Europe is awaiting with interest US President George W. Bush's speech before the United Nations in New York on Thursday.

One day after Bush led his country's solemn memorials marking the one year anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States, Bush is expected to try and convince a still-skeptical UN of the need to topple Saddam Hussein.

American officials have told wire services that Bush will take a hard line in his speech and say the UN risks irrelevance if it doesn't take action.

Germany has emerged as one of the Bush administration's strongest critics in the Iraq question. German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder has repeatedly said his country would not take part in any military action against Iraq - with or without a UN mandate.

The country's foreign minister Joschka Fischer told German radio Thursday morning that his government's stance hasn't affected the solidarity Germany feels with the United States.

"If we have serious concerns, then we need to say them," said Fischer, in New York to represent Germany in the memorial ceremonies.

Fischer said the international coalition against terror was set up to fight against terrorists. The coalition sould not be used to "connect regional conflicts to this terrorism fight and weapons of mass destruction."

He said the Israel-Palestinian peace process needs to be solved first. Regional stability in the middle east following any action in Iraq is extremely improtant, said the foreign minister.

"Those questions have been to date not answered," Fischer said.

"Terrorists and tyrants" must be stopped

President Bush reinforced the need to topple "terrorists and tyrants" in his speech in front of the Pentagon on Wednesday.

"Our generation has now heard history's call, and we will
answer it," Bush said before a crowd of relatives of the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks on the Pentagon.

In a parallel speech at the United Nations, Secretary General Kofi Annan urged the United States to seek a multilateralist course in any decision on Iraq.

"When states decide to use force to deal with broader threats to international peace and security, there is no substitute for the unique legitimacy provided by the United Nations," he said. "I stand before you today as a multilateralist by
precedent, by principle, by charter and by duty."

The European Union will be represented by Anders Fogh Rasmussen, prime minister of Denmark, which holds the current six-month rotating presidency of the 15-member EU. In remarks to Danish press Thursday morning, Rasmussen said Hussein has already broken a number of UN resolutions, giving the US and its allies a legal right to take military action.

"It undermines the authority of the UN if he can ignore the resolutions without some kind of reaction being implemented," he said.