http://192.168.2.6/english/1104/20061101VOA.mp3

It's 15:00 Universal Time, and here is the news from the Voice of America.

From the VOA news center in Washington, I'm Frances Alonzo.

The US envoy to six-party talks aimed at ending North Korea's nuclear program says Pyongyang has agreed to resume negotiations before the end of the year. Speaking to reporters in Beijing today, Christopher Hill confirmed an early report that an agreement to restart multi-lateral talks had been reached. He says the talks could start as early as November.

Iraq's prime minister has ordered US and Iraqi troops to lift a week-old cordon around Baghdad's Shiite Sadr City district. The extra checkpoints are part of an operation to search for a missing American soldier. Radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr called for the general strike today to protest the checks points, closing most shops, schools and government offices in Sadr City. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki ordered the blockade to be fully dismantled today but he said checkpoints could be re-imposed for curfews and other operations.

Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf says all of the 80 people killed in an attack on a religious school near the Afghan border were militants undergoing terrorist training. And its first comment since Monday's airstrike in the B tribal district. Musharraf said today that the militants have been under close surveillance for last six or seven days before / Pakistan's helicopter gunships attacked it down on Monday. Meanwhile over ten thousand people staged demonstrations today protesting that attack.

Australia is expressing concern at a new surge of violence in East Timor. Whether the government claims political opponents are giving gangs illegal drugs to stir up deadly trouble, which left 6 people dead last week. Australia is leading a multi-national peacekeeping force sent in to quell unrest early this year. From Sydney, Phil Mercer has more details on the story.

Regional power Australia which is heading the international peacekeeping force in East Timor says it concerned about the latest street violence and the possible cause. This after advisors to East Timor Prime Minister Jose Ramos-Horta blamed much of last week's deadly fighting in Deli on gang use of the illegal drugs, methamphetamine. Locally made and known by slang terms of "ice" or "crystal meth", it can trigger uncontrolled rage. Youth workers in East Timor believe/ it is being supplied to young gang members.

East Timorese officials have suggested that anti-government elements are distributing the drugs to gangs to calls chaos in Deli. Phil Mercer for VOA news, Sydney Australia.

NATO officials in eastern Afghanistan say suspected militants have attacked a convoy of Afghan and alliance troops, killing two NATO soldiers and wounding two others. NATO officials say the soldiers were on patrol of N province which borders Pakistan when a roadside bomb hit a vehicle. NATO meanwhile has not released the nationalities of those soldiers.

Three Hamas militants were killed by Israeli troops on Tuesday in a heavy gunbattle in the Gaza Strip. Israel's prime minister says his country's military might expand operations on the Gaza Strip to counter Palestinian militants who continue to launch rockets into Israeli territory. VOA's Jim Teeple has more details in this report from Jerusalem.

The militants were killed in Khouza, a village in the southern Gaza Strip near the Khan Younis refugee camp, which is next to the Israeli border. Several other Palestinians were reported/ wounded in the fighting. Questioned about Israel's operations in Gaza during a closed parliament committee session Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Israel could step up operations in Gaza. However, he says he has no intention of re-occuppying the territory from which they disengaged last year. Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, a leading Hamas militant/, has condemned the latest Israeli military incursion in Gaza, calling on the international community to halt what he describes as Israeli aggression. Jim Teeple VOA news, Jerusalem.

Israeli warplanes have flown at low altitude over Hezbollah strongholds in Beirut, and the largest such display of Israeli airpower since the end of the Israel-Hezbollah war in August. Israeli fighter jets were seen diving over the southern suburbs of the Beirut today before veering up into the sky. Israel says it's monitoring the alleged smuggling of weapons from Syria. Lebanon's government and the United Nations have frequently protested such operations as a violation of the UN-mediated ceasefire.

You can read these stories and more in depth on our website 24 hours a day at VOAnews.com. I'm Frances Alonzo in Washington. You are listening to VOA news.