美国副总统候选人对阵经济中东议题

U.S. Vice Presdient Joe Biden and Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan disagreed early and often on foreign and economic policy during a feisty, interruption-filled debate in (the state of ) Kentucky Thursday.

From the outset of the 90-minute nationally televised debate, both candidates engaged in animated back-and-forth exchanges.

Looking to regain momentum following President Barack Obama's poor debate performance last week, Vice President Biden launched an aggressive defense of White House policies. He called on Representative Ryan and other Republican lawmakers to "get out of the way" and let the Obama administration fix the slow economy.

But Ryan countered that after nearly four years, President Obama and Congressional Democrats bear full responsibility for an economy that he said has left 15 percent of the country living in poverty.

The candidates also opposed each other's foreign policy views, with Biden declaring that U.S. troops will leave Afghanistan in 2014 and Ryan saying that such an announcement amounts to weakness.

On Syria, Biden praised the Obama administration's careful work with America's allies in pressuring Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down.

Ryan accused the Obama administration of inaction on Syria, saying it has allowed tens of thousands to die in the conflict despite mounting international pressure to act.

On Libya, Ryan slammed the White House for not providing enough security in Benghazi, where an attack last month killed the U.S. ambassador. He said the administration was too slow in recognizing that it was a terrorist attack.

Biden called the attack against the U.S. ambassador "a tragedy," promising that whatever "mistakes" were made "will not be made again."