Helms Warns He’ll Stall Foreign Policy Legislation

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms, in a pointed exchange with Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, said Tuesday he intends to stall key U.S. foreign policy legislation unless the White House yields to Congress on an unrelated abortion issue.

Albright warned that the impasse is forcing her to conduct foreign policy “with one hand tied behind my back.” But Helms insisted that the administration was responsible for the deadlock and he called for new talks, possibly including President Clinton, to “work something out.”

The conservative North Carolina senator said Congress is unlikely to approve a compromise bill to pay overdue U.S. dues to the United Nations, increase by $18 billion the U.S. line of credit for the International Monetary Fund and reorganize the State Department without an agreement on the abortion issue.

The U.N., IMF and reorganization legislation was described by Albright as the most important piece of unfinished foreign policy business on Capitol Hill. The bill stalled last year when abortion opponents in the House attached an amendment prohibiting U.S. contributions to international family planning organizations that use their own funds to perform or suggest abortions abroad.

Clinton threatened to veto the bill if the abortion language was included.

Albright has cultivated a relationship with the crusty Helms and clearly had regarded him as an ally on the issue before their exchange during a committee hearing Tuesday.

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She seemed shocked when Helms asserted: “You’re not going to get any United Nations money; you’re not going to get the reorganization.”

Albright said she thought Helms agreed that the U.N., IMF and reorganization plans were too important to be jeopardized by the abortion fight. She also reminded him that he helped craft the legislation that was sidetracked by the abortion dispute.

“I stood with you last year,” Helms said. “And I got fussed at all across the country by people who thought I had sold out. Well, I hadn’t sold out.”

The U.N. and IMF issues are crucial to administration foreign policy goals. The United States is about $1 billion behind on its dues at the United Nations, a fact that has subjected Washington to ridicule abroad and, according to administration officials, damaged U.S. efforts to use the world organization to advance U.S. priorities, such as destruction of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction.

“Mr. Chairman, this issue is not complicated; it is simple,” Albright said. “The best America is a leader, not a debtor. Let us act quickly to put our U.N. arrears behind us; restore America’s full influence within the U.N. system; move ahead with U.N. reform; and use the U.N. . . . to make the world safer, more prosperous and humane.”

But Helms, an outspoken foe of abortion, told Albright: “There may not be swift approval of IMF and U.N. funding, even if you have the votes for it, so long as the administration continues to reject concessions made by the House last year.”

He accused Clinton of rejecting “out of hand” a last-minute compromise on the abortion issue.

Albright said the “so-called compromise” did nothing to temper administration opposition to the abortion provision.