mr. eliot engel of new york. >> mr. chairman, thank you. let me pick up where you left off.in my opening remarks i talked about the f-16s in the cakes program. i'm really very concerned about it. ministry nowfense faces a tough decision of how to move forward with the upgrade of its fighters at a reasonable cost. this is an upgrade that it desperately needs. maybe they will continue with it and maybe they won't. concerned about taiwan being able to maintain its fleet of f-16s, and certainly the that we apparently made, the u.s. air force made not to fund the cakes program was a poor decision. it just makes no sense to me whatsoever. , there comes to taiwan is this sort of undercurrent that we feel over time where we bend over backwards to try not to upset the sensitivities of the beijing regime, and frankly it irks me. not that i don't wish to have good relations with beijing, because we should, but not at of our relationship to taiwan or our friendship with taiwan. it really just irritates me that we make a decision like this, which has an adverse impact on our friend taiwa

mr. eliot engel from new york, and then any other members seeking recognition to speak on the bill. we will then proceed to consideration of a manager's amendment. then to an en bloc package of bipartisan amendments, and then to any free-standing amendments that may remain before the committee. now let me make the observation that russia's armed intervention in ukraine and its illegal annexation of crimea have created an international crisis. and the danger, obviously, is far from over. president putin has deployed russian forces on ukraine's borders, and may yet attempt to carve off additional pieces of eastern or southern ukraine. if we wish to prevent him from further aggression, then the united states and our allies must take immediate action to strengthen ukraine's sovereignty, to strengthen their independence, to target responsible russian officials and others, in order to give the russians second thoughts before they take any additional action. this bill provides much-needed assistance to ukraine's struggling democracy, which will be tested in the presidential election that's

mr. engel his family is originally from the ukraine mr. eliot engel from new york. >> thank you very much mr. chairman. administrator alexander deputy assistant secretary singh thank you for appearing before the committee today and your tireless efforts in the last couple of months in your support of ukraine and let me thank chairman of royce for holding this hearing on this issue that is in the forefront of all of our minds right now. since 1991 the u.s. has strongly supported democratic prosperous sovereign ukraine in keeping with this commitment we support a peaceful negotiated resolution pic as hundreds of thousands of ukrainian citizens came out in the streets of kiev to express their desire for more democratic and just stayed. the recent selection of new interim government signal ukraine is back on the path towards stability and economic health but instead of welcoming this event is in the case of u.s. and europe president putin has reacted in a very different and disturbing manner so let me be clear president putin's aggressive military a

mr. eliot engel of new york for his opening remarks, our ranking member the committee. >> chairman royce, thank you for calling this hearing on the taiwan relations act. i'm a big supporter of taiwan and have traveled there many times, most recently with you last year on your first year as chairman. i want to agree with everything you just said about taiwan. next month marks the 35th anniversary of the taiwan relations act. the act, passed in 1979 is the cornerstone of the relationship between our two nations. it has been instrumental in maintaining peace and security across the taiwan straits and in east asia and serves as the official basis for friendship and cooperation between the united states and taiwan. i am proud to be a lead sponsor with you, mr. chairman on hhres 494 which rye affirms the importance and relevance of the taiwan relations act three decades after its adoption. taiwan is a flourishing multiparty democracy of 20 million people with a vibrant, free market economy. it's a leading trade partner of the united states along much bigger countries like brazil and india. over

myself and eliot engel and mr. ted deutch and others had an opportunity last year to travel to israel to see the effects, see the efforts by israel to counter the rocket attacks that come in from gaza by hamas. had an opportunity back during the second lebanon war, back during the war with hezbollahering -- hezbollah, to actually see the effects in august of 2006 of what was happening with rockets firing into a city on a daily basis. the city was under siege. there were literally 600 israelis, jewish israelis, arab israelis, jews israels, who were victims of these attacks from the communities who were in the trauma hospital and every day these rockets were rain down. now, this was not just the handy work of hezbollah. and of hamas that we saw last year. no. this was with rockets provided by iran, by iran and syria. and in the rocket attacks that i saw in 2006, those rockets, every one of them, in the cone of those rockets had 80,000 ball bearings and they would be fired on schools, on homes, on the hospital itself

mr. keating, the gentleman from massachusetts, for his work on this resolution as well as our ranking member of the committee, eliot engel of new york, and also recognize the long hard work that congresswoman marcy kaptur of ohio and mr. gerlach, mr. gerlach of pennsylvania have put in to their engagement on this issue with the ukraine. i would also add that if we do not recognize that russia is using energy as a weapon, we are missing what is really going on in eastern europe and central europe. it was in part ukraine's reliance on russia's energy that pushed the now deposed ukraine president to abandon the trade deal with the european union. it was that attempt to pressure him, and he was tempted by promises of discounts on natural gas. he was pressured by the threat of turning off the valve on that gas. he was pressured to turn toward russia instead of the european union. we believe that ukraine should have the right to trade with russia and the european union, trade east and west and north to poland and south to muldova. this should be the decision of the ukrainian people, and i believe the administration must do far