Bangkok - December's summit of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) has been moved from Bangkok to Chiang Mai to avoid ongoing anti-government protests in the capital, media and ministerial sources said Monday.

Thai Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat announced the shift over the weekend during a visit to Chiang Mai, Thailand's second-largest city, located 550 kilometres north of Bangkok, the Bangkok Post said.

The change in venue, however, has yet to be confirmed with Thailand's fellow ASEAN members: Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam.

"It's 90-per-cent certain, but this will have to be ruled on soon," Thai Foreign Ministry spokesman Tharit Charungvat said.

Washington - The race for the US presidency was entering the backstretch Monday as Democrat Barack Obama pushed to keep Republican John McCain on the defensive in states long regarded as Republican strongholds - like Virginia and Florida.

Senator Obama was to deliver a speech in the hotly contested manufacturing-intensive Rust Belt state of Ohio that his campaign called his "closing argument."

Rio de Janeiro - The Workers' Party of Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has suffered severe losses in mayoral elections, losing in such metropolises as Sao Paulo and Porto Alegre.

In Sao Paulo, the nation's largest city and its financial hub, incumbent Gilberto Kassab of the conservative Democrats won by a landslide with 61 per cent of the vote in Sunday's runoff against Workers' Party candidate Marta Suplicy.

Hamburg, Germany - Sea levels around the world will rise one metre this century, according to German scientists who warn that global warming is happening much faster than hitherto predicted.

Citing UN date on climate change, two senior German scientists say that previous predictions were far too cautious and optimistic.

Earlier estimates predicted a rise of 18 to 59 centimetres in sea levels this century. But that estimate is woefully understated, according to Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, who heads the Potsdam Institute for Research on Global Warming Effects, and Jochem Marotzke, a leading meteorologist.

"We now have to expect that the sea level will rise by a metre this century," said Schellnhuber in Berlin.

Sydney - Prostitution is regulated differently in Australia's six states, allowing researchers like Basil Donovan to compare how the industry operates under different rules and the implications for public health.

Donovan, from the University of New South Wales, found that sex workers in his state had the lowest incidence of sexually transmitted disease.

If the health of those who work in the industry was the only consideration, he argues, other jurisdictions should fall into line with the biggest state and decriminalize prostitution and deregulate the industry.

"The prevalence of gonorrhoea in sex workers in Sydney is as close as you can get to zero," Donovan, an internationally recognized expert in sexual health, said.