LABOUR Euro MP Gary Titley has applauded Princess Diana for focusing the world's attention on landmines.

And he says he wholeheartedly agrees with the introduction of an international ban on the lethal weapons.

He issued a call in Strasbourg to the EU to "eradicate the weapons once and for all", after experiencing first hand the atrocities that landmines can cause when he visited Bosnia a year ago.

Mr Titley described to Euro MPs the horrific scenes of children in hospitals who had lost limbs after stepping on landmines.

He welcomed the new Labour government's decision to ban the sale and export of landmines and said he now hopes that other EU countries like Italy, Spain and Greece will follow suit when they meet with 65 other countries in Brussels later this month.

Mr. Titley said: "This is an ideal opportunity for the EU to make real progress on this crucial issue".

Diana put her urgent message across at the American Red Cross fundraising gala evening in Washington last night - and raised £300,000 for landmine victims.

Campaigning Diana's message was: "In the name of humanity, ban landmines and make the world a safer place."

In a keynote speech at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, the Princess told an attentive audience: "The more expeditiously we can end this plague on earth caused by the landmine, the more readily can we set about the constructive tasks to which so many give their hand in the cause of humanity."

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