President Bush Urges U.N. General Assembly to Help Rebuild Iraq

This was the first gathering of world leaders at the United Nations since the United States, Britain and others intervened in Iraq without Security Council backing.

“The primary goal of our coalition in Iraq is self-government for the people of Iraq, reached by orderly and democratic means,” the president said, some six months after the start of the war that ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s regime.

“This process must unfold according to the needs of Iraqis, neither hurried nor delayed by the wishes of other parties,” Mr. Bush added, responding to calls from the French and German governments for a quick transfer of power to the people of Iraq.

“America is working with friends and allies on a new Security Council resolution which will expand the U.N.’s role in Iraq,” he said. “As in the aftermath of other conflicts, the United Nations should assist in developing a constitution, in training civil servants, and conducting free and fair elections.

“Now the nation of Iraq needs and deserves our aid — and all nations of good will should step forward and provide that support,” the president said.

President Bush emphasized the cruelty of Saddam’s regime as a critical factor in the U.S.-led war, marking a shift from a pre-war focus on Iraq’s suspected weapons of mass destruction program.

“As we discover the killing fields and mass graves of Iraq, the true scale of Saddam’s cruelty is being revealed,” he said.

“We are interviewing Iraqi citizens and analyzing records of the old regime to reveal the full extent of its weapons programs and its long campaign of deception,” he added on the largely futile search for banned weapons in Iraq.

President Bush acknowledged the rifts created in the international community during the debate over Iraq saying, “I also recognize that some of the sovereign nations of this assembly disagreed with our actions.

“Yet there was, and there remains, unity among us on the fundamental principles and objectives of the United Nations,” he added.

“Iraq now has a Governing Council, the first truly representative institution in that country. Iraq’s new leaders are showing the openness and tolerance that democracy requires, and also showing courage,” the president told the assembly before adding that “every young democracy needs the help of friends.”

The president also called on the world community to participate in the rebuilding of Afghanistan saying, “I have recently proposed to spend an additional $1.2 billion for the Afghan reconstruction effort, and I urge other nations to continue contributing to this important cause.”

The president discussed other key initiatives of his administration’s foreign policy including measures to combat the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, the fight against AIDS, and aiding the victims of human trafficking and sex tourism.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan opened the session by presenting his annual report to the world body and warning that a doctrine of pre-emptive military intervention posed a fundamental challenge to the United Nations.

“My concern is that, if it were to be adopted, it could set precedents that resulted in a proliferation of the unilateral and lawless use of force, with or without credible justification,” said Annan. He did not mention the United States by name.

But Annan also urged world leaders to set aside their disagreements over the war and work together to build a peaceful democracy in war-torn Iraq.

“Whatever view each of us may take of the events of recent months, it is vital to all of us that the outcome is a stable democratic Iraq at peace with itself and with its neighbors, and contributing to the stability in the region,” Annan said.

French President Jacques Chirac, one of the leading critics of the U.S.-led Iraq war, also addressed the assembly, saying the process of handing power over to the Iraqi people needs to be conducted on a “realistic timetable.”

“In Iraq, the transfer of sovereignty to the Iraqis, who must have sole responsibility for their destiny, is essential for stability and reconstruction,” the French president said.

“It is up to the United Nations to lend its legitimacy to that process,” he added.

Chirac also criticized the unilateral nature of the coalition military action in Iraq, saying, “The war, which was started without the authorization of the Security Council, has shaken the multilateral system.”

“In an open world, no one can live in isolation; no one can act in the name of everyone; no one can accept the anarchy of a society without rules,” said Chirac before adding, “There is no alternative to the United Nations.”

Chirac has indicated that he will not veto the planned U.S. resolution aimed at garnering more international troops and aid for Iraq.