NEW YORK -- The United States and China should make efforts to manage current difficulties in bilateral ties for the benefit of both peoples and the future of the world, former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger said here on Thursday.

In a speech delivered at the annual gala dinner of the New York City-based U.S. National Committee on U.S.-China Relations (NCUSCR), Kissinger said that both sides have to understand that differences are "inevitable" for the two great countries with different senses of history in this world linked by modern economics and technologies.

The challenge to both sides "is to see whether we can develop enough of a common conviction about the future, so that we can spare the world a conflict between two great societies," he said.

The United States and China should share an obligation to "develop some common conception of the evolution of the world," a task that requires great efforts and may spark new disagreements, said the 96-year-old veteran diplomat and strategist, who served under two U.S. presidents, Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford.

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ADDIS ABABA -- Eradicating extreme poverty and reducing existing inequality have remained the African continent's biggest challenges, the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) said on Friday.

The statement was made by Thokozile Ruzvidzo, Director of Gender, Poverty and Social Policy Division at the ECA, while addressing a high-level continental meeting of the committee on gender, poverty and social policy, which is underway at the ECA headquarters in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa from November 14 to 15.

"Eradicating extreme poverty and reducing inequality remain some of Africa's biggest challenges, is which the ECA is trying to help member States tackle through various policy recommendations and actions," Ruzvidzo told the meeting, which aimed at looking into the core role of the ECA's newly-formed Gender, Poverty and Social Policy Division that was reformulated to address gender, poverty and social policy as key African priorities.

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SAN FRANCISCO -- The national-level absence at the second China International Import Expo (CIIE) is "absolutely" a loss to the United States, California state lawmaker Phil Ting said Thursday.

Ting, who was elected to the State Assembly in 2012, told Xinhua that the United States should have had a presence at the CIIE, although it is having trade disputes with China.

China is the third largest trade partner of the United States, and "it is very important (for the United States) to be there," said Ting, who returned from China last week after leading a trade delegation of California state to the CIIE, which was held from Nov. 5 to 10 in Shanghai.

Ting said he was impressed by the Shanghai expo, adding that "not everybody in the United States wants to have an antagonistic relationship with China."

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DAMASCUS -- Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said the U.S. military presence in Syria would generate a resistance until its withdrawal from the country, state news agency SANA reported Friday.

"There is no occupying force that can exist in a certain place without having agents on the ground," al-Assad said in an interview with Russia's media outlets RUSSIA 24 and Rossiya Segodnya.

The immediate and most effective way for Syrians is to unite to make the United States leave the Syrian territories, he added. Enditem

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