THE US: President Bush has continued to talk tough in warning named "rogue" states of US resolve to prevent their deployment of weapons of mass destruction.
Although administration officials have insisted that Mr Bush's State of the Union speech on Tuesday was not necessarily a warning of imminent military action against Iraq, Iran, and North Korea, Mr Bush yesterday insisted again that "all options are on the table on how to make our allies more secure" .
Mr Bush was speaking to journalists after a meeting in the White House with King Abdullah of Jordan, who praised the campaign against terrorism and said other countries "better make up their minds pretty quickly" to join it.
Significantly, the king supported the designation of the three states, including its own neighbour, Iraq, as an "axis of evil". "There's some countries in the middle that haven't made up their mind . . . And those countries better make up their minds pretty quickly," he said.
At the same time, Mr Bush said, he was open to a dialogue with North Korea. He called on Pyongyang to "pull back some conventional weaponry" on the Korean peninsula and "make a clear declaration of their peace intentions." In New York, however, the Secretary General of NATO, Lord Robertson, warned that the organisation would not automatically back action beyond Afghanistan.
"I think if the Americans could produce convincing evidence that there was a link between other countries and the attack that took place [on September 11th\], then I think the allies would be seriously interested in that information," he said. "But that hasn't been forthcoming up to this moment." Lord Robertson is attending the World Economic Forum.
Mr Bush yesterday refused to be drawn to comment specifically on the suggestion by the Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Ariel Sharon, that Israel had missed an opportunity in not killing Mr Yasser Arafat in 1982. "I think the best way to peace is for us all to keep the focus on what derails peace, and what derails peace is terror," Mr Bush told reporters.
"And the more quickly we eliminate terror, the more likely it is we'll have a peaceful resolution in the region, and that's all I want to comment on the situation." Meanwhile a prize Bush project, the development of a missile defence system, has been given a potential $238 billion price tag. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO), in one of the most comprehensive yet assessments of the likely cost of the controversial plans, reports that a combination of ground and sea-based missiles, and space-based missiles, all as yet unproven technology, could involve that level of total spending by 2025.
Mr Bush has indicated his support for a "multi-layered" system but both land-based and space-based systems are the more controversial. Ship-based interceptors brought close to "rogue" states and tasked to take out missiles soon after launch are seen as less likely to prompt a destabilising arms race in countries that are not targeted.
The CBO puts the respective costs of each system as: land-based - between $26 billion and $74 billion by 2013; ship-based - $50 billion to $64 billion by 2015; and space-based - from $82 billion to $100 billion by 2025.
Iranian clerics and politicians condemned President Bush for his "axis of evil" comments against their country and urged rival reformists and conservatives to close ranks against the US.
In a rare show of unity, Iranian politicians from both camps took a break from long-running, bitter disputes to heap scorn on Mr Bush over his "arrogant" remarks.
A call for the Government to "speak out strongly" against current US foreign policy has been made by the Green MEP, Ms Patricia McKenna. Speaking at an anti-war demonstration outside the US embassy in Dublin yesterday, she said: "America is out of control and nobody is saying stop."
She said that, "The Irish Government's persistent silence is an absolute disgrace. The Irish Government are terrified of upsetting America. Weaker and more disadvantaged countries around the world must be astonished at Ireland abandoning its long history of defending and speaking out on behalf of the oppressed."