LISBON - Either the United Nations will undergo a change of heart and throw its unconditional support behind Washington's decisions, or its days are numbered, at least in its current shape and form.

That was the warning that the United States government issued from Portugal's Azores islands on Sunday, according to analysts in the Portuguese capital.

The message was sent out by U.S. President George W. Bush and backed without reservations by the prime ministers of Britain and Spain, Tony Blair and Jose María Aznar, who were joined by their host, Portuguese Prime Minister José Manuel Durao Barroso.

The summit at the wind-swept Lajes air base clearly marked the parameters of the new international order, which will be designed with or without the United Nations, said analysts.

The meeting also sent out an unequivocal signal that the United States was putting an end to its failed attempts to legitimize its war against Iraq in the United Nations.

The Azores Declaration on Iraq adopted by the leaders meeting at the Lajes base, which is jointly run by the United States and Portugal, said the position taken by Iraqi President Saddam Hussein weakened the authority of the Security Council.

"It's important for the U.N. to be able to function well if we're going to keep the peace," said Bush.

"I will work hard to see to it that, at least from our perspective, the UN is able to be a responsible body, and when it says something, it means it, for the sake of peace and for the sake of security, and for the capacity to win the first war of the 21st century, which is the war against terrorism."

"We hope tomorrow the UN will do its job. If not, all of us need to step back and try to figure out how to make the UN work better," he added.

Teresa de Sousa, an analyst of European affairs, said that "if an ultimatum came out of the summit, it was addressed to the Security Council," and especially France, a country that according to the U.S. vision of the world, "is compromising the future of transatlantic unity, the main bond of solidarity between Europe and the United States," by defending ideas that differ from those of Washington.

De Sousa was referring to France's refusal to vote for, and its threat to veto, any war resolution in the Security Council.

The role played by Durao Barroso, said de Sousa, "was more than that of a simple host," because the chief concern of Portuguese diplomacy was to "keep the Azores Declaration from being read as a gesture of hostility towards the rest of Europe."

But despite the extreme care taken in drafting the document, Bush could not refrain from lashing out at the French government in the news briefing that followed the summit.

Bush said "France showed their cards. After I said what I said, they said they were going to veto anything that held Saddam to account. So cards have been played. And we just have to take an assessment after tomorrow to determine what that card meant."

In the European Union (EU), the United States has the backing--in descending order of level of commitment--of Britain, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Denmark.

The other 10 countries, headed by France and Germany, and including Austria, Belgium, Finland, Greece, the Netherlands, Ireland, Luxembourg and Sweden, are opposed to a military solution without a green light from the UN.

According to analyst Raul Vaz, "the war began on Sep. 11, 2001 (with the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington)--first against terrorism, in the 'Afghanistan laboratory', and later with this war, which has already gone too far for its main actors to find a justification for backtracking without losing face."

Copyright 2003 IPS

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