11.   Conference organisers had originally sent out media invitations for the two-day meeting, but Chinese authorities later said they were unhappy about the attention.

12.   Conference organisers and speakers include AIDS sufferers for the first time.

13.   Conference organisers said NAM officials holding preliminary talks reached an agreement Sunday on a common strategy for bringing reforms in the world body.

14.   Earlier, conference organisers said the gathering in Antananarivo, which had been due to end on Monday, was continuing into Tuesday because no agreement had been reached.

15.   Rashid attended the first day of the conference in Rome but later fell ill at his hotel and died on Friday night, conference organisers said.

16.   Regional navies will spend billions of dollars on new warships, submarines and other naval equipment as they modernise their defence forces, conference organisers said.

17.   Several leaders of the former National Islamic Front are among the conference organisers.

18.   The Berlin conference is also expected to be confronted from the beginning with a number of potentially problematic procedural and political questions, delegates and conference organisers said.

19.   The conference organisers said early Thursday that a Philippine delegate had been deported from Malaysia after being denied entry by immigration authorities.