US election candidates unite to honour 9/11 victims

Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama dismissed the "lipstick on a pig" controversy as a "silly season in politics" before White House candidates halted their attacking adverts to mark the seventh anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks today.

Both Mr Obama and his Republican rival John McCain will put their differences aside and come together "as Americans" at Ground Zero in New York as they remember the nearly 3,000 people who died in the worst terrorist outrage in history.