US Osama bin Laden loomed large over the final whirlwind of the US presidential race as the two contenders sparred over how best to defeat Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden after he threatened new attacks in a videotape the day before. Mideast Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was undergoing medical tests in a Paris hospital to determine the cause of an illness that one of his doctors believes could be a potentially fatal blood disorder. Mideast The Palestine Liberation Organisation held its first executive meeting without leader Yasser Arafat, laid up in a French hospital, as a 12-year-old Palestinian boy was killed by Israeli troops. Afghanistan US forces in Afghanistan said they believed Osama bin Laden, whose appearance in a video on Al-Jazeera television was his first in 13 months, is still roaming along the frontier between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Iraq Crunch talks to avert a military assault on rebel-held Fallujah rumbled on, as British troops started to patrol a hostile region outside Baghdad and confusion reigned over the fate of a Japanese hostage. EU Rocco Buttiglione, who brought EU affairs to a halt with his views that homosexuality is a sin and that women should stay home looking after children, said that he was stepping down as candidate to become the new European commissioner for justice. Ukraine Ukraine stepped up security nationwide as it braced for a landmark presidential election fraught with East-West rivalries certain to impact the course of one of Europe's largest states for years ahead. Afghanistan A breakaway Taliban group claiming to hold three UN workers threatened to execute them unless foreign troops withdraw from Afghanistan and condemn its "invasion" by US-led forces. Botswana Voters go to the polls in Botswana in elections that are expected to hand victory to the party in power since the independence in 1966 southern African country, one of the most stable on the continent. Thailand Hundreds of Muslims will be prosecuted after a demonstration that ended in the deaths of 87 people detained by authorities in southern Thailand, Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said in a move which could further raise tensions in the region.