President Mahmud Abbas said in remarks published on Sunday that Palestinians will seek U.N. membership despite U.S. "threats" to stop financial aid.

"We will go to the United Nations to obtain an international recognition to the state of Palestine, despite the obstacles and dangers, including U.S. threats to halt 470 million dollars in annual assistance," Abbas told Jordan's government-owned al-Rai newspaper in an interview.

A Canadian government decree that the Queen's portrait be displayed in all embassies and missions abroad triggered an angry response Friday from a former diplomat and an opposition lawmaker.

"This decision is retrograde and anachronistic," said Paul Heinbecker, Canada's erstwhile ambassador to the United Nations. "After 60 years of emancipation, this is a step back for our country," he added.

A lawyer for a Turkish Islamic group said Friday he had submitted to prosecutors a list of Israeli soldiers involved in a deadly raid on a flotilla sent by the group to break the Gaza blockade.

"We have presented a list of Israeli soldiers who gave the order for and who were involved in the attack on the Turkish flotilla to the Istanbul prosecutor's office," Ramazan Ariturk, the lawyer for the Humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH) which organized the ill-fated flotilla, told Agence France Presse.

Israeli Intelligence Minister Dan Meridor on Friday described as "grave and serious" a threat by the Turkish prime minister to send warships to escort any aid vessels trying to reach the Gaza Strip.

"These remarks are grave and serious, but we have no wish to add to the polemic," Meridor said on army radio.

United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon Friday said Palestinian statehood was "long overdue", a day after its leadership launched a campaign to become the world body's 194th member state.

"The two state vision where Israel and Palestinians can live... side by side in peace and security -- that is a still a valid vision and I fully support it," he told reporters in Canberra.

Iran Thursday warned it would "not hesitate" to hit back following a foreign strike on its soil in a formal complaint to the United Nations over a warning from French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Sarkozy said last week that Iran's "military, nuclear and ballistic ambitions constitute a growing threat that may lead to a preventive attack against Iranian sites that would provoke a major crisis that France wants to avoid at all costs."

China is ready to help Libya rebuild after Moammar Gadhafi's downfall and it supports the United Nations taking a leading role in reconstruction efforts, Vice Foreign Minister Cui Tiankai said Friday.

"It depends on the needs of the Libyan people themselves, whatever they need we will be willing to help them," Cui told reporters on the sidelines of the Pacific Islands Forum in Auckland.

The United States said Thursday it will veto a bid for U.N. recognition of a Palestinian state if it comes to a vote before the U.N. Security Council.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said U.S. opposition to such a move by the Palestinians "should not come as a shock."

Palestinians on Thursday kicked off a campaign of support for their bid to become the 194th state to join the United Nations, calling on U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon to back them.

The launch of the campaign, dubbed "National Campaign for Palestine: state 194", is part of the build-up to September 20, when Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas is expected to submit the formal membership request.

A delegation from Yemen's ruling party headed Thursday to Riyadh to seek permission from convalescing President Ali Abdullah Saleh for his deputy to negotiate a power-transfer plan with the opposition, a party official said.

"The delegation is heading to Riyadh to meet the president and ask him to authorize his deputy to start the dialogue" with the opposition, which is demanding Saleh's ouster, the official told Agence France Presse requesting anonymity.