Thank you, Mr. President. To return to Duke after so many years -- it's indeed a privilege that I deeply appreciate. And to return here with such a distinguished group of personalities that are also receiving these honorary degrees is another privilege.
You have given me such an opportunity today and I am extremely happy to return to this home. A home that as a university one never really leaves, and this is something that you will experience for the rest of your life.
Needless to say that the world of the early sixties was quite different from the world of today. The international system was quite different -- the technological capacity, the potential productivity was very different. Nevertheless, values and ideas are the same. How we are going to be able to live in democracy, to respect human rights, to organize society in such a way that everybody has similar opportunities? How are we going to accept pluralistic society with different views?
The situation in the 1960s was still dominated by the Cold War. In the early sixties, the dynamic of the Cold War had spread to Latin America, so much so that the confrontation over Cuba between the United States and the Soviet Union took the world to the very brink of a nuclear war.
However, during those same years I was a witness to the extraordinary progress that you, here, in American society made with regard to civil rights, leave a powerful social movement.
One of the first things that I noticed when I arrived to Raleigh-DurhamAirport in January '61 was to realize that restrooms in the Raleigh-DurhamAirport were different for color and non-color people. During that same week, buses were ending the segregation here in the city of Durham.
As I observed the progress of this struggle of civil rights, I began to admire the infinite capacity of the United States to seek the solution to his problem with more democracy and greater freedom. America is rightly proud of his history that has been acknowledged by the contribution of many men and women of different origin, language, belief, who have found in this land of place in which to fulfill a dream of a better life -- of a free life.
As long as this capacity for integration remains, America will continue to be America. America will continue to be a land of opportunity for all his people. But precisely because of this success, the influence of American has been growing in the world. In today's world, the influence of America is made bigger than the American influence in the 1960s.
And you, as the talented people that today are having this commencement exercise, you that are the graduates from Duke, you will be the first generation to live in the most influential country over the planet since the last four or five centuries.
Today, you are ending an important chapter of your life. What you have ahead is still more challenging. But, at the same time, because it's more challenging, because you have a tremendous responsibility in what kind of a country you are going to shape, and to what extent this country has a tremendous responsibility, what kind of a world is going to be shaping.
And the same principles that you have with regard to integration within American society is the kind of integration that we can have at the regional level in the hemisphere. There is no question, things have changed so much. When I came here, how many in Durham city were able to speak Spanish? Quite a few. Not today anymore. And I think that Spanish is becoming the second language here in the United States, and to some extent English is becoming the second language in Latin America.
Probably, it is possible to foresee a continent where English and Spanish will be the lingua franca from the Bering Strait down to the Cape Horn. And at the same time, popular music where lyrics and melodies of the Americas blend without losing their identity in a constant process of enrichment.
And in addition to that, we share the values of democracy and respect for human rights. And this is why, now, we are in the process also of trying to integrate better our economies through a free trade agreement of the Americas.
But, as the process of integration of the United States and the hemisphere has been growing, so the world, there is no question today, how are we going to be able to build a better world where democratic values and institutions will have to forge a more global society in which difference does not necessarily mean antagonism.
To what extent, if globalization is here to stay, if globalization is the new phenomenon of the 21st century, when distance no longer matters, when geography is changing so much, to what extent all these things have to be tackled together with different tasks. To what extent is it possible to think that in the global world some rules are going to be essential. The rule of law, that is essential in our own societies, are going to be needed also at the more global level.
To what extent in the middle of this process, you are the first graduate class that two weeks after being here in Duke, you suffer and you see the Sept. 11th, 2001. The terrorists' attack represents a more urgent and crucial in the way that we are going to be able to face that enemy in this 21st century. What kind of lessons of history, what kind of initiatives are we going to be taking? Until what extent the United States plus the other countries of the world are going to be able to collaborate to say no to terrorism -- to say yes to life -- and the difference in mankind. We have to be able that terrorism as a global threat is something that has to be faced globally, and multilateral institutions are going to be essential for that, not only in United States, not only in United Nations, but if globalization is going to be here to stay, how can we make sure that the world that we are going to build is a better world?
The kind of society that you have here, giving similar opportunities to everybody, to what extent those can be the challenges in today multilateral system. The United Nations -- have you a great United Nations to the realities of today's world and not the world right after the Second World War?
To what extent, if globalization is going to be here to stay, to what extent a rule of law is going to be needed with regard to world change and world investment, the way that the different economies mix to each other?
I came from a small country, but that country where democracy today exists is not afraid of globalization. More than 70 percent of our product is export and import. For us is becoming essential then, how are we going to integrate with the rest of the world? What are going to be the rules of that integration? And you all know that if there is no rules, then what is going to prevail is the rules of the most powerful.
So, in this 21st century, different challenges, different responsibilities are the ones that you are going to assume. As the Class of 2005, it is going to be upon you not only to be the leaders of this country, but also to think beyond the frontiers of this country about our responsibilities that different countries of the world today have in the more global society.
We are entering a new epoch, quite different of the one that we learned before. But, precisely because the challenges that we have, they are real responsibilities.
I give you -- all of you -- success in this new chapter that you are about to begin. This new chapter has to deal with your own personal life, but this new chapter has to do also with the responsibilities that you will have to shape a better world for mankind.
Thank you and good luck.