Gaza - Palestinian officials on Saturday warned the humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip will deteriorate because Israel is showing no signs of opening crossing points it shut down.

"There are no indications that goods required to meet the basic needs of the Gaza Strip will be allowed to enter in the next few days," said Hatem Owaida, an official at the ministry of economics.

Israel closed the commercial crossing points along Gaza Strip on November 4, following a surge of violence that left a June ceasefire in tatters.

Washington - The major players on the world economic stage were united like they had never been before on the need for joint action to prevent future crises, as the Group of 20 (G20) gathered at the White House for an urgently convened summit aimed at staving off the global financial crisis.

But as they sat down to dinner Friday night with their host, outgoing US President George W Bush, there was no overriding consensus among the 20 developed and emerging economies on the degree to which the recent wild swings of the financial markets could be tamed, participants at the dinner said.

Tokyo - Japan, China and South Korea agreed at the Group of 20 summit to enhance bilateral currency swap between Tokyo and Beijing to help Seoul stay afloat in the global financial crisis, Japanese media said Saturday.

A joint statement said the three nations agreed to "explore an increase in the size of bilateral currency swap arrangements" among them.

The deal was mainly aimed at helping South Korea fend off the financial crisis since the won has faced selling pressure as foreign investors withdrew capital.

Paris - Many flights were cancelled Saturday at Charles de Gaulle international airport in Paris as pilots went on strike.

Carrier Air France said that a third of long-haul flights and half of all other flights would have to be cancelled.

The pilots' union was due to meet Saturday to discuss whether to continue the strike, which was due to end Monday at midnight.

The pilots are protesting a change to working regulations that would allow them to choose to retire at 65 instead of the current 60, which they see as a first step to extending their working lives.

Sana'a, Yemen - A Yemeni state security court on Saturday sentenced an Iranian man to death and 11 other Iranians as well as a Pakistani man to 25 years in jail for smuggling drugs into the Gulf state.

The court convicted the 13 men, aged between 24 and 50, of smuggling some 1,400 kilograms of hashish from Iran into Yemeni territorial waters.

The men were arrested in March and their Iranian-flagged boat was seized by Yemeni coast-guard patrols off the south-eastern province of Mahra on the Arabian Sea.

Ayoub Muhammad Houd, 50, was sentenced to death after the court condemned him for leading the group.

The latest of report United Nations AIDS agency paints a grim picture for India. The report says that if the country fails to check the sharp rise in the number of intravenous drug users, HIV/AIDS infection will spread like wild fire.