United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has warned that reprisals for the deadly attacks on New York and Washington should not be levelled at innocent people.
"The world must recognise that all societies have common enemies, but it must also understand that these are not - are never - defined by a religion or a nationality," Mr Annan wrote in an article for French newspaper Le Monde.
"No people, no region, no religion should be targeted because of the abominable acts of certain individuals," he said.
United States officials have accused the ruling Taliban in Afghanistan of harbouring Osama bin Laden, the key suspect in the devastating attacks on New York and Washington on September 11th that left over 6,800 people dead or missing.
The United States is pursuing its biggest military mobilisation since the 1991 Gulf War as President George W. Bush prepared to strike after the Taliban refused to surrender bin Laden.
Annan said the UN is the best forum for coordinating the fight against terrorism, for extraditing criminals and bringing them to justice and suppressing money laundering. He guarded against arbitrary acts of revenge that affect innocent people.
"To allow divisions between and within societies to be deepened by acts of this kind would be to help do the terrorists' job," he said.