Former Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad said today a planned international conference on peace later this year could spur US voters to shun "liars" like US President George W Bush.

Mahathir said the forum would hopefully spark US non-governmental organisations to lobby against leaders like Bush who had initiated the Iraq war.

"People like Bush should never be elected and they will not be elected if the people of the United States are agitated by, say, the NGOs, so they will not vote in anybody who is for war," Mahathir said at the forum's launch.

"We would like to see eventually democratic countries electing only people who are for peace and against war," he said.

The Perdana Global Peace Forum, to be held from December 15 to 17, includes noted Iraq war critics such as British MPs Clare Short and George Galloway and former Australian prime minister Bob Hawke.

Mahathir said the forum - which will discuss war, terrorism and religious tensions - would go beyond rhetoric and help activists to "agitate against war and for peace".

"That is the kind of thing that we hope will fall upon this global peace forum. It is not a forum for people just to say things and then go home feeling good that they have voided all they have on their chest, and said all the nasty things about the people they don't like," he said.

"Hopefully it is going to be the start of a world-wide campaign," he said.

What else God has told him?

Mahathir, a vocal critic of Western countries as well as the Iraq war, later took a swipe at Bush over reports the US president had invaded Iraq because God told him to.

If people were agitating against war, then "I am quite sure in such a situation they wouldn't elect a person like Mr Bush, who feels that God has asked him to invade Iraq. I don't know what else God has told him," he said.

"We may be one of the countries invaded if God should whisper in his ears, 'Please, Bush - invade Malaysia'," Mahathir added.

Mahathir also labelled Bush and two US allies, Australian Prime Minister John Howard and British Prime Minister Tony Blair, "proven liars" for claiming Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and lamented their re-election.

"You see three liars were re-elected. There's Howard in Australia, and there's Blair in Britain. Proven liars," he told reporters later.

"In the end they found no weapons of mass destruction. And yet they were re-elected. So we find that the democratic system is subject to manipulation by certain forces," Mahathir said.

The forum is being organised by the Perdana Leadership Foundation, a private think tank headed by Mahathir.