DAMASCUS (AP) — Syria’s president promised to do what he can to ease tensions in neighbouring Iraq on Sunday during a landmark visit here by Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, just days after the US president accused Syria of backing Iraq’s insurgency.

CAIRO — Moderate Arab governments planned to tell visiting US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that they will help Washington stabilise Iraq if the US in turn takes more active steps to revive a broad peace initiative between Israel and its Arab neighbours, Arab officials and media said Sunday.

The Iraqi foreign minister called Sunday for the release of five Iranians detained by US forces in what he said was a legitimate mission in northern Iraq, but he stressed that foreign intervention to help insurgents would not be tolerated.

RIYADH (AP) — The top Iranian national security official visited the king of Saudi Arabia to discuss Iran’s contentious nuclear programme on Sunday, a day before US secretary of state arrives in the kingdom.

MOGADISHU (Reuters) — African Union officials arrived in Somalia to finalise plans for a peacekeeping force as government troops searched for weapons in the latest push to bring back order after weeks of war, an official said on Sunday.

CAIRO (AP) — Police on Sunday arrested six prominent members of the Muslim Brotherhood, including two leaders and four top businessmen, in separate dawn raids across the country, police and the Islamic opposition group said.

CARACAS (AFP) — Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, seeking support among Washington’s critics, arrived here Saturday for talks with his ideological “brother” President Hugo Chavez in a decidedly anti-US Latin American tour.

CAIRO (AP) — Reconciliation and national unity in Iraq are necessary for the success of US President George W. Bush’s new strategy for the war-torn country, Egypt and Saudi Arabia warned.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- Iranian Defense Minister Brigadier General Mostafa Mohammad Najjar in a meeting with his Sudanese counterpart here on Saturday stressed that withdrawal of the US occupying forces is the only way to restore peace and stability in the region.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- Iran’s accredited ambassador to Myanmar Mohsen Pak Ayeen said that the double veto of the US proposed draft UN Security Council resolution by Russia and China is viewed as a fresh failure for Washington’s foreign policy.