* Huge turnout in Iran presidential poll There has been a huge turnout for Iran’s closely-fought election as incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad seeks a second term in office.

* ‘Mousavi win wouldn’t stop nuke drive’ As more than 46.2 million eligible Iranian voters choose their president in elections on Friday.

* Iranian missile threat on US by 2015 Air Force’s National Air and Space Intelligence Center says Islamic republic, with support from outside sources, within six years could produce ocean-leaping missile capable of hitting United States.

* US fears third nuclear test in North Korea The United States is braced for further “reckless” actions by North Korea, including a possible third nuclear bomb test.

* US Mideast envoy presses for Palestinian state President Barack Obama’s special Mideast envoy said Friday that Washington supports the creation of a Palestinian state “as soon as possible.”

* Bin Laden ‘is still in Pakistan’ Al-Qaeda chief Osama Bin Laden is still hiding in Pakistan, the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director Leon Panetta has said.

* Palestinian FM: We’ll have majority in 20 years The alternative to the two-state vision is a bi-national state, where Palestinians will be the majority, PA Foreign Minister, Riyad al-Maliki said Thursday after meeting with European Union representatives.

* Poll: 56% of Israelis back settlement construction Nearly six of every 10 Israelis think Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should resist U.S. demands to completely freeze construction in Jewish West Bank settlements.

* Sarkozy and Merkel offer Barroso ‘conditional’ backing France and Germany are refusing to give EU commission president Jose Manuel Barroso full formal backing to become head of the institution for a second time at next week’s summit.

* What about the Arabs’ natural growth? It seems that never before has so much been written and said about the “natural growth” of so few.