The head of the joint Palestinian force, Maj. Gen. Munir Maqdah, has revealed that the elite force's numbers at the southern refugee camp of Ain el-Hilweh would be bolstered.

Maqdah, a senior Fatah official, told pan-Arab daily Asharq al-Awsat on Wednesday that the 150-member force, which deployed in Ain el-Hilweh last year, will increase in numbers in cooperation with the Lebanese army and security forces.

A spiritual summit will be held on Monday at the seat of the Maronite church in Bkirki to press forward the election of a new head of state, An Nahar newspaper reported.

The daily said on Wednesday that participants will send a letter to the political arch-foes to rectify the adopted policies to serve citizens.

U.S. President Barack Obama insisted Tuesday that his disagreement with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu represents a substantial policy difference and not a personal vendetta.

As the Israeli premier works to build a new coalition government at home, he faces one of the worst confrontations in his stormy relationship with the White House.

A naval aircraft crashed off the western Indian coast leaving two pilots missing, the navy said Wednesday, in the latest of a string of accidents which have hit the force.

Rescue operations were underway after the Indian navy's Dornier aircraft plunged into the sea some 25 nautical miles off the western holiday state of Goa around 10:00 pm local time (1630 GMT) Tuesday.

Russia and Cuba worked on their joint strategy against the U.S. economic embargo on the communist island Tuesday, during a visit by Moscow's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

Lavrov, the first Russian cabinet member to visit Cuba since Washington and Havana announced they would set aside their Cold War enmity and renew diplomatic ties, met President Raul Castro at the start of a four-country Latin American tour.

Sweden is seeking to quell an unprecedented diplomatic spat over human rights with Saudi Arabia which has seen ambassadors recalled and arms sales cancelled, drawing comparisons with Denmark's Mohammed cartoons controversy.

Stockholm's relations with Riyadh have nosedived since leftist Foreign Minister Margot Wallstroem told parliament in a February speech the oil-rich state was a "dictatorship" that violated women's rights and whipped bloggers.

As tensions mount in the central African nation of Burundi ahead of presidential elections, journalists and activists say they are paying an increasingly heavy price as standard bearers for free speech.

Civil rights in the small Great Lakes nation, they say, are on the decline -- sacrificed at the altar of President Pierre Nkurunziza's controversial ambition to defy a two-term limit and stay in power for another five years.

Venezuela alleged Tuesday that Spain's former socialist prime minister Felipe Gonzalez had joined a plot of ultraconservatives to overthrow President Nicolas Maduro's embattled government.

Leftist Maduro, whose country is in economic freefall after adopting a government-run economy while oil prices slide, said the leftist Spanish statesman had signed up with a group of far-right plotters in Spain, Colombia and the United States.

Australia has prevented a third teenager from flying out to fight in the Middle East, a minister said Wednesday, as Western countries battle to stop the flow of youngsters to jihadist groups.

The 17-year-old boy was taken off a plane at Sydney airport on March 12 after being interviewed by counter-terrorism officers, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton told reporters.

Washington is considering launching air strikes, possibly within days, to back up Iraqi and Shiite forces battling to recapture Tikrit from the Islamic State jihadist group, U.S. officials said.

The statement came Tuesday after an official said the U.S. was already providing reconnaissance support for Iraqi forces there, the first confirmation of American involvement in the operation.