Hello, this is David Austin with the BBC news. President Obama on a visit to Vietnam has lifted a ban on selling weapons to the Vietnamese government. Mr. Obama said the end of the long-standing ban removes a lingering vestige of the cold war. The president's visit comes as China asserts its territorial claims in the South China Sea moves are unnerving its neighbors and the United States.Jonathan Headreports from Hanoi. With a lifting of all the many arm sales restrictions, President Obama has brought to an end the diplomatic legacy of the Vietnam War and completed the normalization of relations with its former enemy. Mr. Obama said military exports were still subject toprovisoson human rights. This is an area where he said two countries still disagreed. He also announced some big commercial deals which he said will secure thousands of American jobs.

The Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi says a big military operation is under way to rest control of the city of Fallujah from Islamic State fighters who seized it more than two years ago. Thousands of troops have mustered around the city 50 kilometers west of Baghdad in recent day. Demir has more of the operation. The built-up has been going on for quite a while, but as far as we know not much of that actually happened in terms of offensive presumed they will do some kind of softening-out bombardment. It's been a toss-up really between going for Fallujah or Mosul, the big prize of being in the north second city, but certainly the Iraqi seemed to decide Fallujah had to be dealt with first. It's right on the door to Baghdad over to the west. So that's what they're doing whether the Americans hold halt to behind it. They said nothing yet. They don't tend to believe in announcing offenses until they are actually under way cuz the element of surprise of course is totally gone.

The German pharmaceutical giant, Bayer, has offered to buy the US agricultural and bio-technology firm Monsanto in a deal of 62 billion dollars. Bayer said the move will create the wealthiest supplier of seeds pesticides and fertilizer.

Hundreds of thousands of postal votes will determine today who's won the neck and neck race to become Austria's next president. Results from Sunday's voting at polling stations left the outcome too close to call. Norbert Hofer, the candidate of the far-right anti-migrant and Euro skeptic freedom party is pitted against the former Green party leader Alexander Van der Bellen. Bethany Belle is following developments in Vienna. Projected results see the results will be very very close still, even when those postal votes are taken into consideration, it could still be almost 50-50 for both of them. Possibly with a slight advantage to Alexander Van der Bellen but as I say so close that is really impossible to tell at the moment. We also saw just quite interesting in the breakdown of the vote lots of support for Alexander Van der Bellen of the Green in big cities, but lots of support for Norbert Hofer in the countryside. World news from the BBC.

A suicide attack in the southern Yemeni city of Aden has left at least 20 people dead. Report say attack detonated an explosive bolt after joining the queue at an army recruitment center. Aden is currently serving as temporary base for the Yemeni governments. There are reports of serious explosions in two cities on Syria's Mediterranean coast, the stronghold of the government of President Assad.

The monitoring group, the Syrian observatory for human rights says a number of people have been killed in four blasts in the city of Jableh in Latakia Province. A further three explosions are reported to have taken place in the port of Tartous. The first World Humanitarian Summit organized by the United Nations begins today in Istanbul. President Erdogan of Turkey who’s hosting the summit has described the international aid system as broken. Mark is in Istanbul. There are almost 6,000 attendees at this conference, from governments, from NGOs, heyday agencies, and the donor organizations, some other businesses as well, to try to work how better to respond to humanitarian crisis. At the moment, there is an annual gap of about 15 billion dollars in terms of humanitarian funding, they are gonna try to plug that gap to some extent. But also they gonna try to respond to the needs of the 60 million people who have now displaced by conflict.

An advisor to the Turkish president has suggested that the country could suspend all its agreements with the European Union if it is not satisfied with the deal on migration. Brute said the EU was using what he alleged as double standards. Brussels once anchored reform its anti-terror legislation before it allow Turkish citizens visa free travelling to Europe.

India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi has congratulated its country's scientists on the launch of their first unmanned model space shuttle. The wing craft which is scaled down to about 1/6 of the size is the first of the series of prototypes. BBC news.