Vilnius - With most votes counted in the Lithuanian general election, the opposition Homeland Union - Lithuanian Christian Democrats party looks likely to be the largest single party in the next parliament.

Provisional results released by the Central Election Commission show the conservative Homeland Union took 17.87 per cent of the vote in the portion of the vote run under proportional representation (PR) rules, giving it 17 of the 70 parliamentary seats decided in this manner.

Voter turnout was better than predicted at around 48 per cent.

The performance of the election so far came from the second-placed Rising Nation Party with 14.88 percent of the vote and 14 seats from the PR vote.

New Delhi, Oct 13: Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh will chair the 14th meeting of the National Integration Council (NIC) here today.

Prevention of extremism, promotion of communal harmony and security among minorities, and equitable development are some of the important items on the agenda of the meeting.

Promotion of education among minorities, scheduled castes and scheduled tribes; elements contributing to national integration; and removal of regional imbalances, caste and identity divisions will also be discussed in the day-long meeting.

New Delhi, Oct 13: The Bureau of the Asia Pacific Ministerial Conference on Housing and Urban Development (APMCHUD) will meet here today.

The meeting will be chaired by Iranian Housing and Urban Development Minister Mohammad Saeedi, who is currently the Chairperson of the APMCHUD.

The meeting will focus on concretizing the Action Plan for Regional Cooperation on promoting Sustainable Urban Development among Asia-Pacific countries as adopted during the Tehran Conference of APMCHUD in May 2008.

The APMCHUD was established in December 2006, subsequently to the first Asia Pacific Conference held at New Delhi under the aegis of Government of India, Ministry of Housing and Poverty Alleviation and UN-HABITAT.

Tehran - Moderate cleric Mehdi Karroubi became the first candidate to officially declare his nomination Sunday for next June's presidential elections to challenge Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The 71-year-old cleric is head of the moderate opposition party Etemad Melli (National Trust) and the party's choice run in the June 12 elections.

"It will be quite difficult but I am still ready to take the challenge for changing the political status quo," Karroubi said in a press conference in Tehran.

The cleric referred to the president's economic and foreign policies as the main problems of the current administration which should be amended.