KEVIN RUDD may believe the Iraq war to be the worst foreign policy disaster since Vietnam but tomorrow he will join the US President, George Bush, and other leaders of the so-called coalition of the willing nations to honour those who have died.

The British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who, like Mr Rudd, inherited the war from a predecessor, will not attend the ceremonial "commemoration for the fallen" because he does not arrive until the next day.

Mr Rudd left for the US yesterday, shrugging off the Opposition's criticism that attending the annual United Nations General Assembly was frivolous and did not warrant missing a sitting week. His main reason for being in New York is to lobby for Australia's bid to be one of 10 non-permanent members of the UN Security Council in 2011. He has arranged 10 to 15 bilateral meetings with leaders whose votes will be needed as well as for informal "pull-aside" meetings with others.

Mr Rudd will speak on climate change on Friday morning, Sydney time, before flying home.

But with the world economy on the brink, Mr Rudd found a new tool to blunt Opposition criticism, saying yesterday "when you have an opportunity, as the leaders of the world gather in New York for just three days, to engage on what is the greatest financial crisis for a long, long time, and to muster the political will to respond coherently to it, it's important that in the national interest, Australia is there rather than simply hoping someone else sorts it out on our behalf."

Mr Rudd has scheduled meetings with financial officials and regulators, including Stephen Friedman, the New York Federal Reserve chairman, who he said yesterday was "one of three critical players in the United States on future actions on the US domestic financial market".