U.S. President Barack Obama has expressed concern over the crisis that has erupted in Lebanon over the Special Tribunal for Lebanon.

"I think we are all deeply concerned with the special tribunal there (Lebanon) and making sure that justice is appropriately served," Obama said Monday following talks with French President Nicolas Sarkozy at the Oval Office.

U.S. President Barack Obama and his French counterpart Nicolas Sarkozy will discuss the Lebanese crisis during talks in Washington on January 10, An Nahar daily reported Thursday.

The Elysee presidential palace announced last month that Sarkozy would visit the U.S. capital to discuss the agendas of next year's G8 and G20 summits with Obama.

Richard Holbrooke, a brilliant and feisty U.S. diplomat who wrote part of the Pentagon Papers, was the architect of the 1995 Bosnia peace plan and served as President Barack Obama's special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, died Monday, the State Department said. He was 69.

Calling Holbrooke "a true giant of American foreign policy," Obama paid homage to the veteran diplomat as "a truly unique figure who will be remembered for his tireless diplomacy, love of country, and pursuit of peace." Holbrooke deserves credit for much of the progress in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the president said.

The Middle East peace process lay in tatters Wednesday after Washington admitted defeat in its efforts to secure an Israeli freeze on settlement building, the Palestinians' condition for resuming talks.

Speaking late on Tuesday, U.S. officials admitted top-level efforts to coax Israel into imposing new curbs on West Bank settlement construction had gone nowhere, prompting Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas to declare a crisis in peace efforts but backslapping among Israeli hardliners.

South Korea's military began a major live-fire exercise Monday amid high tensions sparked by North Korea's deadly bombardment last month, as Washington pressed Beijing to curb its unruly ally Pyongyang.

The South, smarting over the unprecedented shelling of a civilian area, dismissed claims by the North that the five-day drill could spark war.

NATO blamed the Taliban on Thursday over an attack on an Afghan wedding that killed more than 40 people in an area U.S.-led troops are massing to dislodge insurgents from their fiefdom.

The cause of the carnage has been unclear, but the government said initial reports indicated that a suicide bomber strapped with explosives had walked into the party reportedly attended by members of an anti-Taliban militia.

Israel on Wednesday was discussing the format of an investigation into its deadly raid on a Gaza-bound flotilla, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted soldiers would be off-limits.

Israel was in talks with "several members of the international community" about the investigation, Netanyahu said, stressing that it should focus on "the pro-Palestinian activists who fought the naval commandos with knives and clubs."

President Barack Obama Wednesday pledged unwavering commitment to forge significant progress in the Middle East this year, despite the furor whipped up by Israel's raid on a Gaza aid flotilla.

Welcoming Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to the White House, Obama promised the "full weight" of U.S. diplomacy on the latest crisis and to push Israelis and Palestinians out of a "dead end" and into direct peace talks.