Bush targets Iran in tongue-lashing

George Bush gently nudged authoritarian Arab allies to satisfy frustrated desires for democracy in the Middle East, saving his harshest criticism for Iran, branding it “the world’s leading state-sponsor of terror”.

Speaking in the United Arab Emirates, about 150 miles from the shores of Iran, Mr Bush said Tehran threatened nations everywhere and that the United States was “rallying friends around the world to confront this danger before it is too late”.