Washington  - US President Barack Obama headed to the US Congress Tuesday for a rare meeting with opposition Republican lawmakers to convince them of the merits of his 825-billion-dollar economic stimulus package.

But despite the meeting, Republican leaders have reportedly urged their members to oppose the measure when it comes up for a vote in the House of Representatives on Wednesday.

Obama has sought bipartisan support for the legislation, which includes a mix of tax cuts and government spending and is the centrepiece of his efforts to revive the struggling US economy.

Baghdad  - A string of politically-targeted attacks took place on Tuesday across Iraq, as the country gears up for provincial council elections on January 31.

Unknown militants set fire to a school that was set to be a polling station in the town of Falluja, about 50 kilometres west of the Iraqi capital Baghdad, a security source said.

The school was completely destroyed, the source told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa, adding that security around polling stations would be tightened across the country.

Washington  - The US Treasury Department on Tuesday unveiled new rules that will govern its efforts to stabilize the crumbling US financial sector, including clamping down on lobbyists' influence and prioritizing bank lending to the wider economy.

The announcement offered some fresh indications of how President Barack Obama's administration will manage the 700-billion-dollar financial rescue package approved by Congress in October.

Paris  - The government of French Prime Minister Francois Fillon on Tuesday easily rebuffed a no-confidence vote brought by the opposition Socialists in the National Assembly.

Although the no-confidence measure was supported by all left-wing law makers and the head of the centrist Modem party, Francois Bayrou, it fell 58 votes short of the
289-vote majority required.

The measure never had a realistic chance of passing because the UMP party of President Nicolas Sarkozy holds a large majority in the body.

London  - The British government was Tuesday ordered to release the minutes of crucial cabinet meetings in the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

A tribunal set up to oversee the implementation of the Freedom of Information Act said the confidential documents should be released in the "public interest."

The cabinet meetings on March 13 and March 17, 2003, led by ex-prime minister Tony Blair, are known to have considered the highly-controversial issue of whether the invasion was allowed under international law.

Harare/Pretoria  - Zimbabweans reacted sceptically Tuesday to conflicting reports out of a Southern African summit about a possible breakthrough in the four-month standoff between President Robert Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai.

"It doesn't look good from here," said John Makumbe, a political scientist at the University of Harare in Zimbabwe. "It appears Tsvangirai came under extreme pressure to make concessions, and that there was minimal pressure on Mugabe.