And President Clinton has made it our goal to eliminate the threat that landmines pose to civilians, everywhere on the face of the earth, by the end of the next decade. I hope you will embrace this goal in this conference. And I urge you all to do so. For proof, we need look no further than Afghanistan. There, facing difficult circumstances, NGOs have learned to play distinct roles in what has become a coherent national program.
Indigenous capacities are now formidable.
The need for expatriate supervision is minimal. And we now expect the top priority minefields in that war-ravaged country to be cleared within three years. What we must do now is combine this knowledge with the awareness, the commitment, the resources, the coordination and the leadership to design and carry out a truly global strategy. In terms of the public awareness, national energies and total resources that can now be harnessed, we embark on this great enterprise with the wind at our backs. I want to salute Senator Patrick Leahy, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines and the Ottawa process for bringing enormous attention to the truth that it is wrong to endanger civilians with landmines.