Iraq Iraq claimed it had netted an aide to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi who was plotting election day attacks as Al-Qaeda's Iraq supremo continued his war on the vote with a deadly car bombing in Baghdad. Mideast Radical Islamist groups said they had narrowed their differences with Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas over his calls for a ceasefire but insisted Israel must pay a price for peace. Russia Ukraine President Viktor Yushchenko vowed to take historic ties with Russia in a new direction, but on a symbolic first trip to Moscow since taking office he assured President Vladimir Putin that Moscow would nonetheless remain an "eternal" partner. UN A historic special session of the UN General Assembly got underway, commemorating the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camps at the end of World War II. US US President George W. Bush will hold a working dinner with his French counterpart Jacques Chirac on February 21 during a visit to Brussels, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said. Indonesia A controversial Japanese military aid mission arrived in Indonesia's disaster-hit Aceh even as civilian groups were taking charge of relief efforts, while a new earthquake sparked a tsunami panic. Myanmar Trials for more than 300 people linked to Myanmar's disbanded military intelligence unit began under a cloud of secrecy inside the notorious Insein prison, a legal source said. SAfrica South Africa: A white South African and two black accomplices accused of feeding a farm worker to a pride of lions pleaded not guilty as they went on trial in this small rural town. India A top opposition politician was gunned down in southern India, setting off riots in which dozens of buses and government buildings were burnt and destroyed, police said.