Proclamation 4700—Aid for Kampucheans

Thirty-seven years ago, a holocaust began that was to take the lives of more than six million human beings. The world stood by silently, in a moral lapse whose enormity still numbs the human mind.

We now face, once again, the threat of avoidable death and suffering for literally millions of people, and this time we must act swiftly to save the men, women, and children who are our brothers and sisters in God's family.

The International Committee of the Red Cross and the United Nations' Children's Fund recently appealed jointly for $111 million in aid to help the millions of Kampucheans, formerly known as Cambodians, who are facing death from starvation during the next six months. We must respond to this appeal, and we must also respond to the related needs for food, medicine, and shelter for Kampuchean refugees who are fleeing to Thailand.

A major program has been launched by the American government to support this relief effort, but it is too important to be left to the government alone. I am certain that the American people, as individuals and families, through churches, schools, voluntary organizations, and businesses, will want to be a part of this emergency humanitarian response to a desperate and terrible need.

Now, Therefore, I, Jimmy Carter, President of the United States of America, do hereby call upon all Americans to give generously to the voluntary relief agency of their choice to alleviate this terrible suffering, asking specifically that the donation be earmarked for Kampuchean relief. Further, I hereby designate each Saturday and Sunday in November until Thanksgiving as days for Americans in their synagogues, churches, and other places of worship to donate to this cause, and I call upon leaders of the religious community to take whatever measures are needed to publicize and facilitate these donations.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this second day of November, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred seventy-nine, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and fourth.

JIMMY CARTER