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Mr. DORNAN of California. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from California [Mr. Lagomarsino] for yielding, and I thank the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solarz] and everybody involved with this over the years. Of all the issues I have been involved with in the House in 14 years, this has been the most heartrending, but also the most satisfying, to see Members of all beliefs, from all parts of the country and from both our great parties working together to make sure, as the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Michel], our Republican leader, said, that we do not forget.

Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to add one note here. Today I am wearing the bracelet of a friend of mine who was shot down in Laos in mid-May 1965. That is 25 years and 2 months ago. He was a known prisoner, Dave Herdlecker, but David would not mind that every other day I alternate this bracelet with one of our current prisoners, the hostages in Lebanon. They are prisoners of a different kind of a war, a war against terrorism, and I spoke with one of the hostages we managed to get out yesterday, Dave Jacobsen, who has a tremendous respect for the missing-in-action issue and the work we did here in the House on that issue while he was a prisoner in Beirut. He went over with me yesterday again the litany of abuses against human rights that Iran, the Iranian Government, is guilty of, and he pointed out again that his friends, two to them that he actually served with, Tom Sutherland who was taken on June 9, 1985, and he has been there now 5 years and 1 month, and that out longest held prisoner, Terry Anderson, was taken March 16, 1985. So, in 3 says that will be 5 years and 4 months. That is past the halfway mark of our longest held prisoner in Vietnam unless there are some still alive, which we pray there are, and we get them out someday, and this prisoner of war issue, this missing in action issue, is a living, dynamic horror story in American life, and the rumors, as we talk tonight, are ricocheting around the world that Brian Keenan, the Irishman who has been held captive for years, that he may be released.

TERRY ANDERSON (Senate - September 27, 1991)

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Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I rise to inform my colleagues that today marks the 2,386th day that Terry Anderson has been held captive in Lebanon.

And I note that former hostage John McCarthy--held for a time with Terry Anderson and Thomas Sutherland--has offered the first public reflections on his captivity. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Associated Press report of his remarks be printed in the Record at this time.

There being no objection, the report was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:

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From the Associated Press, Sept. 27, 1991

FROM THE ASSOCIATED PRESS, SEPT. 27, 1991

McCarthy Salutes Strength of Hostages

London.--John McCarthy says the strength of his fellow hostages helped him through more than five years of captivity in Lebanon and supports him still.

`These are all men of real merit,' McCarthy said of the hostages he was held with: Brian Keenan, Terry Anderson, Thomas Sutherland, and Terry Waite.

`I realize how lucky and privileged I was to share their ordeal. Their strength continues to support me now.'

McCarthy, who was released in Aug. 8, made his first lengthy public comments this week about his 5-year ordeal.

In a series of interviews with newspapers and Britain's two television networks, McCarthy, 34, was joined by Jill Morrell, 33, who led a campaign to keep his case in the public eye. Both turned aside questions about whether they intended to marry.

McCarthy said he was imprisoned longest with Brian Keenan, the native of Belfast, Northern Ireland, who was released in 1990. `He was the rock on which I built my survival and I always missed his dear presence,' McCarthy said.

McCarthy and Keenan later were held with Anderson and Sutherland. The two Americans had a radio and gave McCarthy the news that his mother had died.

`As I got to know Anderson and Sutherland again I realized that I had found two new right arms. They gave me a new and very great support,' McCarthy said.

Anderson, the chief Middle East correspondent for The Associated Press, is the longest-held hostage. He was kidnapped March 16, 1985.

Waite, a Church of England envoy, was the last to join the group, just before Christmas last year, McCarthy said.

`Terry had been kept alone for almost four years, yet within a few hours he was chatting away as if that huge chasm had never existed,' said McCarthy.

After a serious attack of asthma, Waite had `returned to form and kept us entertained with tales of his life and experiences around the world.'

`Days and weeks would pass without note. But I did find that if I slept during an afternoon I would often awake, terrified of the time years and months that I had lost, in which nothing had been achieved,' he said.

`A hostage doesn't relax. Apart from the obvious questions forever on one's mind * * * there are more immediate tensions.

`I was always apprehensive about moving to a new location as the moves were traumatic. I slept badly. At whatever time the lights went out, it always took me two or three hours to relax and restore a sense of proportion and hope before I could go to sleep.'

He said he felt no bitterness toward his captors.

`A long time ago one came to terms with the fact that the people who were holding us were doing what they thought was the right thing what they believed in,' he said.

The hostages filled the time with cards, invented games and endless conversations, he said.

`We used to make plans, just enormous and wild plans particularly Brian Keenan would come up with enormous schemes that he would insist that we discuss for days on end,' such as Keenan's scheme for starting a yak farm in Patagonia.

`We know nothing about yaks nor Patagonia, but this didn't really seem to matter at the time. You know, we make it up as we go along, and discuss possible problems, and figure them out when we get to Patagonia,' McCarthy said.

`The days of despair were fairly short-lived. I might go up and down a few times in a day, but it didn't stretch over many hours or something like days, so that one might be up a little and then down a little, but it kind of evened out. We all watched each other, obviously, to how it was going, to try to jolly someone along.'

McCarthy said he kept a newspaper picture of Ms. Morrell in his cell.

`You can see we are here together today and we're taking it very slowly and I think that's the only way to do it. We're just two normal people getting to know each other again. It's going very nicely,' McCarthy said.

Earlier this week, Britton Jack Mann, 77, was released. He was kidnapped in Beirut in 1989.

At least nine Westerners are still missing in Lebanon five Americans, a Briton, two Germans and an Italian. In addition, British officials says Alec Collett is presumed dead following claims he was killed in 1986 in retaliation for British complicity in U.S. bombing raids on Libya.

TERRY ANDERSON (Senate - October 25, 1991)

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Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I rise to inform my colleagues that today marks the 2,414th day that Terry Anderson has been held captive in Lebanon.

Today, two Beirut daily newspapers published a letter from Peggy Say to Terry Anderson. In her letter, Peggy calls the videotape of her brother--released earlier this month--a wonderful gift, noting his good health and sense of humor. And she reminds him:

Thousands of people will be praying for you this Sunday for your birthday and for the continued success of the Perez de Cuellar mission.

More. Sulome, Terry Anderson's daughter, has recorded a video message. And the BBC is broadcasting birthday greetings from John McCarthy and Brian Keenan, perhaps others. I add my own.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that an Associated Press report detailing the day's events be printed in the Record at this time.

There being no objection, the report was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:

Two Papers Publish Peggy Say's Letter to Anderson

BY RIMA SALAMEH

Beirut, Lebanon.--American hostage Terry Anderson's sister sent him a letter that was published in Beirut newspapers on Friday, two days before his seventh birthday in captivity.

Freed hostages John McCarthy and Brian Keenan also broadcast messages of hope to their former cellmates Friday, including a special birthday wish to Anderson.

The greetings came four days after kidnappers released American educator Jesse Turner, who returned to the United States on Friday. Turner was freed as part of complex negotiations mediated by the United Nations that have raised hopes for the freedom soon of all the Westerners held in Lebanon.

In her letter to Anderson, who turns 44 on Sunday, his sister Peggy Say wrote that the family was heartened by the way he looked on a videotape broadcast by Cable News Network on Oct. 6.

`The family is still basking in the glow of your robust good health, which was quite obvious on your videotape,' Say wrote.

`Equally apparent was the survival of your sense of humor and emotional well-being.'

`We are very grateful that you were allowed to send us this wonderful (videotape) gift,' she wrote.

The letter was published by Beirut's two conservative newspapers, Al-Answar and Ad-Diyar. Other Beirut dailies, including the leading An-Nahar and as-Safir, also received Mrs. Say's letter and plan to publish it Saturday.

Anderson's 6-year-old daughter, Sulome, who was born nearly three months after his capture, sent him a videotaped birthday message, saying she felt he would be out soon.

Anderson, chief Middle East correspondent for the Associated Press, is the longest-held hostage. He was kidnapped on March 16, 1985.

Islamic Jihad, a pro-Iranian Shiite Muslim fundamentalist group, claims it holds Anderson as well as American educator Thomas Sutherland and Anglican church envoy Terry Waite, a Briton.

Keenan, McCarthy and other freed Westerners have said Anderson and other captives are allowed to read newspapers and magazines and listen to radios.

In their radio message on the BBC, McCarthy and Keenan spoke hopefully about what Anderson and the others would encounter when they are finally freed. `I think it struck me, and will probably strike all the boys as they come home, that we are very famous people because of what has been done for us, and that is a little unnerving if you haven't been when you went away,' said McCarthy, 34, a television journalist who was released on Aug. 8.

McCarthy wished Anderson a happy birthday and then assured the hostages: `Everything's fine with your families ... It's been a great joy to talk to them and get to know them. When you're ready when you come home, it will be lovely to meet up with you all again, with the families.'

Speaking of Anderson's daughter, Sulome, he said: `There's a lot of Terry obviously in her, though they have yet to meet. But God willing, that will be very soon.'

Say's letter gave her brother a detailed account of the activities of each family member, as well as the efforts being made by U.N. Secretary-General Javier Perez de Cuellar to free him.

`Thousands of people will be praying for you this Sunday for your birthday and for the continued success of the Perez de Cuellar mission,' said the letter.

The United Nations has been trying to arrange a swap of the Western hostages held in Lebanon for an estimated 300 Arab prisoners held by Israel and its proxy militia, the South Lebanon Army.

Perez de Cuellar's efforts came in response to a letter from Islamic Jihad that was brought to him by McCarthy. Since then, three Western captives have been released--Briton Jack Mann as well as Americans Edward Tracy and Turner.