Nong Duc Manh
Invitation
General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam Central Committee Nong Duc Manh will pay an official visit to South Korea on Wednesday. The visit will be made at the invitation of South Korean President Roh Moo-huyn. (Vietnam News Agency)
Shimon Peres
Parliament address
Israeli President Shimon Peres will address Turkey's parliament next week -- the first time an Israeli president will speak before the legislature of a Muslim country. Turkey, a member of NATO and Israel's closest ally in the Islamic world, has in the past played the role of mediator between the Jewish state and its Muslim neighbors.
Yasuo Fukuda
Washington trip
Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda is meeting with US President George Bush in Washington in the week of November 12. (Reuters)
Laptop
Production begins
A $188 string-pulley-charged XO laptop was scheduled to go into production at a Chinese factory in October, but it is now slated to begin by Monday. The One Laptop per Child Foundation expects to produce 100,000 laptops this year. (Reuters)
Benazir Bhutto
Long march
Former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto has said Pakistani opposition supporters will begin a long march from Lahore on Tuesday unless President Pervez Musharraf quits the army. (Reuters)
Trains
Maiden voyage
St Pancras, the new home for Eurostar trains to the continent, will see its first trains depart to Paris on Wednesday.(Reuters)
Akira Amari
Securing mineral wealth
Japan's Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Akira Amari is to visit South Africa and Botswana this week in a bid to secure alternative sources of rare metals, which are indispensable for Japan's high-tech industries. (Reuters)
Commonwealth
Emergency meeting
The Commonwealth, the 53-nation group of mainly former UK colonies, has called a special ministerial meeting this week to discuss Pakistan, where President Pervez Musharraf suspended the constitution and imposed emergency rule at the weekend. (Reuters)
Ban Ki-moon
Balancing climate change
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has said he will discuss how to balance climate change and food security in the development of biofuels when he visits major ethanol producer Brazil this week. (Reuters)
Civil rights leaders
Protest
Black civil rights leaders will lead a march around the US Justice Department this week to protest what they described as its silence in the face of a rising tide of race crimes. (Reuters)
Han Duck-soo
Bilateral talks
North Korean Prime Minister Kim Yong-il and his South Korean counterpart Han Duck-soo are to hold talks in Pyongyang on easing tension and boosting inter-Korean economic cooperation; it is a follow-up to inter-Korean summit held in Pyongyang on 2-4 October. (South Korean news agency Yonhap)
Sergey Stanishev
Economic cooperation
Bulgarian Prime Minister Sergey Stanishev is to visits Azebaijan to discuss economic cooperation. (Azerbaijani website Day.az)
Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad
OPEC Summit
The third OPEC Summit in Riyadh is due to take place; Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad is among those attending.
Far-right groups
March
Far-right groups plan to march on the anniversary of pogroms against Jews in 1938 known as Kristallnacht.
Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero
Latin America trip
Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero visits Argentina and Uruguay.
