, World Conservation Union
Name: 
Dr. Vaidotas Antanaitis
Title: 
Member of the Exeutive Council/Co-founder of Green Movement/Deputy
Body: 
Lithuania's Reform Movement/Lithuania/Council of the Union of the Supreme Soviet
Name: 
Dr. Zbigniew Karpowicz
Title: 
IUCN
Name: 
Dr. Thomas Frey
Title: 
Head of the Green Movement
Body: 
Estonia
Name: 
Hon. Richard Schifter
Title: 
State Department

The purpose of this hearing, which Sen. Dennis DeConcini and Rep. Steny H. Hoyer chaired, was to examine the first meeting in CSCE history devoted exclusively to the environment. The hearing predated the Sofia Meeting itself, whose purpose was to address environmental problems that recognize no borders and threaten every individual’s right to a peaceful and secure life.

Unfortunately, the Sofia Meeting had been marred by the Bulgarian government’s lack of tolerance in its treatment of its Turkish and Muslim minorities, specifically the Bulgarian government’s campaign to assimilate Turkish minorities, which constituted a serious violation of human rights. Needless to say, then, intersectionality existed and continues to exist among environmental issues and the Helsinki process’s other top priorities.

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