During a debate on the Iraq crisis by UN members who do not have seats on the 15-nation Security Council, 23 nations, including South Africa, Brazil, New Zealand, Ukraine, Belarus, Greece, India, Cuba as well as Middle Eastern countries from Iran to Algeria were openly opposed to a war and backed further inspections, as France has proposed.
Only Australia and Japan strongly backed the tough US position, supported in part by Peru and Argentina.
"All the countries in the region with the exception of Israel are appealing to prevent war on Iraq," said Yahya Mahmassani, the UN representative for the Arab League.
Kuwait, invaded by Iraq in 1990, however, tempered its anti-war comments by faulting Iraq for continuing to challenge demands of the 15-member UN Security Council.
The meeting was organised by South Africa, head of the 115-member Non-Aligned Movement of developing countries to give nations without a seat on the Security Council a chance to air their views. In addition to the 27 delegations who spoke on Tuesday, another 29 address the council on Wednesday.
South African Ambassador Dumisani Kumalo opened the session saying that UN weapons inspections should be enhanced and become more intrusive before the United Nations ends them and considers other measures.
"We believe that resorting to war without fully exhausting all other options presents an admission of failure by the Security Council in carrying out its mandate of international peace and security," Kumalo said.
Australian Ambassador John Dauth argued that, given President Saddam Hussein's "record," he was "not sure why we should be giving him the benefit of the doubt."
"The council could give Iraq more time, yes. We could wait until March. We could wait another three months," he said. "But do we really think more time will make Iraq cooperate? Does Iraq really need more than three more months to make a decision that should take no more than three minutes?"
But New Zealand's ambassador, Don MacKay, disagreed with his neighbour, saying his country supported diplomatic solutions and continued inspections.
Reacting to the debate, US Ambassador John Negroponte told reporters he wanted to be sensitive to international opinion and hear what every nation had to say.
"But in the end I think our behaviour is going to be determined by our concern about the disarmament of Iraq and considerations of national security of our own country and that of others," he said.
Iraq's UN ambassador, Mohammed Aldouri, appealed to members to listen to the "call of millions" who condemned war in demonstrations over the weekend but said Iraq was prepared to fight if attacked.
"If the aggression against Iraq takes place, Iraq's sons, famous for their struggle against British occupation in the 1920s, will defend their country," Aldouri said.
While the debate was being conducted, the United States and Britain worked on a new UN resolution seeking backing for an attack against Iraq, despite a reluctant Security Council.
A draft is not expected before Wednesday at the earliest. Negroponte said Washington had not "ruled out putting down a resolution this week (but) we haven't ruled it in yet."
Prospects for achieving a quick and clean resolution authorising war dimmed after the chief UN weapons inspector, Hans Blix, on Friday gave a more positive report than last month on the progress of his work in Iraq.
So far most council members support France, which means the United States and Britain face an uphill struggle getting even the minimum nine votes needed for adoption.
Earlier this month, the United States spoke of a resolution explicitly authorising force. Last week this was toned down to declaring Iraq in "material breach" of a November 8 council resolution 1441, words that would give the legal basis for war, and threaten "serious consequences."
Diplomats said they expected any new resolution to follow the language of resolution 1441. London and Washington are also considering a set of conditions to Iraq within a tight deadline to disclose any weapons of mass destruction programs.
But an option issuing Saddam an ultimatum to relinquish power is considered unlikely. This would be tantamount to a call for "regime change," that most of the 15 council members would reject as illegal, diplomats said.
UN backing is particularly important for Britain and other European nations that support the United States, which has amassed 250,000 troops in the Gulf for an attack many analysts believe will come in mid-March.
Anti-war protests over the weekend showed massive turnouts throughout the globe, with at least 1,000,000 people protesting in London alone.