The United States rejected yesterday accusation by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that the White House governs by "coercion, force and injustice."

"Clearly this is something of, again, a public relations stunt or a public relations gesture," US State Department spokesman Tom Casey said of the letter to Americans from Ahmadinejad released earlier in the day by Iran's UN mission at the United Nations.

Ahmadinejad wrote an 18-page letter to US President George W.Bush in May, which Washington criticized for not addressing Iran's nuclear program - where the United States is leading the drive to impose UN sanctions on Tehran for its refusal to stop enriching uranium.

Iran and the United States have had no diplomatic relations since 1979 when Iranian protesters seized the US Embassy in Tehran and kept 52 people hostage for 444 days.