Bangkok Post - Friday, November 07, 2003

The 2004 presidential election would be a significant time for Americans to turn around the country's image in the eyes of the world over the issue of the Iraqi war, United States human right advocate Jesse Jackson said yesterday.

Mr Jackson, former assistant to Martin Luther King Jr and two-time Democrat presidential candidate, said the election next year was not just about choosing a new leader but also changing the direction and priority of the American administration.

''I don't like the US being isolated like it is now. We deserve better than this,'' he said.

Mr Jackson predicted Mr Bush would face a similar dilemma as his father over the war issue which would come up in the presidential debates.

''We can beat George W Bush again and this time we must revise the sense of democratic process,'' he said in his keynote speech on the US after the war on Iraq.

Mr Jackson said the Bush administration went to war with no real interest in liberalising the Iraqi people but for payback, oil and destroying Saddam Hussein.

He said the administration did not choose the right approach with its decision to go into war alone and choosing violence over peace.

Preeyanat Phanayanggoor