Kaunda's US bashing creates a stir at the meet

NEW DELHI: India���s increasing ties with the United States and its effect on the Muslim vote for the Congress is a subject that has spurred endless political debates within the party, but a sampler of what Sonia Gandhi thinks on the issue was on display at the two-day Satyagraha world conference.

Ms Gandhi turned out to be one of the many who applauded Zambia���s iconic leader Kenneth Kaunda���s passionate appeal to president George Bush, to prime minister Blair and their allies to stop these wars at the inaugural session of the conference.

Mr Kaunda, who lashed out at the US and Britain for unleashing a war in Iraq drawing loud applause from the audience, had more than the occasional Congressman ���rattled���, as one senior leader put it. ���No one with any sense of humanity and responsible leadership can stand the sickening devastation shown on our television sets,��� Mr Kaunda said.

���The US primacy in world affairs may be unquestionable, but it will not give Americans power to control and dominate the world,��� he said, adding that ���the re-launching of the Satyagraha, therefore, provides an opportunity to tell the war-mongers: Enough is enough. Stop the wars; start talking.���

According to the African leader, the US and UK were less safe today than before the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. ���I also appeal to the Al-Qaeda leadership, Islamist militants and other combatants engaged in conflicts to end the pursuit of their objectives through the terrorist path,��� he said.

Mr Kaunda urged all those who fund terrorism to redirect the money to fight diseases like AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis. Mr Kaunda���s speech ended with a song on eradicating AIDS from Africa.