Tunisia has arrested a colonel in the former Libyan intelligence service, hiding out in a rented house in a remote town after Moammar Gadhafi's fall, the official TAP news agency said Saturday.

The officer had crossed the border using false identity papers more than a month ago, according to a security source cited by the agency, who did not name the colonel.

British police said Saturday they had arrested seven protesters outside the Syrian embassy in London, including three men who climbed onto the roof of the building and waved the Kurdish flag.

The trio were arrested on suspicion of criminal damage after mounting the roof of the entrance of the embassy, where they waved the red, white and green Kurdish flag with a sun emblem on it, according to television pictures.

Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, faced with more than eight months of street protests demanding his ouster, said on Saturday he is ready to step down within days but would not hand over to his foes.

"I don't want power and I will give it up in the coming days," the veteran leader said in a televised speech during which he launched a tirade against his opponents.

Syrian dissidents were in Cairo on Saturday to lobby for recognition of an exile opposition council seeking the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad, Egypt's official MENA news agency reported.

The delegation planned to meet Egyptian activists and party representatives as 90 members of the Syrian National Council-led opposition met in Stockholm to strategies their struggle against Assad.

Forces from Libya's interim regime scored a strategic goal Saturday in their push to capture Sirte, seizing a highway that opens the way to a final assault on a key base of troops loyal to Moammar Gadhafi.

But with thousands of civilians still trapped in the ex-leader's hometown, NTC commanders said they were pacing their advance to evacuate some of those who had not fled and to avoid losses from friendly fire.

The United Nations's new special envoy to Iraq Martin Kobler, a former ambassador to Baghdad for Germany, flew in on Saturday to take up his post, the U.N. mission said.

Kobler, 58, is a former top official at the German foreign ministry experienced in helping countries in conflict and served as Germany's ambassador to Iraq.

The European Union's foreign policy chief on Saturday firmly condemned the murder of a Kurdish opposition leader in Syria, and reiterated concern over Damascus' repression of pro-democracy protests.

"The High Representative condemns in the strongest terms the murder" of 53-year-old Meshaal Tamo, assassinated on Friday by masked gunmen who stormed his house in northern Syria, a statement issued on behalf of Catherine Ashton said.

Around 90 members of Syria's opposition, led by the Syrian National Council, met Saturday in Stockholm to strategize their struggle against President Bashar Assad's regime.

"Around 90 people are taking part... members of the Syrian National Council (SNC), including its leader Burhan Ghalioun, are here as are representatives of other Syrian opposition groups," said Laila Naraghi of the Olof Palme International Center hosting the conference.

Production at Iraq's biggest oil field was partially halted on Saturday after two bombs damaged a pipeline transporting crude, the head of state-owned South Oil Co said.

The blasts occurred overnight in the Safwan bridge area southwest of the port city of Basra, and the Qarenat area west of there, near the Rumaila oil field and caused a fire, according to a police officer and an SOC official.

An Algerian woman who had been evicted from her flat in Oran died after setting herself and her three-year-old son on fire, police said Saturday.

"She died at Oran university hospital" on Thursday, a policeman who spoke on condition of anonymity said, adding that the 35-year-old woman's son survived but had serious burns.