Syria's security forces opened fire on Monday during a raid on political dissidents in the town of Houla in central Homs province, a flashpoint in the months-long anti-regime uprising, activists said.

"Five residents, including a woman, were shot dead on Monday by security forces, who have been conducting a sweep in Houla since Sunday," the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in a statement.

Iranian forces will in the "coming days" finish off armed Kurdish rebels who are based in Iraq, a top commander said, quoted by local media on Monday.

"The scroll of the terrorist group PJAK will be rolled up in the coming days and full security shall be restored to the border areas," Brigadier General Ahmad Reza Pourdastan, the ground forces commander, told Vatan Emrouz newspaper.

Mahmud Abbas said on Monday he expects a "very difficult" situation after he seeks U.N. membership for a Palestinian state this week, in a move strongly opposed by Israel and the United States.

The Palestinian president made the remarks as he arrived in New York, where world powers were meeting in an 11th-hour attempt to head off the membership bid and avoid a diplomatic showdown at the United Nations.

Top Palestinian and Israeli leaders held talks in New York on Sunday amid frantic diplomatic efforts to avoid a showdown over a Palestinian bid to seek full U.N. membership as a state.

Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad and Israel's Defense Minister Ehud Barak held an unannounced meeting a day ahead of the U.N. General Assembly, which is being dominated by a Palestinian bid for U.N. recognition that the United States has threatened to veto.

One in every three Yemenis goes hungry every day because of months of political stalemate that has pushed the economy to the verge of collapse and the government towards total paralysis, Oxfam said on Monday.

"Widespread hunger and chronic malnutrition have taken hold in Yemen," the international charity said in a report on the country of 22 million.

Turkey's top diplomat predicted in an interview published Sunday that his country would form an alliance with a reformed Egypt, creating a new democratic axis of power in the Middle East.

"This is what we want," Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told The New York Times.

A Cairo court sentenced former tourism minister Zuheir Garana on Sunday to three years in prison for illegally issuing operating licenses to tourism companies, the state news agency MENA reported.

Garana had been previously convicted in May on different corruption charges to five years in prison.

The unveiling of a new Libyan government due on Sunday has been put off "indefinitely," Mahmoud Jibril, the number two official in the National Transitional Council (NTC), said.

"The announcement of a new transitional government has been postponed indefinitely in order to finalize consultations," Jibril told a news conference in the eastern city of Benghazi.

Yemeni security forces opened fire on protesters in Sanaa calling for the ouster of President Ali Abdullah Saleh on Sunday, killing 20 people and wounding 500 others, medics said.

Medics in the capital reported 20 dead and 500 others wounded by live rounds, batons or suffering from breathing difficulties after inhaling tear gas.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Sunday warned against "any foreign intervention that threatens to fragment states in the region and increase the risk of extremism in them," in talks with a Russian delegation on a mission to help end the government crackdown on anti-regime protests.

Assad also welcomed the "balanced and constructive Russian position toward the security and stability of Syria," the state-run SANA news agency reported.