Rehire soldiers dismissed on sexual orientation: Congmen

By Staff
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Google Oneindia News

Washington, June 26 (UNI) Two leading US Congressmen have written to Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte suggesting the government to re-hire US military people dismissed solely on the basis of their sexual orientation.

Congressman Tom Lantos (D-CA), chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, and Congressman Gary Ackerman (D-NY), chairman of the Subcommittee on West Asia and South Asia, in their letter to the Deputy Secretary of State urged the State Department to act quickly to hire language-qualified soldiers dismissed from the armed services because of their sexual orientation.

''We are writing to you regarding one of the most regressive, counter-productive policies we could ever imagine - our military's 'Don't ask, don't tell' policy,'' the letter reads. ''We are writing to urge the Department of State to take a specific step - the hiring of our unfairly dismissed, language-qualified soldiers - so our nation might salvage something positive from the lamentable results of this benighted policy.'' In the letter, Mr Lantos and Mr Ackerman noted that the Government Accountability Office has reported that ''Don't ask, don't tell'' had resulted in the dismissal from the military of more than 300 soldiers with critical foreign language skills, including Persian and Arabic.

They stressed that the dismissed soldiers, denied the ability to work for the United States armed forces, often take their language skills to contractors, who sell their services back to the American government - and its taxpayers - at a considerable markup. The letter urged Negroponte to ''immediately initiate a process of interviewing and hiring'' these former servicemen and servicewomen for State Department positions.

''While we lament our government's anachronistic and short-sighted adherence to the bigoted 'Don't ask, don't tell' policy, we see no reason why our nation's diplomatic mission should suffer for the military's lack of vision,'' Mr Lantos and Mr Ackerman wrote.

The letter highlighted the urgent need for skilled diplomats with critical foreign language skills, pointing out that the 9/11 Commission drew a direct connection between under-investment in critical foreign languages and threats to our national security.

In a February Foreign Affairs Committee hearing, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice emphasized the Department's desperate need for translators, prompting Mr Ackerman to ask about hiring translators discharged under the military's 'Don't ask, don't tell' policy.

UNI

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