Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras will hold an investment trip to Qatar later this month and similar trips to China and Russia are planned at a later date, the state agency said on Friday.

"Samaras will travel to Qatar on November 27 and (his office) is planning journeys to China and Russia with the aim of attracting investors," the ANA agency said.

Doha will make a fresh bid to bring the Olympics to the Middle East for the first time in 2024, having missed out on the 2020 Games.

Gas-rich Qatar, named as surprise host for the 2022 football World Cup, failed to make the short-list for the 2020 Games, leaving Madrid, Tokyo and Istanbul in the running as the leading candidates.

Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani warned that Israel's deadly raids on the Islamist-controlled Gaza Strip must not go unpunished, state news agency QNA reported on Thursday.

"This vicious attack must not pass unpunished," QNA quoted the premier as saying at a Wednesday meeting in Saudi Arabia of the six Gulf Arab nations and Russia.

Top football clubs from 90 countries have been invited to a conference in Qatar, and assess preparations for the 2022 World Cup.

The 207-member European Club Association (ECA) said Wednesday it has asked 65 clubs from 37 other countries to attend its six-monthly assembly being held Feb. 4-6 in Doha.

Syria's opposition resumed unity talks in the Qatari capital on Saturday under a cloud of reservations by the Syrian National Council main bloc over a proposed plan for a broad-based government-in-waiting.

The SNC said it would put forth its own proposals at the repeatedly delayed talks and suggested any final agreement would need more time, despite mounting frustration with its stance among other dissident factions.

Veteran dissident George Sabra, a Christian former communist, was elected president of the Syrian National Council opposition bloc at a meeting in Doha on Friday.

The SNC's 41-member general secretariat, itself newly elected, chose Sabra, who garnered 28 votes, as part of efforts to revamp the group working to oust President Bashar Assad.

The opposition Syrian National Council, meeting in Qatar to broaden its membership, said Tuesday that the "cornerstone" umbrella group should preserve its leading role in any revamp.

SNC chief Abdel Basset Sayda also denounced the failure of the international community to act to end "massacres" being committed by forces loyal to the regime of President Bashar Assad.

Qatar and the United Arab Emirates have asked to buy more than $7.6 billion in U.S. missile defense technology, the Pentagon said Tuesday.

The orders for the Lockheed Martin-made equipment were detailed in documents posted online late Monday by the Defense Security Cooperation Agency, which said it had notified Congress of the request.

Syria's main opposition bloc, under U.S. pressure to reshape into a widely representative government-in-exile, agreed on Monday to broaden its structure to accommodate 13 other groups, a spokesman said.

The decision by the Syrian National Council came on the second day of a four-day meeting of opposition groups in the Qatari capital Doha aimed at forging a more united front against Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime.

Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani has accused the Syrian regime, with the complicity of the international community, of waging a "war of extermination" against its people.

Sheikh Hamad in an interview with Al-Jazeera satellite channel late on Monday took issue with U.N.-Arab League peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, who earlier in the day had characterized the deadly conflict ravaging Syria as a "civil war."