BRUSSELS — The European Union set up a high-stakes battle with Italy, one of the bloc’s biggest economies, over who has final control over a member state’s budget after the executive Commission took the unprecedented step of ordering the country to revise its public spending plans.

In a move that escalates a monthlong standoff, the EU said the populist government’s budget for next year is out of line and breaks earlier promises to lower public debt.

Italy’s debt load is the second-highest in Europe, after Greece, and there are worries that losing control of spending could rekindle financial turmoil in Europe. The populist Italian government says the sharp increase in spending is needed to jumpstart growth after years of malaise.

The confrontation laid bare the fundamental problem within the eurozone where 19 nations share a currency, yet governments maintain autonomy over spending priorities and the EU has been reluctant to enforce spending limits.

Since the euro economy can be destabilized if one member state loses control of its finances, as Greece did a decade ago, the other nations want to have some say over excessive spending, especially when it concerns the region’s third-biggest economy.

The EU Commission said it had no choice after Italy proposed a deficit of 2.4 percent of GDP for next year — three times more than what it had previously targeted. The higher deficit means Italy would not fulfill its promise to lower its debt, which is over 130 percent of GDP and more than twice the EU limit of 60 percent.

U.S. health chief says overdose deaths beginning to level off

WASHINGTON — The number of U.S. drug overdose deaths has begun to level off after years of increases driven by the opioid epidemic, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said Tuesday, cautioning it’s too soon to declare victory.

Confronting the opioid epidemic has been the rare issue uniting Republicans and Democrats in a politically divided nation.

More than 70,000 people died of drug overdoses last year, according to preliminary numbers released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention this summer— a 10 percent increase from 2016. Opioids were involved in most of the deaths, killing nearly 48,000 people.

Earlier this month, the CDC released figures — also preliminary — that appear to show a slowdown in overdose deaths in late 2017 and the first three months of this year.

Japan: Man believed to be missing journalist in Syria freed

TOKYO — Japan’s government said Tuesday that a man believed to be a Japanese freelance journalist who went missing three years ago while in Syria has been released and is now in Turkey.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told a hastily arranged news conference late Tuesday that Japan was informed by Qatar that the man, believed to be journalist Jumpei Yasuda, has been released.

Yasuda was last heard from in Syria in 2015.

Suga said Qatar’s government told Japanese officials that the man is being protected by the Turkish authorities in southern Turkey near the border with Syria and is being identified, and that he most likely is Yasuda.

Yasuda was kidnapped by al-Qaida’s branch in Syria, known at the time as Nusra Front.

Egypt arrests author, publisher over book on economy

CAIRO — Egypt has arrested an economist and his publisher over a book that challenged President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi’s economic policies, a lawyer said Tuesday, the latest in a wave of detentions in recent years targeting all forms of dissent.

Prize-winning economist Abdel-Khaleq Farouq and his publisher, Ibrahim el-Khateib, were detained Sunday. Mohammed Abdel-Aziz, a lawyer for the author, said the two are accused of spreading “fake news,” which carries a maximum penalty of three years in prison.

The book — entitled “Is Egypt Really a Poor Country?” — was posted online by activists.

The book has scathing criticisms of el-Sissi’s economic policies, accusing the general-turned-president of lacking the vision needed to remedy Egypt’s economic woes.

Records: Killer of Utah student was sex offender

SALT LAKE CITY — A University of Utah student and track athlete who was shot and killed on campus by a former boyfriend had filed a police complaint against him after she learned he was a sex offender and broke off the relationship, authorities said Tuesday.

Investigators had been working to build a case after receiving the report from 21-year-old senior Lauren McCluskey, university police Chief Dale Brophy said.

Lauren McCluskey had dated Melvin Rowland, 37, for a month then ended the relationship on Oct. 9 when she learned he had lied about his age, name and criminal past, her mother, Jill McCluskey, said.

Lauren McCluskey was found shot in a car Monday night near on-campus student housing. Rowland killed himself overnight at a church when police tracked him down.

Seoul confirms N. Korea deals without OK by lawmakers

SEOUL, South Korea — South Korea’s liberal president on Tuesday formally confirmed his reconciliation deals with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

Some experts say move is largely symbolic, but others say it shows his determination to carry out the September deals despite growing skepticism about whether his engagement policy will eventually lead to North Korea’s nuclear disarmament.

The move by President Moon Jae-in came with no prior parliamentary endorsement. In South Korea, a president is allowed by law to ratify some agreements with North Korea without consent from lawmakers.

Under the latest deals, the two Koreas are to hold a groundbreaking ceremony on a project to reconnect cross-border railways and roads and push to resume economic cooperation projects.

Border killing: Federal prosecutors in Arizona will once again try Lonnie Swartz, a U.S. Border Patrol agent who killed a 16-year-old boy in a cross-border shooting in 2013. The agent was acquitted this year of murder, but a jury deadlocked on manslaughter charges. Opening arguments are scheduled Wednesday.

Sanctions imposed: Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin announced Tuesday that the United States and six other Middle East countries have designated nine individuals associated with the Taliban and their Iranian sponsors for sanctions because of actions to undermine the government of Afghanistan.