Hong Kong's love of Japanese cuisine will help ease tensions over Tokyo's arrest of activists who left from its harbor and landed on one of the disputed Senkaku Islands, fisheries minister Akira Gunji said Thursday at a major food fair in the city. Gunji said the relationship between Hong Kong and Japan will flourish as long as the culinary binds between them stay strong.

The U.S Department of State has withdrawn plans to place a $16.5 million order on Amazon.com for its Kindle Touch devices along with content management and logistics, stating that it intends to conduct additional market research and re-examine its requirements for the program.

First, the other members of the band released a new single online, "Putin Lights Up the Fires." The Guardian newspaper in England compiled clips and stills for an accompanying video, and the song could be a post-sentencing rallying cry for the millions of music fans and free-speech advocates following the case.

Ecuador dragged Britain into an emergency meeting of the Permanent Council of the Organization of American States Friday at OAS headquarters in Washington, calling for a foreign ministers' meeting following the British threat to go into the Ecuadoran embassy in London and get Assange, who is wanted for questioning in connection with sexual assault charges in Sweden.

China has outmaneuvered everybody else in the strategic calculations with respect to cultivating relationships with Africa. In the recently concluded fifth Ministerial Conference of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) on China-Africa strategic partnership, President Hu Jintao pledged a US$20 billion of credit line for African countries in the next three years—double the amount of what China promised to lend Africa at the last joint forum three years ago.

Chinese Ambassador to Cambodia Pan Guangxue on Friday spoke highly on Chinese language volunteers' contribution in Cambodia, hailing them as ambassadors of Chinese culture and language in Cambodia. Speaking to the third tranche of Chinese volunteers in China's embassy, Pan said he appreciates the volunteers' contribution in spreading Chinese culture and teaching Chinese language, which enhances the people-to-people exchanges between the two peoples.

Pakistan and the United States are likely to revive strategic dialogue process next month. Highly placed sources in the US Capital, Washington, DC, said that efforts were underway to make sure that the strategic dialogue between both countries will be revived on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.