WASHINGTON, Sept 11 (AFP) - US presidential rivals George W. Bush and John Kerry on Saturday were to pay their respects to September 11 victims, toning down their bitter election battle on the third anniversary of the attacks that killed almost 3,000 people.
President Bush was to observe a moment of silence on the south lawn of the White House at 8:46 am (1246 GMT) -- the time the first plane struck the World Trade Center -- after attending a service of remembrance at a Washington church.
Democratic White House hopeful Senator John Kerry was due at a commemoration in Boston, Massachusetts.
Those events were among scores of ceremonies held nationwide. In New York, a ceremony at Ground Zero was to feature parents and grandparents reading the names of the 2,749 victims of the World Trade Center attack.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was to lay a wreath at the national Arlington Cemetery in Washington in memory of the 184 people who died when another hijacked plane was flown into the Pentagon.
And Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge was to participate in a ceremony of remembrance for 44 people who staged a rebellion aboard a fourth airliner headed for a target in Washington and who perished when the plane crashed in a field in Pennsylvania.
National security has emerged as a central theme of this presidential race, the first presidential election since the 2001 attacks.
On the campaign trail Friday, Bush said the election "will also determine how America responds to the continuing danger of terrorism".
Opinion polls show Bush leading Kerry in terms of who is deemed better qualified to counter terrorist threats.
"Since the terrible morning of September 11, 2001, we have fought the terrorists across the Earth -- not for pride, not for power, but because the lives of our citizens are at stake," Bush declared.
"I will never relent in defending America, whatever it takes," he told an election rally in Ohio.
"We will stay on the offensive," he said. "We will chase the terrorists around the world so we do not have to face them here at home."
"I believe the most solemn duty of the American president is to protect the American people," he told a rally in Huntington, West Virginia, earlier in the day.
"If America shows uncertainty and weakness in this decade, the world will drift toward tragedy. This isn't going to happen on my watch," he said in a popular campaign-speech refrain.
Kerry, campaigning in St. Louis, Missouri, accused Bush's administration of trying to scare Americans and insisted that the anti-terror fight should be more than just a political battle.
"It is real, we've got a war, we've got a problem, but we should do more than just talk about it, try to scare people about it and make it a political issue," Kerry charged.
The Massachusetts senator also linked the war on terror with Bush's failure to urge the Republican-held Congress to prolong a 10-year-old US assault weapons ban that expires Monday.
He said reports showed that an Al-Qaeda training manual recovered in Afghanistan included a chapter urging extremists to get assault weapons in the United States.
"Why is George Bush making the job of the terrorists easier and making the job for America's police officers harder?" Kerry demanded in a statement.
Vice President Dick Cheney said Tuesday there would be a greater risk of a major new attack on the United States if voters made the "wrong choice" in the November 2 presidential election.
John Edwards, Kerry's vice presidential running mate, accused Cheney of using "scare tactics" to drum up support.