Al-Jazeera: Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah is scheduled to arrive in Damascus, the Syrian capital, on the second-leg of his four-nation "Arab unity tour". King Abdullah was in Egypt on Wednesday and held talks with its president Hosni Mubarak on the Arab-Israeli peace process. He is scheduled to meet Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president, on Thursday.

King Abdullah is to travel to Lebanon and Jordan after wrapping up his Syria visit. He is expected to travel with al-Assad to Beirut for joint talks with Saad al-Hariri, the Lebanese prime minister. If al-Assad does visit Lebanon, it will be his visit since the 2005 assassination of Rafiq al-Hariri, Saad's father and the former prime minister of Lebanon.

GRN correspondents George Baghdadi in Damascus and Caryle Murphy in Riyadh are available for coverage.