November 20, 2003	Thursday	Ramazan 24, 1424

LONDON, Nov 19: US President George W. Bush on Wednesday called on Europe to join the United States and Israel in shunning Palestinian President Yasser Arafat to encourage the rise of a new Palestinian leader, and renewed US demands for the Jewish state and the Palestinians to move toward peace.

“Leaders in Europe should withdraw all favor and support for any Palestinian ruler who fails his people and betrays their cause,” Mr Bush told a select audience at the opulent Banqueting House, in central London.

“The long-suffering Palestinian people deserve better,” said Bush, urging the Palestinians to also sideline Arafat, whom he did not mention by name but who was the obvious target of his remarks.

The Palestinians “deserve true leaders capable of creating and governing a Palestinian state,” he said. “Those who would lead a new Palestine should adopt peaceful means to achieve the rights of their people.”

UN, EUROPE CHIDED: The US president chided his critics in Europe on Wednesday and said the United Nations risked extinction unless it showed the sort of “Anglo-American backbone” that toppled Iraqi president Saddam Hussein.

Mr Bush used the keynote speech to appeal to the world’s democracies to stop tolerating tyrants and join America in spreading “freedom” around the globe.

“We cannot turn a blind eye to oppression just because the oppression is not in our own backyard,” Mr Bush said.

“No longer should we think tyranny is benign because it is temporarily convenient, “ Mr Bush told a select audience at the opulent Banqueting House, in central London.

“Tyranny is never benign to its victims and our great democracies should oppose tyranny wherever it is found.”

Sketching out his vision of the United States and the world, President Bush said “the United States and Great Britain share a mission in the world beyond the balance of power or the simple pursuit of interest”.

“We seek the advance of freedom and the peace that freedom brings,” he said, as he praised the British and American people’s “alliance of values”.

The US president justified his divisive Iraq policy and his alliance with British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

He also told powers in continental Europe they had a responsibility to help ensure global security, despite their opposition to the occupation of Iraq.

“Because European countries now resolve differences through negotiation and consensus, there’s sometimes an assumption that the entire world functions in the same way,” Mr Bush said.

“Beyond Europe’s borders, in a world where oppression and violence are very real, liberation is still a moral goal and freedom and security still need defenders.”

Hundreds of protesters turned out in a foretaste of a planned march on Thursday, as police mounted a security operation unprecedented in Britain that aimed to protect Mr Bush from terror attacks.—AFP/Reuters