The price of gold struck a record high above $1,700 an ounce on Monday with dealers flocking to the safe haven metal as Asian stocks tumbled following Standard & Poor's downgrade of U.S. debt.

The price of gold reached $1,704.30 an ounce in Hong Kong trade.

Trading on Israel's Tel Aviv stock exchange was temporarily halted on Sunday after share prices fell six percent at the open on news of a U.S. credit rating downgrade, public radio reported.

Trading opened as normal on Sunday, the first day of Israel's working week, but mandatory suspensions went into effect minutes into the session as the stock exchange plunged.

A bomb destroyed at least 16 tankers on Saturday carrying fuel for NATO troops in neighboring Afghanistan, Pakistan police said, the latest in a string of attempts to disrupt supplies.

A total of 28 NATO oil tankers were parked at a terminal on the outskirts of Peshawar, the main city in Pakistan's northwest, at the time of the explosion, which triggered a fire that engulfed 16 of the vehicles.

The State Department on Friday urged Americans in Syria to leave the country immediately and advised those who remain in the country to restrict their movements, as the Syrian government intensified a violent crackdown on opposition protesters.

The warning came as congressional calls grew for the Obama administration to impose severe new sanctions on President Bashar Assad's regime.

The office that oversees billions in aid to Afghanistan will be without a chief for the second time this year, as its leader announced Thursday he was stepping down.

Herbert Richardson, acting special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction (SIGAR), said he will take a job in the private sector after he leaves his government post on September 2.

The Obama administration sent its ambassador back to Damascus on Thursday as it incrementally turned up the heat on Syrian President Bashar Assad with tougher rhetoric and new sanctions.

The White House said Assad's deadly crackdown on protesters had put Syria and the Middle East on a "very dangerous path," as Washington extended a raft of recent sanctions to include a businessman close to Assad and his family.

Oil prices fell on Wednesday, dragged down by concerns that demand will weaken due to slowing economic growth and the Eurozone debt crisis as traders awaited data on U.S. crude inventory levels.

New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in September, slipped 39 cents to $93.40 a barrel.

Shoppers in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) are among the wealthiest and most discerning in the world. Most major malls in Dubai, for instance, feature couture retailers usually associated in the United States with upscale fashion districts. It is not an uncommon sight to see shoppers with several large shopping bags, loaded into a cart just as a family buying groceries would, only the purchases being Gucci shoes and Louis Vuitton handbags. According to Business Monitor International, U.S.$31 billion worth of retail sales are expected this year in the UAE, and will top U.S.$41 billion in less than five years.

As there is more total retail space supply in the country than its entire population -- according to retail surveys, an estimated 5.75 million square meters by the end of 2014, or 1.27 square meters of shopping space for every UAE resident -- online retail has struggled to find room. Because of concerns about fraud, 45% of UAE shoppers said they would not buy online, according to a survey this year by MasterCard.

Israel is willing to begin new peace talks using the 1967 lines as a basis for negotiations, if the Palestinians drop their U.N. membership bid, an Israeli government official confirmed on Tuesday.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, the official confirmed that Israel has been working with Washington and members of the international peace-making Quartet to draw up a new framework that could re-launch stalled talks.

The dollar climbed against the yen in Asia on Monday, after U.S. President Barack Obama announced an 11th-hour agreement to raise the U.S. debt limit to avoid default that is pending approval by Congress.

The dollar was at 77.45 yen in Tokyo at 05:00 GMT after briefly rising above the 78 yen level, from 76.73 yen in New York late Friday.