On May 20, the House Foreign Affairs Committee approved, by voice vote, the Foreign Relations Authorization Act for FY2010 and FY2011 (H.R. 2410).
Sponsored by Chair Howard Berman (D-CA), H.R. 2410 would authorize $17.935 billion for the State Department in FY2010 and “such sums as may be necessary” for FY2011. Included in that amount is $1.578 billion for migration and refugee assistance, which includes funding for programs to combat human trafficking; $2.26 billion for international peacekeeping activities; and $400 million in FY2010 and $450 million in FY2011 for the Peace Corps.
The measure would require the secretary of State to “establish an exchange program for Liberian women legislators and women staff members of the Liberian Congress” to “promote the advancement of women in the field of politics, with the aim of eventually reducing the rates of domestic abuse, illiteracy, and sexism in Liberia.”
An Office for Global Women’s Issues would be established within the department. The office would be required to coordinate and advise the State Department on activities and programs related to gender and “women’s empowerment internationally.” The ambassador-at-large for the office also would be required to “actively promote and advance the full integration of gender analysis into the programs, structures, processes, and capacities of all bureaus and offices of the department of State and in the international programs of other United States Government departments and agencies.”
H.R. 2410 would “[support] the decision by President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan to submit for review the Shi’ite Personal Status Law and strongly urges him not to publish such law on the grounds that such law violates the basic human rights of women and is inconsistent with the constitution of Afghanistan.” The Senate Foreign Relations Committee passed a resolution condemning the Shi’ite Personal Status Law on May 6 (see The Source, 5/8/09).
The bill would require the State Department to submit a report to Congress concerning the incidence of child marriages throughout the world; in addition, the State Department’s annual country reports would be required to include data when at least one sub-national region has child marriage rates present at rates of 40 percent or more.
Finally, the bill would require the department to report on its recruitment of women and minorities, and on the employment compensation of these groups. In addition, the State Department would be required to submit a report to Congress detailing the number of small, women-owned, and minority-owned businesses that provide goods and services to the State Department.
During debate on the measure the committee adopted the following amendments:
The following amendments were rejected:
