China said Monday it opposed foreign leaders meeting the Dalai Lama "in any form", ahead of a public appearance by the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader with U.S. President Barack Obama.

Obama will attend the National Prayer Breakfast with the Dalai Lama in Washington on Thursday, the White House previously said.

A small drone crash-landed on the grounds of the White House early Monday, prompting officials to declare a security lockdown until they were able to determine that it posed no risk.

The device was spotted shortly after 3:00 am (0800 GMT) by a uniformed Secret Service officer on the south grounds of the White House complex, the U.S. Secret Service said in a statement.

U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday met the wife of a Christian pastor who has been jailed in Iran for over two years, vowing to work to win his release.

Obama met the wife of Saeed Abedini during a visit to Boise, Idaho, where the president was selling his vision of a more equal America, unveiled in a State of the Union address on Tuesday.

U.S. President Barack Obama told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that America was committed to a "comprehensive" nuclear deal with Iran, and said that Palestinian ICC membership was not "constructive," officials said.

"The United States is focused on reaching a comprehensive deal with Iran that prevents Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon and verifiably assures the international community of the exclusively peaceful nature of its nuclear program," the White House said in a statement.

U.S. President Barack Obama has invited Tunisia's first democratically elected president to visit Washington, the White House said Monday.

Beji Caid Essebsi won Tunisia's first free presidential election last month. The revolution that toppled long-time ruler Zine El Abidine Ben Ali four years ago unleashed the so called Arab Spring.

The CIA's interrogation of al-Qaida suspects was far more brutal than acknowledged and did not produce useful intelligence, a damning and long-delayed U.S. Senate report said Tuesday.

The Central Intelligence Agency also misled the White House and Congress with inaccurate claims about the program's usefulness in thwarting attacks, the Senate Intelligence Committee said.

The White House denounced Thursday human rights violations in Gambia, calling on the government to allow U.N. experts into the country and revoke laws discriminating against homosexuals.

"The United States is deeply concerned by continued reports of human rights abuses in the Gambia," said Bernadette Meehan, National Security Council spokeswoman.

President Barack Obama on Friday will announce his choice to replace Chuck Hagel as Pentagon chief, the White House said.

Favored for the post is Ashton Carter, a former deputy defense secretary under Leon Panetta from October 2011 to December 2013.

Fury mounted in the U.S. town of Ferguson on Tuesday as the family of a slain black teenager denounced the "broken" justice system that failed to indict the white policeman who shot him.

Lawyers for the family of Michael Brown, backed by civil rights leaders, denounced the prosecutor whose grand jury hearing found that the officer had killed the 18-year-old in self-defense.

Barack Obama says voters in the United States are going to want "that new car smell" when the 2016 presidential campaign comes along to choose his successor.

Obama's former secretary of state Hillary Clinton is strongly fancied to run on the Democratic ticket for the White House, although she has repeatedly refused to confirm she wants to do so.