Lois Capps: “I rise today in great dismay over the President's decision not to sign the Ottawa treaty banning antipersonnel land…”

“I rise today in great dismay over the President's decision not to sign the Ottawa treaty banning antipersonnel land mines. The administration's position defies reason. The only way that the United States can show leadership on this issue is to sign the comprehensive ban treaty on these deadly devices. One hundred nations courageously have changed their policy, but U.S. lawyers have simply changed the definition of a landmine. But a landmine by any other name is still a landmine, and landmines are immoral. People around the globe have come together to say, no more. No more killing, no more maiming, no more maiming of innocents. No more fear of leaving one's home to find food. No more social and economic dislocation to the world's neediest countries. I ask the President to sign the treaty to ban the antipersonnel landmines.”