The United Nations should take on responsibility for "nation building" in post-Taliban Afghanistan, President Bush said last night. "I think that would be a useful role for them," he said, insisting that it was not a role he wanted for the US and that all parties in the country should have an opportunity to join such a government - "we shouldn't play favourites".
Speaking to journalists in the East Room of the White House at his first prime time press conference, Mr Bush said the campaign would continue "as long as it takes to bring al-Qaeda to justice". "It may take a year or two, but we will prevail," he said.
His aides said that the purpose of the press conference was to give an account to the American people of his campaign one month to the day since the attacks on September 11th. Just as importantly, however, it was an attempt to show off the new Bush, a confident leader who has done much in that time to shake off a reputation of a light-weight of whom there were few expectations. Questions, some hostile, were answered at length and without hesitation.
And Mr Bush, applauding the attempts by the Palestinian President, Mr Yasser Arafat, to control militants, hinted that he would meet him. "If I am convinced that a meeting with a particular party will further progress I will do so," he said.
In a sign of the extraordinary changing relationships in the Middle East, Mr Bush paid tribute to Syria's willingness to co-operate with the campaign, and said that "we take that seriously and will give it the opportunity to do so."
Was there an effective amnesty for states which previously hosted terrorism, he was asked. "If you want to join our coalition against terrorism, you're welcome," he said, even suggesting to the Taliban that if they "cough him [Osama bin Laden] up and his people today we'll reconsider what we're doing."
The president warned Iraq, however, that it was in its interest to demonstrate its good faith by readmitting UN inspectors to check its commitments to ending the production of weapons of mass destruction.
Updating the US on the multifaceted campaign against terrorism, Mr Bush said they had already done "a great deal" to disable the Taliban military capacity, that $24 million in bin Laden-linked assets have been frozen internationally in 62 countries, and he unveiled a new humanitarian initiative involving the nation's children, each of whom he asked to give $1 to the children of Afghanistan, half of whom were suffering chronic malnutrition.
Responding to a question about popular fears in the face of a new FBI warning of imminent retaliatory attacks in the US, Mr Bush promised that if the Government received a specific credible threat to any building, city or facility it would act to protect citizens close to such facilities but he urged people not to be paralysed by the terrorists but to "go about their lives". It was important, he said, that the public knew the Government was on full alert.
Insisting that the campaign was not one against Islam, the President pointed to the declaration this week by the 56 nations of the OIC that the attacks on the US were contrary to the peaceful message of Islam.
