Vina del Mar, Chile  - US Vice President Joe Biden, in Chile to discuss world economic issues as well as relations within the Americas, Friday proposed that Latin America and the United States "work together, as partners," and move "toward a new day" in their relations.

Biden arrived in Chile Friday, where he was to meet with President Michele Bachelet ahead of a so-called Progressive Leaders' Summit in the seaside resort of Vina del Mar intended to prepare for next week's G20 summit in London on the global financial crisis.

Budapest - Hungary's Socialist Party leadership met Friday to discuss the possibility of backing former finance minister Lajos Bokros as the leader of an interim government.

The meeting was called after the liberal Free Democrat party rejected Hungarian Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany's nomination of Electrolux Hungary boss Janos Takacs as his replacement, the daily newspaper Nepszabadsag reported.

Moscow  - Russia plans to create a military force directed at defending its interests in the Arctic by 2020, the National Security Council said in a strategy document published Friday.

The reported posted on the council's web site outlined the government's plan to set up a special force "to guarantee Russia's military security in diverse military and political circumstances."

A spokesman for the council told news agency Ria-Novosti that Russia's strategy did not signal confrontation.

Yet another film celebrity is about to step into the world of politics. Sreenath will be the Sivasena candidate in the upcoming Parliamentary elections from Attingal constituency, Thiruvananthapuram. There are rumours going around that many more cinema personalities will also contest for the Parliament elections from Thiruvananthapuram.

Harare  - Expectations that decades of violent repression meted out by President Robert Mugabe's henchmen would end with the creation of the new coalition government have been bitterly disappointed, a leading local human-rights body said Thursday.

Instead, "not much has changed yet" to the "almost inherent Zimbabwean culture of political victimization and discrimination," said the Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO forum in its latest report.

Prague  - Czech President Vaclav Klaus said Thursday he preferred to find a quick but lasting solution to the political crisis, rather than keep outgoing Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek in a caretaker role until the end of Prague's stint as president of the European Union.

"I will not allow a lack of a solution ... such as maintaining the current, provisional state ... until the end of our presidency," Klaus said after accepting Topolanek's cabinet resignations earlier in the day.