The meeting would be a chance for both countries to improve their frayed ties. Bush and Putin were once close but their relationship has become strained over U.S. criticisms of Russia's crackdown on democratic freedoms and Russian opposition to the Iraq war and what it sees as an overly aggressive U.S. foreign policy.

Washington is seeking Russia's backing for a tougher line against both Iran and North Korea on their nuclear weapons programs. Meanwhile, Russia wants U.S. support for its bid to join the World Trade Organization.

"I hope that the relations between our defense ministries will develop as constructively as they did so far," he said in televised comments. "What I mean is that both ministries will defend their national interests, but also take into account threats and challenges faced by both the United States and Russia."

Ivanov did not expand. He had earlier listed international terrorism and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction among such common threats.

Russia's defense chief, tipped to be one possible successor to President Vladimir Putin when Putin steps down in 2008, said he had enjoyed his dealings with Rumsfeld.

"We had good personal relations," Ivanov said. "Although each of us defended the interests of his own ministry and state, this never stopped us from expressing our views frankly and openly."

Bush leaves on the eight-day trip on Tuesday. As a gesture of friendship to Russia, Air Force One will make a refueling stop in Moscow on its way to southeast Asia, where Bush is attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum in Hanoi.

"Southeast Asia is a region with an active al-Qaida-linked terrorist presence that we are working with partners to defeat," Bush's national security adviser, Stephen Hadley, said Thursday. "It is a region where serious transnational health challenges exist, including avian flu, and the U.S. is cooperating with regional nations to control these threats."

It will be the president's second trip to Singapore and Indonesia and his first trip to Vietnam.

"It is a region of dynamic and transforming economies, ranging from the financial and high-tech hub of Singapore to the reforming and literally booming Vietnam," Hadley said during a White House briefing on the trip. "But it is also a region that is experiencing change and uncertainty in some sense as a result of the changing power dynamics within Asia."

Bush will meet with Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung and President Nguyen Minh Triet, an economic reformer who has pushed for his country's membership in the World Trade Organization.

The communist nation had hoped to join the trade body before the APEC forum, but it is unlikely that it will be able to join before December. The House could take up the Vietnam bill as early as Monday, before Bush leaves on the trip. The measure probably will pass, although some senators have held it up because of concerns about human rights violations.

Relations between Vietnam and the United States have steadily improved since the normalization of ties in 1995, with two-way trade reaching nearly $8 billion last year. Former Vietnamese Prime Minister Phan Van Khai visited the White House in June 2005. He is the highest-ranking official from Vietnam to visit the United States since the end of the Vietnam War.

Hadley acknowledged that the trip to Hanoi would prompt comparisons between the wars in Vietnam and Iraq. On Nov. 18, the president will visit the joint POW-MIA Accounting Command, where he will be briefed on efforts to ensure the accounting of all missing service members from the Vietnam war.

The conflicts differ, he said, because U.S. troops and public support for the war in Iraq is much higher than it was during the Vietnam War. And while there are fears of terrorism today, back then, talk about withdrawing troops from Vietnam prompted concern that nations would fall one after the other.

"There were discussions about dominoes, some which fell, some which didn't fall," Hadley said. "But nobody, I think, felt that it would result in a clear and present danger to the territory of the United States."

After his brief stopover in Moscow, where he will be greeted at the airport by Putin and his wife, Bush is traveling to Singapore to meet Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and President S.R. Nathan. Bush will give a speech to National University of Singapore to highlight U.S.-Asia relations and discuss ways to work together to battle poverty, disease, terrorism and energy security.

During his trip, Bush also will meet with: Australian Prime Minister John Howard, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono of Indonesia, South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan.

On his way back to Washington, Bush is stopping in Honolulu to have breakfast with U.S. troops and attend a briefing by the commander of the U.S. Pacific Command.

Addressing a group of elites, Ahmadinejad said only 40 percent of the eligible voters took part in the elections, which cost the government more than dlrs 40 billion.
Ahmadinejad said the vote results show that majority of Americans are fed up with their government's policies.

Referring to Iran's peaceful nuclear activities, Ahmadinejad said that with regards to the nuclear issue, the enemies are falesly expressing worries over likely diversion of Iran's nuclear program from its peaceful course. "The killers whose hands are stained with blood of the oppressed are falsely pretending that are worried about lives of human beings," said the president.

He stressed that the enemy could not do a damn thing and thanks God almighty the nation would proceed its way.

That debate in Toulouse, closed to cameras, was the final chance for the three to convince the 217,000 card-carrying party members to vote for them in a 'primary' to be held next Thursday.

If none of the hopefuls gets an absolute majority in that vote, a second, knock-out round will be held a week later between the two top contenders.

Polls suggest Royal, who aims to succeed Jacques Chirac to become France's first woman president, will likely win most votes.

But Fabius and Strauss-Kahn hope to force the second round of party voting, in the hope that one or the other will just pip Royal to the nomination.

The debates - unprecedented in France, which up to now has resisted such US-style tactics - "allowed the party members to take stock of the points in common and the different approaches" of the three, he said.

While there are no reliable indications of how the Socialist Party members will vote, general voter surveys show Royal would have the best chance of beating the probable conservative presidential candidate, Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy.

Observers said that all three Socialist presidential hopefuls acquitted themselves well during the series of six debates, half of which were televised. Their format was deliberately non-confrontational, with the speakers addressing the audience, not each other.

While Fabius and Strauss-Kahn put their years of government experience on show, radiating practised authority, Royal had the advantage of putting a new face on politics, often smiling and contrasting with the other two with her tailored, light-coloured suits.

An unexpected outburst of boos and jeers during the fourth debate caught Royal off-guard, however, and fuelled speculation that her hold on party members was weaker than thought.

She has been accused of keeping her rhetoric vague, often ducking direct questions to make broad policy statements.

Late Thursday, she urged France's left "to keep the heart of the revolution intact" and said she was "calmly awaiting" next week's party vote.

The debate concluded with a speech from Socialist Party leader François Hollande - who is Royal's domestic partner and father of her four children - in which he urged for a big turnout in the upcoming polls.

A poll by France's CSA institute published before Thursday's final debate showed left-wing voters preferred to see Royal named the Socialist presidential candidate, with 58 percent in favour.

Strauss-Kahn had narrowed the gap with her over the course of the debates and now had 31 percent support, the poll showed. Fabius had nine percent.

Asked about the debates, Royal had admitted Thursday that she felt they had gone on too long and were "exhausting".

But, she said, she had "emerged strengthened by the test."