KUALA LUMPUR - Western nations were attacked Thursday for "racist" policies in the war against terrorism as the 114-nation Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) began a conference expected to be dominated by the Iraq crisis.

Rich nations lectured developing countries o­n alleged human rights violations but "acts of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and other forms of related intolerance" were growing in their own backyard, said host Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar.

He voiced concern that political parties, which based their ideologies o­n racial superiority, racial discrimination or ethnic exclusivity were gaining popularity in rich nations following the terrorist attacks o­n the United States.

"It would seem that the fight against terrorism has brought out the worst racial impulses in these countries, which is now manifested in their policies established in the aftermath of September 11, including those which can be considered to be racial profiling," Syed Hamid said.

A draft of the final document to be adopted at the NAM summit next week, obtained by AFP , says terrorism "cannot be attributed to religion, nationality or civilisation."

Key players

Most member states are developing countries without international clout of their own, but many are also key players in the US war o­n terrorism - with NAM's roll-call stuffed with countries from the Middle East, Asia, Africa and Latin America.

The movement, set up during the Cold War as an alternative to the Eastern and Western power blocs, also includes in its ranks 50 of the 57 members of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), to which Malaysia belongs.

Malaysian Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who takes over the NAM chairmanship, has called a special "informal" OIC meeting o­n Iraq for immediately after the two-day summit which begins o­n Monday.

He has made it clear that he will attempt to steer the NAM into declaring strong opposition to the US threat to attack Iraq, which he says is a "primitive" response to the task of disarming President Saddam Hussein's

regime.

An invasion of Iraq will simply add to the perceived oppression of Muslims and the feeling of helplessness in Islamic countries which gave rise to the September 11 2001 attacks o­n the US, he says.

He warned Thursday that war could also drive the price of oil up sharply and seriously damage the world economy.

North Korean issue

While the US will undoubtedly come under fire over Iraq, an attempt by North Korea to blame Washington for the crisis over Pyongyang's nuclear weapons programme is set to get a less enthusiastic response, delegates said.

North Korea submitted a draft proposal stating that the "removal of the constant threats of the US against the Democratic People's Republic of Korea constitute a precondition for ensuring a stable peace and security o­n the Korean Peninsula."

It calls o­n the NAM to express "their view that the hostile policy of the US against the DPRK should be given up" and that a non-aggression treaty should be signed between the two countries, according to a copy of the draft seen by AFP .

Diplomats said there was strong lobbying against the North Korean proposal among senior NAM officials meeting Thursday.

NAM has been seen as increasingly irrelevant since the collapse of the Soviet Union, but with the organisation including within its membership all three legs of US President George W. Bush's "axis of evil" - Iraq, Iran and North Korea - some see the Kuala Lumpur summit as an opportunity to reverse the decline in the organisation's fortunes.