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Asia and Australia Edition

Xi Jinping, Saudi Arabia, APEC: Your Friday Briefing

Good morning.

Here’s what you need to know:

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Credit...Doug Mills/The New York Times

• “You’re a very special man,” President Trump told President Xi Jinping at a news conference in Beijing, showing uncharacteristic deference on a state visit that has been heavier on ceremony than tangible results.

Mr. Trump may hope that cultivating a personal connection with Mr. Xi will help push him on North Korea and trade, but so far, the Chinese have made no significant concessions. Nor have American pleas quelled China’s online drug market, which Mr. Trump blames for contributing to the U.S. opioid epidemic.

Here are photographs from Mr. Trump’s tour so far. He heads to Vietnam today, where he may meet President Vladimir Putin of Russia on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum. He returns to the U.S. Tuesday, after the East Asia Summit meeting in Manila.

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• Among Chinese citizens, Mr. Trump’s straight-talking ways have gained him fans who call him “Uncle Trump” and praise him for changing the tone of America’s conversation with China. For them, he is a familiar type: the celebrity businessman.

Mr. Xi, China’s most powerful leader in decades, is cultivating his own persona, as well. His airbrushed face can be seen in portraits all over the country.

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Credit...Ben Hubbard/The New York Times

• A Saudi blockade on Yemen threatens to starve millions as tensions build over a proxy war there with Iran. Our correspondent described how one Yemeni town, above, struggles for normalcy.

Power in Saudi Arabia has consolidated around Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who has had top rivals or potential rivals arrested in what the government calls an anti-corruption drive.

The French president, Emmanuel Macron, made an unscheduled stop in the kingdom for talks with the prince on Yemen, as well as Lebanon, which has accused the Saudis of holding their prime minister.

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• Papua New Guinea vowed to remove hundreds of protesting migrants and refugees by force if they did not leave a closed detention center on Manus Island by Saturday.

A United Nations panel bluntly rejected Australia’s position that it was not responsible for the welfare of the migrants, and urged the government to move them to safety in Australia and end the offshore detention program for asylum seekers. A handful of Australians climbed the Sydney Opera House in support of the migrants.

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• Sexual harassment accusations continue to upend careers. Five women told our reporters of sexual misconduct by the comedian Louis C.K. involving masturbation, and the premiere of his new movie was abruptly canceled.

We hosted a TimesTalk about exposing male abuses of power. The reporters behind our coverage of the accusations against Harvey Weinstein, Bill O’Reilly and prominent men in tech answered questions from readers. The discussion was also streamed on our Facebook page

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• The U.S. Congress pressed its efforts to push a sweeping tax bill through by Christmas. The Senate unveiled a bill that lowers the top rate for millionaires, keeps the mortgage interest deduction and creates seven individual tax brackets.

The plan is taking shape as Republicans re-evaluate the election losses they suffered this week in affluent suburbs around the country.

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Credit...Charles Platiau/Reuters

• In a double blow to the agrochemical industry and the chemicals giant Monsanto, the European Union voted against reauthorizing glyphosate, the world’s most popular weedkiller. Above, Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller for sale in Paris.

• We are interviewing chief executives from AT&T, Uber and other major companies at The Times’s annual DealBook conference.

• South Korean retailers are hoping to capitalize on the easing of diplomatic tensions with China in time for Singles Day, the annual shopping extravaganza created by Alibaba that falls on Saturday.

• Another airline brand is being resurrected: A U.S. investment firm has acquired the rights to World Airways as part of a plan for discount flights to Asia and Latin America.

• TripAdvisor started putting symbols next to hotels identified as locations of sexual assault.

• U.S. stocks were down. Here’s a snapshot of global markets.

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Credit...Adrian Dennis/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

• The British government, facing critical decisions on the country’s departure from the European Union, is grappling with internal turmoil. Two cabinet ministers, including the international development secretary, Priti Patel, above, have quit within the space of a week. [The New York Times]

• India will enforce an even-odd system based on the last digit of a vehicle’s license plate from Monday to Friday next week, aiming to reduce the severe smog engulfing the capital. [Hindustan Times]

• “We are heading to this horrible place in our politics where you can’t have civil disagreement, you can’t have civil debate”: An Iranian-born Australian senator gave a radio interview after being verbally attacked by members of the far-right group Patriot Blue. [The New York Times]

• Soccer fans in Hong Kong jeered China’s national anthem, a display not yet illegal in the territory but punishable with up to three years in prison on the mainland. [South China Morning Post]

• A North Korean diplomat in Pakistan reported the theft of a huge hoard of liquor, beer and wine, raising suspicions that he might have been involved in large-scale bootlegging. [BBC]

• Another vice purged: Forgoing significant profits, the Vatican will end sales of duty-free cigarettes next year. [The New York Times]

Tips, both new and old, for a more fulfilling life.

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Credit...Jason Henry for The New York Times

• Sip slowly. A medical group is warning that drinking alcohol elevates the risk of some cancers.

• There are real medical benefits to falling and being in love.

• Recipe of the day: Try pairing brussels sprouts with chorizo.

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Credit...Emon Hassan for The New York Times

• The opera singer Audrey Luna, above, sings the highest note ever in the 137-year history of New York's Metropolitan Opera: the A above high C.

• A Canadian documentary crew has been shadowing two North Korean men’s hockey teams, finding layers of the sport’s long-existing subculture in one of the world’s most mysterious nations.

• The Russian dissident band Pussy Riot has taken aim at the Russian and American presidents with a new song, “Police State,” about state surveillance and police brutality.

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Credit...Neal Boenzi/The New York Times

Ellis Island, the U.S. gateway for more than 12 million immigrants, is celebrating the 125th anniversary of its opening this year. Sunday marks the day it closed in 1954.

Much of the U.S. population has an ancestor who was processed there.

Upon arrival, steerage passengers were transported to the island for inspections. (First- and second-class passengers skipped that step.)

Those found to have serious contagious illnesses or deemed to be unemployable could face deportation.

Nearly 70 percent didn’t speak a word of English, but language was never an issue, said Doug Treem, a National Park Service Ranger.

Interpreters — the unsung heroes of Ellis Island — translated scores of languages. To qualify, each had to be conversational in four languages other than English. Many were immigrants or children of immigrants.

“I doubt if anyone working as a translator at the U.N. right now could have gotten a job at Ellis Island,” said Mr. Treem.

One translator, the child of European immigrants and a veteran of the U.S. Foreign Service, worked in Italian, German, Yiddish and Croatian, while attending law school at night. That was Fiorello LaGuardia, who became a three-term mayor of New York City.

Sara Aridi contributed reporting.

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Your Morning Briefing is published weekday mornings and updated online. Browse past briefings here.

We have briefings timed for the Australian, Asian, European and American mornings. And our Australia bureau chief offers a weekly letter adding analysis and conversations with readers. You can sign up for these and other Times newsletters here.

What would you like to see here? Contact us at asiabriefing@nytimes.com.

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