Berlin  - Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday offered Germany's good offices to help resolve a new gas dispute which has surfaced between Russia, the European Union and Ukraine.

The chancellor said after talks with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in Berlin that she would raise the issue with the European Commission.

Russia has called an agreement with the EU to modernize Ukraine's gas infrastructure an "unfriendly act," pointing out that Moscow was excluded from the talks.

Doha  - Arab League Secretary General Amr Mussa knows the new Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, well.

In the 1990s, Mussa was Egypt's foreign minister when Netanyahu was Israel's prime minister. And while the two men share a taste for fine Cuban cigars and other small indulgences, and though the countries they represented in the 1990s had been at peace for more than a decade, the two were often at odds on politics.

Little has changed today.

Dubai  - The United Arab Emirates has asked the Russian police for cooperation in the mystery of the death of a former Russian army commander in Dubai, the chief of Dubai Police said on Tuesday.

"We expect the Russian authorities to cooperate with Dubai's police to reach the murderers. Both authorities should intensify their efforts to bring such perpetrators to justice," General Dahi Khalfan Tamim said.

Dhaka - Bangladesh and Russia on Tuesday began a three-day dialogue toward signing an agreement for the peaceful use of nuclear energy that could pave the way for cooperation in setting up nuclear power plants in Bangladesh, officials said.

"We will discuss the possible deal to pave the way for cooperation in this field," said MM Neazuddin, a joint secretary of Bangladesh's science and ICT ministry, who is leading the Bangladeshi side to the talks.

Washington  - The US Chamber of Commerce Tuesday threw its weight behind a bill being introduced in the US Senate which would eliminate the ban on most US travel to the Caribbean island.

The bill, which has strong momentum in both parties, is seen as a first step towards reexamining the overall restrictions on US trade with the communist island.

"The US embargo on Cuba is a 50-year failure, and lifting the ban on travel is a good first step toward a more rational policy," said Myron Brilliant, a top official in the business group.

The Hague - The United States' special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, held talks with Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister Mehdi Akhunzadeh at a conference on Afghanistan in The Hague on Tuesday.

"During the course of the conference today, our special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, had a brief and cordial exchange with the head of the Iranian delegation," US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in The Hague.