Coral Gables, Florida -- "El Salvador has discovered the path to defeat poverty and to obtain prosperity" and that path is called freedom, President Francisco Flores told the "Dialogue on Democracy" conference hosted by the United States.

In a keynote dinner address, President Flores, who spoke in English, called the evolution of democracy in El Salvador "both a lifesaver and a guarantee of prosperity" because it also helped end a brutal civil war that affected the lives of all its citizens, including himself.

He told the conference delegates from Africa and Latin America, who have gathered to discuss best practices for democratic development, "The reality of development is strikingly simple. The only real wealth of any nation is its people and the true wealth of any individual is his or her creativity. Only in freedom can an individual be creative and productive. This is the secret to development."

Describing El Salvador's democratic evolution, President Flores noted that in 1989, after 50 years of military rule and 13 years of war, Salvadorans flocked to the ballot boxes to elect their new political leadership. "It was the first time we did not know who would win the election."

A few years later, Flores said, he became a congressman elected to the first national assembly which had in its midst many of those who had been fighting the country's civil war for years. "In the first session of Congress, we would all come face to face for the first time with our enemies, with those who had murdered our love ones."

Speaking of his own personal experience, the President said, "It was a difficult moment. For me, it meant seeing for the first time the men that had murdered my father-in-law. My daughter... was in his arms when he was killed. She was saved by a miracle. I remember saying to myself ironically, ‘So this is democracy.'"

Today, Flores said, "I say to myself, truly and honestly: thank God for democracy."

Flores went on to chronicle his nation's economic, social and democratic progress, noting that although his nation is one of intense beauty, it has been traditionally poor because it lacks natural wealth. El Salvador, he reminded everyone, was the last conflict of the Cold War, lasting from 1979, he said, to 1992.

"In those 13 years, tens of thousands died. In one of the most dramatic population displacements ever," he said, "30% of its total inhabitants fled the country. There is not one family in El Salvador," he told his audience, "that has not suffered either the loss of one of its own members or the separation of the family due to forced migration" out of the country.

The war, he said, destroyed the country's infrastructure and even parts of the Pan-American Highway, which in certain sections became so debilitated it existed only as a dirt road.

Energy failures were rampant and the waiting time for a telephone was five years, he said, with the cost being $3000 for one telephone. That was compounded, he added, by high inflation, high interest rates and negative economic growth.

Although the El Salvador back then became synonymous with conflict and strife, he said, the El Salvador of 2003 is a radically different country. "After 15 years of a clear vision and intense work, today...from 40 Salvadorans out of 100 that could neither read or write, only 14 of 100 are now in that predicament."

Poverty levels have dropped from 35% of the population to 17%, he said. In the old El Salvador, he noted, it was very common for many children to die of smallpox, polio, measles and tetanus. In the last four years, he said, El Salvador has not lost one single child to those illnesses.

Life expectancy in El Salvador, Flores explained, has jumped from 57 years 15 years ago to 70 years this year. Ten years ago, he said, only four in ten rural Salvadorans had electricity, as compared to six out of ten. That means 85% of all Salvadorans throughout the country now enjoy electrical service, he said.

Four years ago, El Salvador had 400,000 telephone lines, as compared to 1.5 million now, he said, while proudly noting that it now only takes 48 hours to get a telephone line.

El Salvador has also achieved financial strength and stability, he said. "In spite of an extremely complicated international environment, marked by a prolonged recession and aggravated by a terrorist attack, high petroleum prices, a downfall of agricultural commodity prices, a profound risk aversion from investors in the region, and the greatest natural catastrophe provoked by two earthquakes, El Salvador was able to reconstruct itself, pay its debt punctually, lower its fiscal deficit, double public investment without raising taxes, achieve the lowest inflation rate and the lowest interest rate in Latin America and become along with Chile and Mexico, one of the few countries that has been able to achieve a positive growth rate."

That progress has been attained, he said, because of his country's belief in freedom and democracy. Government institutions have been reformed to serve the needs of the people, he said, and the country is pursuing an economic model based on freedom. As part of that effort, he expressed his hope that his country can very soon sign a free trade agreement with the United States.

Following his speech, Flores received a standing ovation from the conference delegates, before answering a few questions from the delegates.

Asked how El Salvador has been able to succeed in putting conflict behind it, Flores reminded everyone that the only a way a society can move forward is by rethinking its entire strategy and taking responsibility for its own fate.

"We used to blame industrial nations for our poverty...rich nations for our poverty...the North for the poverty of the South...the international community... It was not until we decided that everything in El Salvador was the result of our decisions and that we had to assume full responsibility for our destiny that we then faced our reality, rethought our country and started to move ahead."

Asked how the people of El Salvador became convinced to embrace progressive and democratic changes, Flores said a "generational change" took place all across the country -- which brought young people with a new mindset into the government. He said many people have joked with him because his cabinet officers are so young.

Finally, Flores was asked when he knew his country had reached a turning point and was making solid progress. It was not until seven years after the constitution was signed, he said, when the 1991 ceasefire took effect in a peace accord. The first important building block was when people put their guns down, he said.

That was the most important political signal, followed by an important economic signal three years later -- when Salvadorans started trusting in their country's economy and taking out long-term loans. "That was the first sign that there was trust in our time," he said.

After that took place, he said, the government was then able to move much of the military's budget to education, to build schools and proceed to fully embrace in peace and prosperity.

[U.S. Undersecretary of State for Global Affairs Paula J. Dobriansky hosted the June 5-6 democracy conference, which is a follow-up to the Plan of Action adopted at the Community of Democracies meeting in Seoul in 2002. That plan, specifically charted out key areas in which the Community could: strengthen democracy in individual countries and regions; enhance regional collaboration and cooperation; bolster democratic institutions and civil society; encourage voluntarism; and foster education on the principles of democracy.]

[Attending the Florida conference were governmental and non-governmental representatives from Cape Verde, Mali, Botswana, Senegal, Kenya, Ghana, Mozambique, Jamaica, Brazil, Chile, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Peru and the Dominican Republic. A host of delegates from non-governmental organizations also attended.]