From Washington, this is VOA news. I'm Jonathan Jones reporting.

The United States on Monday ordered 60 Russian diplomats it accuses of being spies to leave the country within a week.

White House spokesman Raj Shah: "Look, we want to work with Russia, but this type of an action cannot be tolerated. The United States is responding to Russia's action as I called it, brazen and reckless. So this is a U.S. response. We want to work with Russia. You know, the ball is in their court with respect to how they want to respond."

At least 17 other countries, including France, Germany and Poland, are expelling more than 100 Russian diplomats in a concerted response to the nerve agent attack on a former Russian double agent and his daughter in Britain.

The U.S. decision, along with the closure of a Russian consulate in Washington state, is in response to what the State Department is calling Russia's "outrageous violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention and breach of international law."

Britain, other Western nations and NATO all blame Russia for the March 4 chemical attack in Britain.

The European Union also took action against Russia. This is Donald Tusk, the president of the European Council: "As a direct follow up to last week's European Council decision to react to Russia within a common framework, already today 14 member states have decided to expel Russian diplomats."

The EU has already recalled its ambassador to Russia.

And North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is reportedly in China on an unannounced visit, according to Bloomberg News, citing three unnamed sources.

If Kim is in China, it would be his first foreign trip since he took power in 2011.

This is VOA news.

The United States is imposing sanctions on seven Pakistani companies for alleged links to the nuclear trade.

The Bureau of Industry and Security at the Commerce Department placed 23 [countries] companies on its list. They include 15 from Sudan, one from Singapore and the seven from Pakistan.

National elections are under way in Egypt.

Correspondent Edward Yeranian reports.

Egyptians cast their ballots Monday on the first of three days of voting in what appears to be a certain victory for incumbent President Abdel Fattah al-Sissi. Supporters of the president applauded while some opponents cried foul and still others appeared to be disinterested in the outcome, one way or the other.

Security was tight as police and military forces stood guard at key government buildings and installations.

Edward Yeranian, for VOA news, Cairo.

The White House said Monday that President Trump "doesn't believe any of these accusations" made by adult film actress Stormy Daniels. [She had a] She said she had a one-night affair with Trump in 2006 and five years later was threatened to keep quiet about the alleged liaison.

A Trump spokesman rejected any suggestion that the president had engaged in wrongdoing because his personal attorney, Michael Cohen, paid the [porns] porn star $130,000 from his own funds in hush money shortly before the 2016 presidential election.

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission said Monday it is investigating the privacy controls of the social media giant Facebook in the aftermath of reports that the personal data of tens of millions of Facebook users was compromised by the British voter profiling firm Cambridge Analytica.

American stocks surged Monday as fears eased about the possibility of an all-out trade war with China over competing tariff increases.

The three major indices on Wall Street had their greatest one-day gains in two-and-a-half years, erasing some of the market's huge losses last week.

The closely watched Dow Jones Industrial Average of 30 key stocks jumped by more than 2.8 percentage points in Monday's trading, the S&P 500 gained more than 2.7 percentage points and the NASDAQ Composite added nearly 3.8 points.

Earlier, Asian stocks were mixed while European indices were down for the day.

You can find more on these and other late breaking and developing stories, from around the world, around the clock, at voanews.com and on the VOA news mobile app. From the world headquarters of the Voice of America in Washington, I'm Jonathan Jones, VOA news.

That's the latest world news from VOA.