UN Secretary General Kofi Annan yesterday said the world is no safer today than it was three years ago, countering President Bush’s claims he had made the world a safer place. At a news conference, Annan also criticized a Bush administration decision to withhold $34 million from the U.N. Population Fund, saying the agency was saving women’s lives. He was responding to a reporter who asked for comment on the Bush funding move and also whether Annan felt the world had become safer in the last two or three years.