WASHINGTON, Sept 14: Saying that the United States must confront Iraqi President Saddam Hussein before he builds a nuclear bomb, President George Bush on Saturday made his most direct appeal yet for public support for disarming Baghdad with force if necessary.

In a weekly radio address, Bush challenged the US Congress and the United Nations to take a forceful stand against Iraq, saying the “lives of millions and the peace of the world” may be at stake.

Bush said his call for action was gaining ground one day after Iraq flatly rejected US demands for a swift and unconditional return of UN arms inspectors. The UN inspectors, responsible for accounting for Iraq’s nuclear, chemical, biological and ballistic weapon programmes, were pulled out of Iraq in 1998.

Bush counted Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, whom he was scheduled to meet on Saturday night, and the leaders of Britain, Spain and Poland among those who “have reached the same conclusion I have — that Saddam Hussein has made the case against himself”.

“We must stand up for our security and for the demands of human dignity. By heritage and choice, the US will make that stand. The world community must do so as well,” Bush said.

For his radio address, Bush borrowed heavily from Thursday’s speech to the UN General Assembly in which he bluntly warned that “action will be unavoidable” against Iraq unless the world body took a hard line forcing Baghdad to disarm.

“Are Security Council resolutions to be honoured and enforced, or cast aside without consequence? Will the UN serve the purposes of its founding, or will it be irrelevant?” Bush said.—Reuters