Stockholm - Swedish heavy-vehicle maker Volvo Tuesday reported a 12-per-cent drop in year-on-year deliveries of trucks in October.

Gothenburg-based Volvo said it delivered 22,136 trucks during the month.

Citing the prevailing financial uncertainty, the group said "customers continue to be very cautious and are in many cases waiting with their investment decisions."

Demand continued to be weak in Europe and North America, but also in other markets, Volvo said.

In Europe deliveries dropped 28 per cent in October while they fell 21 per cent in North America.

Vienna - The price for crude oil produced by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) fell by 1.13 dollars Monday, as the cartel made a further downward revision in its demand outlook for 2009.

One barrel (159 litres) of OPEC crude stood at 47.96 dollars, compared with 49.09 dollars last Friday, the Vienna-based organization said Tuesday.

In its latest monthly market report, OPEC forecast 86.68 million barrels per day of crude-oil demand for next year, 530,000 barrels per day less than predicted in October.

Hanoi - Heavy rains and winds from Tropical Storm Noul unexpectedly changed course and spared Vietnam's most populated city but left four people dead, disaster officials said Tuesday.

Noul had been forecast to hit Ho Chi Minh City on Monday night. City officials breathed a collective sigh of relief when the storm weakened and changed direction.

The storm moved northward, dumping rain on six provinces in the south-central region. One of the areas hardest hit was the beach resort town of Nha Trang, the capital of Khanh Hoa province, where the deaths were reported.

The rains subsided Tuesday but water levels in some areas were still rising from swollen rivers, according to Pham Chu Chinh of the Central Committee for Storm and Flood Control.

Washington, Nov 18 : Pakistan’s deposed Chief Justice Chaudhry Iftikhar was today awarded the lifetime membership of the New York Bar.

Speaking on the occasion, he said he would continue the lawyers’ struggle until the success of their movement, and added that war on terrorism in Pakistan could never be accomplished without the independent judiciary, reported The News.

Earlier, he was given a rousing citizens’ reception in New York on Sunday night, where Pakistanis from far flung areas in the US gathered to welcome him.

Sydney - Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman walked the red carpet Tuesday at the Sydney premiere of a film they made together in the red dust of the Outback.

Directed by Baz Luhrmann, Australia has been praised by film critic Claire Sutherland as a love letter to the landscape that "has international blockbuster written all over it."

Others are not so sure. Veteran film reviewer David Stratton said the 100-million-US-dollar extravaganza is "not the masterpiece we were hoping for" and that "while it will be very popular with many people, I think there's a slight air of disappointment after it all."

Nairobi - The US Navy is monitoring the path of a hijacked Saudi oil tanker as it makes its way to anchorage off the coast of Somalia but does not plan any action to recover the ship, a US navy official said Tuesday.

The tanker Sirius Star, which was sailing under a Liberian flag, was seized by Somali pirates on Saturday 450 nautical miles south-east of the Kenyan coastal city of Mombasa.

"If it follows the pattern seen in previous attacks, we expect it to be taken to anchorage somewhere off the coast of Somali," Commander Jane Campbell, a Bahrain-based spokeswoman for the US Navy's 5th fleet, told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.