It is an honor to address the Stockholm International Forum on the Holocaust. I appreciate the opportunity to appear by videotape, as our State of the Union address requires me to remain here in Washington. I am grateful to Prime Minister Persson for all he has done to bring about this meeting and to Elie Wiesel for serving as conference chairman. I am proud that, with Secretary Eizenstat's leadership, the United States has been at the forefront of efforts to address concretely the wrongs of the Holocaust era, spurring countries to review their roles in dealing with Holocaust assets, returning property to rightful owners, obtaining compensation for victims, giving survivors some measure of comfort at long last. But even as we redress the injustices of the past, we must ensure that the lessons of the Holocaust do not fade away in the future. That is why I am so grateful to Miles Lerman for his leadership of our Holocaust Museum here in Washington. That is why Sweden, the United States and others have advanced the International Holocaust Education Task Force and it is why this conference is so very important. Never before have so many world leaders come together with survivors and educators to underscore the need to teach the lessons of the Holocaust to our children and generations to follow. Fifty-five years after the Nazi death camps were liberated, we have entered a new century full of promise and possibility; but all around the world, humanity still is plagued by our oldest demon, the same dark impulse that spawned the Holocaust -- the fear and hatred of those who are different from ourselves. Still there are leaders who seek to turn that hatred into organized persecution and violence.

I am proud that NATO and the international community acted to reverse ethnic cleansing in Kosovo; but we have far to go before we vanquish ethnic and racial hatred and religious hatred in the Balkans, in Africa, in the Middle East -- indeed, in all our nations. We must do more so that children learn not to hate but to work for tolerance and peace. One thing we must do is teach them about the darkest moments of the past. We must deepen our study of the Holocaust and ensure that its lessons are taught in all our schools. The world must never forget how evil rose, took hold and spread across Europe. The world must never forget the victims, their names, their faces, how they lived their lives, how bravely they struggled for survival in the face of such unimaginable brutality. We must never forget what happened when governments turned a blind eye to grave injustice outside their borders when they waited too long to act. To forget, as Elie Wiesel has said, would be an absolute injustice in the same way that Auschwitz was the absolute crime. To all the leaders and educators gathered -- and, above all, to the survivors -- let me express my deepest respect and my gratitude for all you are doing to ensure that the world does not forget. Thank you for working to see that we use the lessons of the Holocaust to build a better world where people reach across the divides to find strength and joy in our diversity and in our common humanity.