Stockholm - The Swedish government is set to halt an adoption programme with Vietnam over fears of irregularities, reports said Wednesday.

The pending cabinet decision, due Thursday, is based on evaluations that suggest that biological parents were not always aware their children were put up for adoption and were sometimes offered cash for their children.

Health and Social Affairs Minister Goran Hagglund told Swedish radio news that there were "disturbing signals" that not all adoptions from Vietnam were permissible.

The current agreement with Vietnam is due to expire in the autumn of 2009.

Hagglund said there were no signs that Vietnam was willing to admit to the problems.

New York - The United Nations reported Wednesday that the calm brokered by Egypt was holding in the last month in Gaza Strip and southern Israel despite some incidents, including a rocket fired into the Negev this week.

B. Lynn Pascoe, the UN undersecretary general for political affairs, said in a monthly report to the UN Security Council that Israel closed border crossings between Gaza and Israel in retaliation for the rocket attack on Tuesday.

The number of truckloads of imported goods allowed into Gaza decreased in the last month and the number of people allowed into Israel for medical treatment fell by 38 per cent.

Ramallah - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has sacked his chief of intelligence, Tawfiq Tirawi, officials at his office confirmed Wednesday.

Abbas issued a presidential decree, appointing Tirawi, 61, a security advisor to the president with the rank of minister, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media.

Tirawi will also continue to serve as director of the Jericho- based security academy he helped set up with European assistance two years ago

Washington - An emergency summit of leaders from the world's 20 leading economies will be held on November 15 in the US capital to tackle the ongoing financial crisis threatening to plunge the world into recession, the White House announced Wednesday.

President George W Bush has been on the telephone inviting leaders from the Group of 20, a bloc that includes advanced and developing economies, to Washington to "review progress being made to address the current financial crisis," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.

Kabul - US-led coalition forces mistakenly bombed an Afghan national army position in Khost province early Wednesday and killed at least nine soldiers, while more than 40 militants and three police were killed elsewhere in the country, officials said.

The airstrike occurred in Sayedkhail district of the south-eastern province of Khost when a coalition convoy was returning from an operation, the US military said in a statement.

"Initial reports from troops on the ground indicate that this may be a case of mistaken identity on both sides," the statement said.

Brussels - Georgia was Wednesday promised a higher-than- expected 4.55 billion dollars in aid over the next three years to help it recover from its 5-day war with Russia.

Pledges were made by some 40 countries and 15 international organizations attending a donors' conference in Brussels.

The total far exceeded the 3.2 billion dollars that the World Bank had estimated Georgia would need to rebuild its infrastructure, settle its refugees and get its economy back on track.