Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has taken his verbal battle with the US to the floor of the UN General Assembly, calling President George W Bush "the
devil".
"The devil came here yesterday," Mr Chavez said, referring to Mr Bush's UN address and making a sign of the cross.
"He came here talking as if he were the owner of the world."
The leftist leader, who has joined Iran and Cuba in opposing US influence, accused Washington of "domination, exploitation and pillage of peoples of the world".
"We appeal to the people of the United States and the world to
halt this threat, which is like a sword hanging over our head," he said.
He drew tentative giggles at times from the audience, but also some applause when he called Mr Bush the devil. The US seat was vacant
for Mr Chavez's address.
Mr Chavez quipped that a day after Bush's appearance "in this very spot it smells like sulfur still".
Mr Chavez lambasted the US government for trying to block Venezuela's campaign for a rotating seat on the UN Security Council.
If chosen over US-favourite Guatemala in a vote next month, he said, Venezuela would be "the voice of the Third World".
However, the US government has warned that Mr Chavez would be a disruptive force on the council.
"The imperialists see extremists everywhere. No, we aren't extremists," Mr Chavez said in his speech.
"What's happening is the world is waking up." He said many in the world now subscribe to the battle cry: "Yankee empire, go home!"
UN Security Council
Holding a rotating Security Council seat would bring Mr Chavez a higher profile and a platform to challenge the US on its stances in regions from the Middle East to Latin America.
In the past few months, Mr Chavez has crisscrossed the globe collecting promises of support, visiting about a dozen countries including Russia, Belarus, Iran, Vietnam, Qatar, Mali, Benin, China, Malaysia and Syria.
His diplomats also have been busy, while Guatemalan officials and US diplomats also have been lobbying.
Mr Chavez said he has the solid backing of the Caribbean Community, the Arab League, Russia, China and much of Africa, in addition to his allies across South America.
But winning a Security Council seat requires a two-thirds majority - 128 out of 192 UN members - and Guatemala says it has 90 votes secured.
If neither side wins the necessary two-thirds, there could be more rounds of lobbying and voting next month, possibly followed by a search for an alternate candidate.
Mr Chavez said it might eventually be necessary to move the UN headquarters out of the United States.
He reiterated his accusations that the US planned and financed a short-lived coup that briefly unseated him in 2002, and said with Washington's backing Israel had carried out a "genocide" in Lebanon.