Anchor Lisa Mullins speaks with Hussein Agha, senior associate of St. Anthony's College in Oxford, about the current attitudes in the Middle East toward the US presence in Iraq. Many of Washington's allies in the Middle East are calling for troop withdrawal. But Agha claims that what's being said publicly is different from what Middle East leaders are saying in private.

The Senate has approved a bill that sets a deadline for beginning the withdrawal of American forces from Iraq. The bill, which had already been passed by the House of Representatives, makes future war funding dependent on the first troops being pulled out of Iraq by October. The White House has confirmed that President Bush will veto the measure. The World's Matthew Bell reports.

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The World's Marco Werman introduces us to a song called "Ségolène et Nicolas" . Its lyrics lampoon the two French presidential contenders still standing -- conservative Nicolas Sarkozy and socialist Ségolène Royal.

Correspondent Anita Elash reports from Paris on the role of right-wing politics in the French presidential race. French arch-conservative Jean Marie Le Pen is no longer in the running. But frontrunner Nicolas Sarkozy is said to have adopted many of Le Pen's anti-immigrant, law-and-order ideas.

Today's Geo Answer is the Grand Canal, where an exciting gondola race took place today. Melaina Spitzer was on a nearby dock to watch all the fun....and sent us an audio postcard.

Some North Korean defectors are broadcasting news of the outside world into the closed Communist nation. They're hoping to undermine the regime of Kim Jong Il. But it's not clear how many North Koreans are actually able to listen to the broadcast. Jason Strother reports from Seoul, South Korea.

Today we're looking for the name of the main thoroughfare that weaves its way through the Italian city of Venice.

Abortion will soon become legal in Mexico City...and there's strong reaction to that decision within Mexico as well as around Latin America. Anchor Lisa Mullins speaks with Joan Caivano, who covers women's issues at the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, to find out how the abortion question is dealt with in the region.