Thus, except for refusals to sign by the United States, Russia and China, the hopes of the late Diana began its journey toward fulfillment with respect to this cause.

Canada, which provided the cause of land-mine elimination a major impetus, was the first nation to sign.

Jody Williams, winner this year of the Nobel Peace Prize for having worked so diligently as a member of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, addressed the Ottawa assembly.

Only a year before, she confessed, she'd expected no more than 36 nations to acquiesce to the terms of the treaty.

The 47-year old Vermont resident exulted, "And here we have 125 governments recognizing that the tide of history has changed."

Ms. Williams told her multi-national listeners that they represented a new turn in the tide of affairs. There is no longer only one superpower, she explained, because nations united for peaceful purposes constitute, in fact, a superpower themselves.

The United States opted out of signing the international treaty on account, it said, of its "need" to maintain mines in the borderlands between the two Koreas, thus protecting its own 37,000 troops stationed in South Korea. Some military experts, because of improved surveillance technology, dispute the U.S. strategy.

Attendees at the Ottowa ceremony were widely critical of the United States for taking a stand that bespoke military rather than humanitarian values.

Among the harshest critics was Vermont Senator Patrick J. Leahy, a Democrat who spoke out against the reluctance of the Clinton administration to sign. "We become part of the problem," the senator explained, because by not signing, "we give other nations an excuse not to sign."

Land mines, left behind by armies in transit, are the residue of past wars. Each year, 26,000 persons—including a large percentage of children-- are their victims. The new treaty gives its signers a decade during which to complete clearings. However, this means that 2,000 persons will be killed or hideously maimed during the Christmas season alone.

Cornelio Sommaruga, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, gave focus to this fact by saying, "The ban itself will provide little comfort to the 2,000 people whose lives will be forever shattered this month by mines currently in the ground.

Production, use, stockpiling and mine transport are all banned by the treaty.

Canada's Prime Minister, Jean Chretien, celebrated the occasion by saying, "For the first time the majority of nations of the world will agree to ban a weapon which has been in military use by almost every country in the world."