Superstorm Sandy finally weakened on Tuesday but only after leaving a trail of destruction from the Caribbean to Canada with almost 100 dead, New York in chaos and millions without power.

The storm, which claimed 67 lives in the Caribbean and at least 32 in the United States and Canada, has left an uncertain impact on the U.S. presidential race, striking one week before the nation votes in a cliffhanger election.

A top aide to Barack Obama voiced fears Sunday that Hurricane Sandy could hurt the president's re-election chances by reducing turnout, as the impending storm forced both candidates to cancel campaign stops.

Republican challenger Mitt Romney received good news in two key swing states, winning the endorsement in Iowa of the main newspaper, the Des Moines Register, and tying Obama in a newly-released poll in all-important Ohio.

U.S. authorities ordered coastal evacuations and airlines canceled transatlantic flights on Sunday as Hurricane Sandy bore down on the east coast after claiming 66 lives in the Caribbean.

Forecasters warned of catastrophic impacts from the mid-Atlantic to southern New England as the historic storm crashes ashore late Monday or early Tuesday, with New Jersey and New York City bracing for particularly dangerous conditions.

Indonesian police arrested 11 suspected terrorists Saturday allegedly planning attacks on the U.S. embassy and an American consulate, a spokesman said.

"The group's objectives were to attack the U.S. embassy in Jakarta and consulate-general in the eastern Javanese city of Surabaya," national police spokesman Suhardi Alius told reporters.

Canada and the United States announced Friday they were launching a joint cyber-security plan to protect their digital infrastructure from online threats.

The action plan, under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Public Safety Canada, aims to better protect critical digital infrastructure and improve the response to cyber incidents.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was hospitalized Friday after his car was involved in an accident on a highway in his home state of Nevada, police said.

The injury to the 72-year-old top Democrat in the Senate "does not appear to be life-threatening," Nesvada Highway Patrol spokesman Loy Hixson told Agence France Presse.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is leaving the door open to continuing to serve under President Barack Obama should he win a second term that would begin in January.

One of Obama's most popular cabinet members, Clinton has repeatedly insisted she would leave her office as America's top diplomat at the end of the Obama administration's first term.

After leaving 44 dead in the Caribbean, Hurricane Sandy inched toward the U.S. East Coast Saturday, threatening as much as a third of the United States with what has been dubbed a powerful "Frankenstorm."

Forecasters predicted the storm could collide early next week with a seasonal "nor'easter" weather system that would super-charge it while dragging it west onto land and hitting states like Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York, Massachusetts and even inland Ohio.

A suspicious package prompted the evacuation of the Canadian embassy for about two hours Friday but it was found not to pose a threat, police said.

"The package has been cleared," said District of Columbia police spokesman Araz Alali.

Vladimir Putin's Kremlin has carefully avoided taking sides in the U.S. presidential race with a victory by either Barack Obama or Mitt Romney offering potential strategic pluses for the Russian strongman.

Obama spearheaded the "reset" to improve ties which hit a Cold War-style freeze when he took on the presidency and his exit from the White House would dampen hopes of greater military, diplomatic and economic cooperation.