Whereas, on August 23, 1939, the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany pledged mutual nonaggression through the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, which divided Eastern Europe into two spheres of interest in their illicit bilateral negotiations; Whereas this notorious agreement and the Friendship and the Border Treaty on September 28, 1939, allowed both the Soviets and the Nazis to divide and occupy Poland in September 1939 and to occupy the three Baltic States of Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia in June 1940; Whereas the United States refused to recognize the Soviet Union’s forcible occupation of the Baltic States, and consistently recognized the independence of Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia through the Welles Declaration on July 23, 1940; Whereas, on August 13, 1941, the United States Government signed the Atlantic Charter to make certain common principles in the national policies of their respective countries for a better future of the world, including the right of all peoples to choose the form of government under which they will live and self government restored to those who have been forcibly deprived of them and that the people of countries may live in freedom; Whereas the United States Government has actively advocated for and continues to support the principles by the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the United Nations General Assembly resolution 260 (III) of December 9, 1948; Whereas Captive Nations Week, signed into law ( Public Law 86–90 ) by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1959, raised public awareness of the oppression of nations under the control of Communist and other nondemocratic governments; Whereas the European Parliament resolution on European conscience and totalitarianism of April 2, 2009, established a day of remembrance for victims of Soviet and Nazi regimes to remember and commemorate their victims