This hearing of the National Subcommittee will come to order. Welcome, everyone to todays hybrid hearing, house members will appear in person, others will appear remotely. Let me remind everyone that pursuant to the latest guidance from the house attending Physicians Office all individual attending the hearing in person must wear a face mask. Members who choose not to wear a face mask will not be recognized. Let me make a few reminders for members appearing in person. You will only see members and witnesses appearing remotely on the monitor in front of you when they are speaking as active speaker mode. A timer is visible in front of you. Members appearing remotely, youre familiar with webex by now but let me remind everyone of a few points, you can see each other speaking during the hearing whether in personal remote as long as you have your webex set to active speaker view. If you have any questions about this please Contact Committee staff. We have a timer visible on your screen when
This hearing will come to order and we welcome everyone. The subcommittee testimony on the findings and recommendations in the study groups final report. Given the timing of the hearing we will have the opportunity to discuss the ramifications of the policy changes in syria and a study Group Recommendations to still address the challenges that are. For the purpose of an opening statement. Thank you very much for testifying today and for your work and the final report of the study group. Your report as a thoughtful review of the conflict and provides pragmatic recommendations for how policymakers can protect u. S. Interests and destabilize syria. Now it is well known President Trump does not like to read but i wish that he had skimmed over the executive summary before the recent phone call with the turkish president. Your assessment notes do not eliminate the threat to the United States. It also notes the detainee population is a longterm challenge is not being adequately addressed and
[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] good morning, everyone. Welcome to the Atlantic Council. Im paula dobriansky, im on the executive committee of the Atlantic Council board and i would want to commend the councils Eurasia Center for todays program which is entitled the state of human rights and putins russia. As many of you know the center has been extremely active and a vigorous voice on a range of issues from russias disinformation to the issue of ukraine, the scale and scope of the aggression in ukraine and the illegal annexation of crimea. Todays forum is particularly timing. Russia has experienced the worst crack that in human rights in decades. And we have three keynote speakers who will be up first, and all of whom are making a difference in their own way. Their strong, outspoken advocates for freedom and basic human rights in russia. Im going to introduce the first three and then will be having a panel afterwards which will be moderate