Ronald Reagan

“ This week offers Americans an opportunity to honor our Nation's founders whose wisdom and commitment to self-determination and liberty have guided this country for more than 200 years. Let us once again reaffirm our faith that the aspiration for freedom will ultimately prevail over the rule of force and coercion which denies human rights to so many other parts of the world today.
Now, Therefore, I, Ronald Reagan, President of the United States of America, do hereby designate the week beginning July 18, 1982, as Captive Nations Week. ”

“ The brutal suppression of sovereignty in Afghanistan and the bondage of the captive peoples of Eastern Europe continue. Among the oppressed we must also count the peoples of many nationalities within the Soviet Union itself; they are victims of long decades of repression. ”