>> A raid on the Health Ministry in Baghdad. The Deputy Health Minister is arrested. Promises of progress at six-party talks on North Korea's nuclear programme. NATO ministers meet in Spain. Will they come up with enough troops to fight off a Taliban swing offensive? This is bbc world. Welcome. Also in the programme, protests in Jerusalem as Israel restarts excavations at Al-Sadr mosque. And the stage is shared with a sport once considered a symbol of British oppression. Amili is a senior member of the group loyal to moqtada al-sadr. He's been accused of being a central figure in infiltrating militias into the ministry. The bbc's Jane Peel is in the Iraqi capital with more details.

>> This happened around 9:30 local time.   We're told by spokesman for the Ministry of Health that both American and Iraqi forces were involved in the raid. It's said they broke down doors to get into the ministry building in central Bagdad.  As you say, he's closely connected with this political group linked to moqtada Al-sadr, the anti-American Shiite cleric. Involved in helping the mehdi army, the militia which is also connected with Al-Sadr and that specifically he arranged to transport weapons that he was arrested  on those grounds.

>> Just shows, doesn't it, All of this just as the new U.S. Commander gets his feet on the ground there.

>> That's right. General David Petraeus arrives in Bagdad today.  He doesn't officially take over the commander until Saturday, but his job is to quell the violence by which the Iraqis are suffering so much. One of the aims when they bring in these new American and Iraqi forces is to tackle the militias and the death squads in a successfully in the past. That's said to have the support of the Iraqi government and the Iraqi Prime Minister, Nouri Al Maliki. Perhaps he has been seen in the past as giving some protection to the Shiite militias. There are many supporters of the militia in the governing coalition. This time, it's said, they are going to be targeted. So it will be very interesting to see what happens when this new security surge finally gets under way with some 21,500 American troops and many thousands more Iraqi troops brought into Baghdad to try to quell this violence.

>> Jane Peel. Well, staying in Iraq, three bombs have exploded, killing at east 28 people. Separate devices going off in Baghdad, 40 kilometres south of the capital and a further 40 kilometres south. Police say all the explosions were roadside bombs with up to 70 people also injured. The military chief of NATO is expected to urge its member states to commit yet more troops to Afghanistan. 2,000 extra troops are needed to defeat the expected spring offensive by the Taliban in the coming weeks. Well, general Karadzic is attending that meeting of NATO defence ministers. It's being held in the Spanish city of see seville. NATO commanders want to deploy the troops on the border with Pakistan and in the south where fighting is heavier. Now, you end your hostilities towards us and we'll consider an end to our nuclear programme. That seems to be North Korea's message. Six-party talks have begun in Beijing. Christopher Hill, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State, defied report that a deal between Washington and Pyongyang was actually signed during a meeting with his North Korean counterpart in Berlin last month. Our correspondent in Beijing is James Reynolds. He told me there really is great pressure on both sides to ensure some sort of positive result.  

>> Both on the American side and on the North Korean side, they're using exactly the same phrase. Their talking about first steps or first stages. I think that gives you an indication of exactly where these talks are. They've been going on, on and off, for more than three years, but so far they have not achieved anything tangible, anything lasting. Almost now they're starting right from the beginning looking at the very first steps towards North Korea's disarmament. At least from the American side, there is a very real question mark as to whether or not North Korea really does want to disarm. At the end of the last round of six-party talks in December, Christopher Hill said he doubted the north Koreans had come negotiate in good faith. This next round of talks, I think the Americans will be looking closely to see if the north Koreans are willing to make any kind of concessions.

>> Presumably they're not using that language now about raising questions as to whether the North Koreans are there in good faith?

>> No. Christopher Hill has said that America should be cautious. He's looking at first steps. He's looking at trying to reemployment an old agreement which was signed but never implemented about a year and a half ago. The North Korean negotiator who is here has said that he's neither optimistic nor pessimistic, but he says in public he wants the United States to stop any kind of hostile policy towards north Korea. So I think there will be some pretty sharp exchanges, perhaps in private at the talks, but fundamentally they go back to this problem of this: These talks began to try to stop north Korea from developing nuclear weapons, but north Korea has done so. It has developed nuclear weapons. It has carried out a nuclear test. It believes it is a full nuclear power. And so really the task facing negotiators now is almost harder than it was at the beginning when they started several years ago.