US Secretary of State John Kerry will launch a nine-day trip by traveling to Riyadh for talks on Sunday with King Abdullah amid tensions with the Gulf Kingdom. Kerry "will reaffirm the strategic nature of the US-Saudi relationship given the importance of the work between our two countries on shared challenges," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said. Kerry's trip from November 3 to 11 will also take him to Poland, Israel, Bethlehem, Amman, Algeria and Morocco, she said.