deal

WASHINGTON — Cornell University has agreed to pay $60 million and accept the Trump administration’s interpretation of civil rights laws in order to restore federal funding and end investigations into the Ivy League school.

Cornell President Michael Kotlikoff announced the agreement on Friday, saying it upholds the university’s academic freedom while restoring more than $250 million in research funding that the government withheld amid investigations into alleged civil rights violations.

The university agreed to pay $30 million directly to the U.S. government along with another $30 million toward research that will support U.S. farmers.

Kotlikoff said the agreement revives the campus’ partnership with the federal government “while affirming the university’s commitment to the principles of academic freedom, independence, and institutional autonomy that, from our founding, have been integral to our excellence.”

The six-page agreement is similar to one signed by the University of Virginia last month. It’s shorter and less prescriptive than others signed by Columbia University and Brown University.

It requires Cornell to comply with the government’s interpretation of civil rights laws on issues involving antisemitism, racial discrimination and transgender issues. A Justice Department memo that orders colleges to abandon diversity, equity and inclusion programs and transgender-friendly policies will be used as a training resource for faculty and staff at Cornell.

The campus must also provide a wealth of admissions data that the government has separately sought from campuses to ensure race is no longer being considered as a factor in admissions decisions. President Trump has suggested some campuses are ignoring a 2023 Supreme Court decision ending affirmative action in admissions.

Education Secretary Linda McMahon called it a “transformative commitment” that puts a focus on “merit, rigor, and truth-seeking.”

“These reforms are a huge win in the fight to restore excellence to American higher education and make our schools the greatest in the world,” McMahon said on X.

Cornell’s president must personally certify compliance with the agreement each quarter. The deal is effective through the end of 2028.

It appears to split the difference on a contentious issue colleges have grappled with as they negotiate an exit from federal scrutiny: payments made directly to the government. Columbia agreed to pay $200 million directly to the government, while Brown University reached an agreement to pay $50 million to state workforce organizations. Virginia’s deal included no payment at all.

Binkley writes for the Associated Press.

Nov. 7 (UPI) — Tesla shareholders approved an unprecedented new package for CEO Elon Musk that could see him become the world’s first trillionaire.

The firm said 75% of shareholders with voting rights on Thursday backed Musk’s 10-year pay deal, which could net him $1 trillion over that time by boosting his stake in Tesla by more than 423 million shares.

The share bonanza is contingent on him delivering on a promise to drive up Tesla’s market capitalization five-fold from is current level of around $1.5 trillion to $8.5 trillion, roughly double the size of the Japanese economy.

Shareholders at the annual general meeting at Tesla HQ in Austin, Texas, voted it through on the recommendation of Tesla’s board, arguing Musk might quit if it were rejected and that the company could not afford to lose him.

Counsel from independent advisors Glass Lewis and Institutional Shareholder Services who said the “astronomical” deal should be rejected due to “unmitigated concerns surrounding the special award’s magnitude and design,” was largely ignored.

Addressing the meeting after the result, Musk thanked the board and shareholders, saying what Tesla was poised to do was not just “a new chapter in the future of Tesla, but a whole new book.”

Under the deal, Musk will receive the stock in tranches tied to delivering financial and production targets, including 20 million new electric vehicles rolling off production lines, 10 million full self-driving subscriptions​, 1 million Optimus humanoid robots and 1 million robotaxis in service.

The first block of stock gets paid to Musk when Telsa market capitalization reaches $2 trillion with the next nine awarded each time the company’s value rises by another $500 billion, up to $6.5 trillion.

Two additional rises in market capitalization, each of $1 trillion, bringing the value to $8.5 trillion, are required for the final two stock grants to kick in.

While the deal is performance-based, it’s not set in stone — with Musk still in line to earn more $50 billion even if he fails to meet the bulk of the targets — and includes riders for so-called “covered events” with the potential to impact Tesla’s future designs, manufacturing and sales.

These include natural disasters, wars, pandemics and changes to “international, federal, state and local law, regulations or other governmental action or inaction.”

In June 2024, Musk reincorporated Tesla in Texas, the company’s headquarters and center of operations, moving from Delaware six months after a court there struck down a $56 billion pay deal the board awarded to Musk in 2018, ruling it was “unfair” and that Musk held excessive power over the rules and size of the deal.

On the same day, shareholders voted to reinstate the package, at the time the largest in corporate history.

In December 2024, the Delaware judge in the case reaffirmed her ruling in favor of the complainant, shareholder Tornetta, and ordered Musk must return what he had already received from the package.

The board eventually awarded Musk a $29 billion “good faith” package in August, aimed at keeping Musk at the helm, that would see him granted 96 million shares after two years of service in a “senior leadership role” at Tesla.

Musk’s mega-deal on Thursday came three weeks after Tesla reported Tesla reported third quarter profits down 37%, despite a jump in revenue to a record $28.1 billion on stronger sales of its electric cars in the domestic market.

WASHINGTON — Elections this week that energized Democrats and angered President Trump have cast a chill over efforts to end the record-breaking government shutdown, raising fresh doubts about the possibility of a breakthrough despite the punishing toll of federal closures on the country.

Trump has increased pressure on Senate Republicans to end the shutdown — now at 37 days, the longest in U.S. history — calling it a “big factor, negative” in the poor GOP showings across the country. Democrats saw Trump’s comments as a reason to hold firm, believing his involvement in talks could lead to a deal on extending health care subsidies, a key sticking point to win their support.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune opened what’s seen as a pivotal day in efforts to end the government shutdown by saying the next step hinges on a response from Democrats to an offer on the table.

“It’s in their court. It’s up to them,” Thune told reporters Thursday.

But Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer held firm in opening remarks Thursday, saying voters “fired a political torpedo at Trump and Republicans” in Tuesday’s election.

“Donald Trump clearly is feeling pressure to bring this shutdown to an end. Well, I have good news for the president: Meet with Democrats, reopen the government,” Schumer said on the Senate floor.

Trump is refusing to meet with Democrats, insisting they must open the government first. But complicating the GOP’s strategy, Trump is increasingly fixated instead on pushing Republicans to scrap the Senate filibuster to speed reopening — a step many GOP senators reject out of hand. He kept up the pressure in a video Wednesday, saying the Senate’s 60-vote threshold to pass legislation should be “terminated.”

“This is much bigger than the shutdown,” Trump said. “This is the survival of our country.”

Senate Democrats face pressures of their own, both from unions eager for the shutdown to end and from allied groups that want them to hold firm. Many see the Democrats’ decisive gubernatorial wins in Virginia and New Jersey as validation of their strategy to hold the government closed until expiring health care subsidies are addressed.

“It would be very strange for the American people to have weighed in, in support of Democrats standing up and fighting for them, and within days for us to surrender without having achieved any of the things that we’ve been fighting for,” said Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn.

Meanwhile, talks grind on, but the shutdown’s toll deepens. On Wednesday, the Federal Aviation Administration announced plans to reduce air traffic by 10% across 40 high-volume markets beginning Friday to maintain safety amid staffing shortages. Millions of people have already been affected by halted government programs and missed federal paychecks — with more expected as another round of paydays approaches next week.

Progressives see election wins as reason to fight

Grassroots Democratic groups nationwide touted Tuesday’s election results as voter approval of the shutdown strategy — and warned lawmakers against cutting a deal too soon.

“Moderate Senate Democrats who are looking for an off-ramp right now are completely missing the moment,” said Katie Bethell, political director of MoveOn, a progressive group. “Voters have sent a resounding message: We want leaders who fight for us, and we want solutions that make life more affordable.”

Some Senate Democrats echoed that sentiment. Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent who caucuses with Democrats and a leading voice in the progressive movement, said Democrats “have got to remain strong” and should secure assurances on extending health care subsidies — including “a commitment from the speaker of the House that he will support the legislation and that the president will sign.”

Still, how firmly the party remains dug in remains to be seen. Some Democrats have been working with Republicans to find a way out of the standoff, and they held firm after the election that it had not impacted their approach.

“I don’t feel that the elections changed where I was,” said Sen. John Hickenlooper, D-Colo. “I still feel I want to get out of the shutdown.”

Some Republicans also shared in Trump’s concerns that the shutdown is becoming a drag on the party.

“Polls show that most voters blame Republicans more than Democrats,” said Sen. Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican. “That’s understandable given who controls the levers of power.”

Trump sets another shutdown record

While some Democrats saw Trump’s comments on the shutdown Wednesday as evidence he’d soon get more involved, he’s largely stayed out of the fray. Instead, the talks have intensified among a loose coalition of centrist senators trying to negotiate an end to the shutdown.

Trump has refused to negotiate with Democrats over their demands to salvage expiring health insurance subsidies until they agree to reopen the government. But skeptical Democrats question whether the Republican president will keep his word, particularly after his administration restricted SNAP food aid despite court orders to ensure funds are available to prevent hunger.

Trump’s approach to the shutdown stands in marked contrast to his first term, when the government was partially closed for 35 days over his demands for money to build a U.S.-Mexico border wall. At that time, he met publicly and negotiated with congressional leaders. Unable to secure the money, he relented in 2019.

This time, it’s not just Trump declining to engage in talks. The congressional leaders are at a standoff, and House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., sent lawmakers home in September after they approved their own funding bill, refusing further negotiations.

Johnson dismissed the party’s election losses and said he’s looking forward to a midterm election in 2026 that’ll more reflect Trump’s tenure.

In the meantime, food aid, child care money and countless other government services are being seriously interrupted. Hundreds of thousands of federal workers have been furloughed or are expected to work without pay.

Senators search for potential deal

Central to any resolution will be a series of agreements that would need to be upheld not only by the Senate but also by the House and the White House, which is not at all certain in Washington.

Asked if the House would guarantee a vote on extending health care subsidies if the Senate struck a deal, Johnson said Thursday, “I’m not promising anybody anything.”

Senators from both major parties, particularly the members of the powerful Appropriations Committee, are pushing to ensure the normal government funding process in Congress can be put back on track. Among the goals is guaranteeing upcoming votes on a smaller package of bills to fund various aspects of government such as agricultural programs and military construction projects at bases.

More difficult, a substantial number of senators also want some resolution to the standoff over the funding for the Affordable Care Act subsidies that are set to expire at year’s end.

With insurance premium notices being sent, millions of people are experiencing sticker shock on skyrocketing prices. The loss of enhanced federal subsidies, which were put in place during the COVID-19 pandemic and come in the form of tax credits, are expected to leave many people unable to buy health insurance.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., has promised Democrats at least a vote on their preferred health care proposal, on a date certain, as part of any deal to reopen government. But that’s not enough for some senators, who see the health care deadlock as part of their broader concerns with Trump’s direction for the country.

Cappelletti, Mascaro and Jalonick write for the Associated Press.

ESPN is shifting its strategy on online sports gambling, ending its partnership with Penn Entertainment.

The companies announced Thursday they were terminating an agreement that offered ESPN equity in Penn, which operated the ESPN Bet sportsbook app. The app will no longer carry the familiar red ESPN logo. It will operate under a new name.

ESPN said it will partner with DraftKings, a leading sports betting company, which will provide odds and other gaming-related data for the Walt Disney Co. unit’s programs and its digital platforms. ESPN’s on-air staff will use DraftKings’ odds starting Dec. 1.

According to people familiar with the ESPN-Penn arrangement, the app simply didn’t reach its financial targets in the highly competitive business, which operates in the 31 states where online gambling is legal.

In 2023, Penn agreed to pay $1.5 billion in cash over the next 10 years for the rights to use the ESPN name on its app. As part of the deal, ESPN promoted the product across its programming and provided access to on-air talent. ESPN had the right to purchase up to 31.8 million shares of Penn stock for $500 million over the 10-year period.

“When we first announced our partnership with ESPN, both sides made it clear that we expected to compete for a podium position in the space,” said Jay Snowden, CEO and President of Penn Entertainment. “Although we made significant progress in improving our product offering and building a cohesive ecosystem with ESPN, we have mutually and amicably agreed to wind down our collaboration.”

The end of the deal comes shortly after an FBI investigation led to the arrest of Miami Heat player Terry Rozier, who allegedly pulled out of a game claiming injury to deliver a win on one of his prop bets.

ESPN’s decision is unrelated to the recent news, as the company has been in talks for months with DraftKings about a new partnership. But no longer having the ESPN name on a betting app will keep the brand out of the line of fire if the NBA case escalates.

Beginning in December, DraftKings will have its app exclusively integrated across ESPN’s platforms.

The companies said they will “collaborate to advance their shared commitment to responsible gaming, by dedicating prominent assets to educate, raise customer awareness and promote responsible play through campaigns and integrations.”

DraftKings will provide the betting tab within the ESPN app and its customers will receive special promotions for ESPN’s newly launched direct-to-consumer streaming product.

DraftKings operates in 28 states and in Washington, D.C., and Ontario, Canada, and has more than 10 million customers across its products.

Kieran Culkin and wife Jazz Charton made good on their Emmys pact, recently welcoming their third child, according to the former’s “Succession” co-star.

Oscar and Emmy winner Culkin’s on-screen sister Sarah Snook, also an Emmy-winning actor, announced the arrival of the couple’s newest child while speaking to Access Hollywood on Monday. “I met the little baby, it’s so cute,” she said during the premiere of Peacock’s “All Her Fault.”

“They’re very happy and so cute,” she added.

A representative for Culkin did not immediately respond to a request for confirmation. Charton, a contributor for the Financial Times, has not yet publicly addressed the arrival of their littlest one.

“A Real Pain” star Culkin, younger brother of “Home Alone” star Macaulay Culkin, tied the knot with Charton in 2013. They share two children, Kinsey Sioux and Wilder Wolf, and lovingly teased a plan to grow their family during the 75th Emmy Awards in January 2024.

Culkin, 43, famously used part of his acceptance speech for the lead actor prize to remind Charton, 37, of the deal they had struck prior to the ceremony. As he acknowledged his wife and children, Culkin declared, “I want more.”

“You said ‘maybe,’ if I win! I love you so much,” he told Charton from stage.

Charton confirmed that baby No. 3 was on the way in late September, sharing a cheeky Instagram post that also tapped into her well-documented fan love for “Matrix” star Keanu Reeves. “Saw Keanu Reeves on broadway and now I’m 9 months pregnant,” she captioned her post, which featured photos of her baby bump, “This is very on brand for me.”

She revealed she was expecting amid the debut of Reeves and longtime “Bill & Ted” collaborator Alex Winter’s production of “Waiting for Godot.” She quipped in her caption that she had “made a deal with this baby to let me make it to this [show] before labor, not sure what it wants in return but I’m CLEARLY a woman of my word.”

Snook, the first to break the couple’s baby news, has remained close to her “Succession” co-star since the hit HBO drama concluded two years ago. Culkin and Snook respectively starred as Roman and Shiv Roy, two of numerous potential — ahem — successors to media mogul Logan Roy (Brian Cox). “Succession” aired from 2018 to 2023 and won a total of 19 Primetime Emmy Awards, including acting prizes for Culkin, Snook and co-stars Jeremy Strong and Matthew Macfadyen.

With the arrival of Culkin and Charton’s third child, it’s clear that the “Succession” legacy now extends past powerhouse performances, viral memes and memorable lines. Anyone got a ludicrously capacious baby bag?

Clippers owner Steve Ballmer is being sued by 11 former investors in the sustainability firm Aspiration Partners.

Ballmer was added this week as a defendant in an existing civil lawsuit against Aspiration co-founder Joseph Sanberg and several others associated with the now-defunct company. Ballmer and the other defendants are accused of fraud and aiding and abetting fraud, with the plaintiffs seeking at least $50 million in damages.

“This is an action to recover millions of dollars that Plaintiffs were defrauded into investing, directly or indirectly, in CTN Holdings, Inc. (‘Catona’), previously known as Aspiration Partners, Inc,” reads the lawsuit, which was initially filed July 9 in Los Angeles County Superior Court, Central District.

Attorney Skip Miller said his firm, Miller Barondess LLP, filed an amended complaint Monday that added the billionaire team owner and his investment company, Ballmer Group, as defendants in light of recent allegations that a $28-million deal between Aspiration and Clippers star Kawhi Leonard helped the team circumvent the NBA’s salary cap.

“Ballmer was the perfect deep-pocket partner to fund Catona’s flagging operations and lend legitimacy to Catona’s carbon credit business,” says the amended complaint, which has been viewed by The Times. “Since Ballmer had publicly promoted himself as an advocate for sustainability, Catona was an ideal vehicle for Ballmer to secretly circumvent the NBA salary cap while purporting to support the company as a legitimate environmentalist investor.”

Although Ballmer did invest millions in Aspiration, it is not known whether he was aware of or played a role in facilitating the company’s deal with Leonard. The Times reached out to the Clippers for a comment from Ballmer or a team representative but did not receive an immediate response.

CTN Holdings filed for bankruptcy in March and, according to the lawsuit, is no longer in operation.

In late August, Sanberg agreed to plead guilty in federal court to a scheme to defraud investors and lenders of more than $248 million. On Sept. 3, investigative journalist Pablo Torre reported on his podcast that after reviewing numerous documents and conducting interviews with former employees of the now-defunct firm, he did not find evidence of any marketing or endorsement work done by Leonard for the company.

That was news to the plaintiffs, according to their amended lawsuit.

“Ballmer’s purported status as a legitimate investor in Catona was material to Plaintiffs’ decision to invest in and/or keep their investments with Catona,” the complaint states.

It also says that “Sanberg and Ballmer never disclosed to Plaintiffs that the millions of dollars Ballmer injected into Catona were meant to allow Ballmer to funnel compensation to Leonard in violation of NBA rules and keep Catona’s failing business afloat financially. Sanberg and Ballmer’s scheme to pay Leonard through Catona to evade the NBA’s salary cap was only later revealed in 2025, by journalist Pablo Torre.”

Miller said in a statement to The Times: “A lot of people including our clients got hurt badly in this case. This lawsuit is being brought to make them whole for their losses. I look forward to our day in court for justice.”

The NBA announced an investigation into the matter in early September. Speaking at a forum that month hosted by the Sports Business Journal, Ballmer said that he felt “quite confident … that we abided [by] the rules. So, I welcome the investigation that the NBA is doing.”

The Clippers said in a statement at the time: “Neither Mr. Ballmer nor the Clippers circumvented the salary cap or engaged in any misconduct related to Aspiration. Any contrary assertion is provably false: The team ended its relationship with Aspiration years ago, during the 2022-23 season, when Aspiration defaulted on its obligations.

“Neither the Clippers nor Mr. Ballmer was aware of any improper activity by Aspiration or its co-founder until after the government instituted its investigation.”

Leonard also has denied being involved in any wrongdoing associated with his deal with the now-defunct firm. Asked about the matter Sept. 29 during Clippers media day to open training camp, Leonard said, “I don’t think it’s accurate” that he provided no endorsement services to the company. He added that he hadn’t been paid all the money due to him from the deal.

The announcement comes less than week after Amazon laid off 14,000 people.

OpenAI has signed a new deal valued at $38bn with Amazon that will allow the artificial intelligence giant to run AI workloads across Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud infrastructure.

The seven-year deal announced on Monday is the first big AI push for the e-commerce giant after a restructuring last week.

The new deal will give the ChatGPT maker access to thousands of Nvidia graphics processors to train and run its artificial intelligence models.

Experts say this does not mean that it will allow OpenAI to train its model on websites hosted by AWS – which includes the websites of The New York Times, Reddit and United Airlines.

“Running OpenAI training inside AWS doesn’t change their ability to scrape content from AWS-hosted websites [which they could already do for anything publicly readable]. This is strictly speaking about the economics of rent vs buy for GPU [graphics processing unit] capacity,” Joshua McKenty, CEO of the AI detection company PolyguardAI, told Al Jazeera.

The deal is also a major vote of confidence for the e-commerce giant’s cloud unit, AWS, which some investors feared had fallen behind rivals Microsoft and Google in the artificial intelligence (AI) race. Those fears were somewhat eased by the strong growth the business reported in the September quarter.

OpenAI will begin using AWS immediately, with all planned capacity set to come online by the end of 2026 and room to expand further in 2027 and beyond.

Amazon plans to roll out hundreds of thousands of chips, including Nvidia’s GB200 and GB300 AI accelerators, in data clusters built to power ChatGPT’s responses and train OpenAI’s next wave of models, the companies said.

Amazon already offers OpenAI models on Amazon Bedrock, which offers multiple AI models for businesses using AWS.

OpenAI’s sweeping restructuring last week moved it further away from its non-profit roots and also removed Microsoft’s first right to refusal to supply services in the new arrangement.

Image hurdles

Amazon’s announcement about an investment in AI comes only days after the company laid off 14,000 people despite CEO Andy Jassy’s comment in an earnings call on Thursday saying the layoffs were not driven by AI.

“The announcement that we made a few days ago was not really financially driven, and it’s not even really AI-driven, not right now at least,” Jassy said.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has said the startup is committed to spending $1.4 trillion to develop 30 gigawatts of computing resources – enough to roughly power 25 million United States homes.

“Scaling frontier AI requires massive, reliable compute,” said Altman. “Our partnership with AWS strengthens the broad compute ecosystem that will power this next era and bring advanced AI to everyone.”

This comes amid growing concerns about the sheer amount of energy demand that AI data centres need to operate. The Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory estimates that AI data centres will use up to 12 percent of US electricity by 2028.

An AP/NORC poll from October found that 41 percent of Americans are extremely concerned about AI’s impact on the environment, while another 30 percent say they are somewhat concerned as the industry increases its data centre footprint around the US.

Signs of a bubble

Surging valuations of AI companies and their massive spending commitments, which total more than $1 trillion for OpenAI, have raised fears that the AI boom may be turning into a bubble.

OpenAI has already tapped Alphabet’s Google to supply it with cloud services, as Reuters reported in June. It also reportedly struck a deal to buy $300bn in computing power for about five years.

While OpenAI’s relationship with Microsoft, which the two forged in 2019, has helped push Microsoft to the top spot among its Big Tech peers in the AI race, both companies have been making moves recently to reduce reliance on each other.

Neither OpenAI nor Amazon were immediately available for comment.

On Wall Street, Amazon’s stock is surging on the news of the new deal. As of 11:15am in New York (16:15 GMT), it is up by 4.7 percent.

Beijing is positioning itself as the defender of free trade as Washington’s tariff hikes disrupt the global economy and Trump skips the economic summit.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has called for efforts to promote economic globalisation and multilateralism at an annual economic regional forum pointedly snubbed by United States President Donald Trump.

Xi took centre stage at the two-day Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit that began Friday in the South Korean city of Gyeongju, as Trump left the country a day earlier after reaching deals meant to ease the escalating trade war with China.

“The more turbulent the times, the more we must work together,” Xi said during the opening session. “The world is undergoing a period of rapid change, with the international situation becoming increasingly complex and volatile.”

The Chinese leader positioned his country as the defender of free trade systems that observers say are being threatened by Trump’s tariff hikes and “America first” policy.

Xi called for maintaining supply chain stability, as opposed to US efforts to decouple its supply chains from China, and expressed hopes to work with other countries to expand cooperation in green industries and clean energy.

Chinese exports of solar panels, electric vehicles and other green tech have been criticised for creating oversupplies and undercutting the domestic industries of countries it exports to.

The US president left the country before the summit, after reaching several deals with Xi meant to ease their escalating trade war. Trump described his meeting with Xi on Thursday as a roaring success, saying Beijing had agreed to allow the export of rare earth elements and to start buying US soya beans in exchange for slashing tariffs.

The US president’s decision to skip APEC, a forum that represents nearly 40 percent of the world’s population and more than half of global goods trade, fits in with his well-known disdain for big, multi-nation forums that have been traditionally used to address huge global problems, with his preference for grand spectacle one-on-one meetings that generate blanket media coverage.

Al Jazeera’s Jack Barton, reporting from Gyeongju, said Xi was “filling the vacuum left by Trump”.

While on his first visit to South Korea in 11 years, Xi is scheduled to meet South Korean President Lee Jae Myung and new Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi separately on Friday. Xi and Lee are scheduled to discuss denuclearisation on the Korean Peninsula on Saturday.

Barton said the meeting with Japan’s Takaichi would be “setting the diplomatic tone for the foreseeable future”. The Japanese prime minister is described by Chinese media as a far-right nationalist who has visited the controversial Yasukuni Shrine.

The site, dedicated to 2.5 million Japanese who died in wars beginning in the 19th century, is a political lightning rod in East Asia. Among those honoured are World War II leaders convicted as “Class A” war criminals, some of whom committed their atrocities under the Imperial Japan flag in China in the 20th century.

“South Korea and China share some of these historical issues with Japan,” Barton said. “They came out essentially saying, we’re going to put legacy issues on one side and diplomacy on another, so there is scope for a positive outcome.”

Xi also met Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney on Friday to discuss trade. “We’re expecting perhaps the biggest substantial economic deal to come out of that meeting,” Barton said.

Leaders and other representatives from 21 Asian and Pacific Rim economies are attending the APEC meeting to discuss how to promote economic cooperation and tackle shared challenges.

The APEC region faces an array of issues, including strategic competition between the US and China, supply chain vulnerabilities, ageing populations and the effect of AI on jobs.

South Korean officials said they have been communicating with other countries to prod all 21 members to adopt a joint statement at the end of the summit, so as not to repeat the failure to issue one in 2018 in Papua New Guinea due to US-China discord over trade.

South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun said last week that issuing a joint statement strongly endorsing free trade would be unlikely because of differing positions among APEC members.

Al Jazeera’s Barton said the result might be a “watered-down version”.

“The question really is, can APEC survive this age of US-China rivalry?” he added.

Walt Disney Co. on Wednesday said it finalized its deal to acquire a majority stake in FuboTV and swiftly combined its Hulu + Live TV business with the sports-focused operation.

The union creates the nation’s sixth largest pay-TV service with nearly 6 million domestic subscribers.

Financial terms were not disclosed.

Similar to competitors DirecTV, YouTube TV and Charter Spectrum, both Hulu + Live TV and Fubo distribute traditional channels including broadcasters ABC, CBS and cable channels Fox News, Bravo and ESPN.

The combined company will be overseen by a nine-member board led by Brad Bird, former chairman of Walt Disney International. The firm will continue to offer Fubo and Hulu + Live TV as separate services available through their respective apps.

Disney’s investment plans were announced in January, after the much smaller Fubo sued Disney and two other media companies over their plans to launch a high-profile streaming joint venture, Venu Sports. Fubo argued the collaboration of Disney, Fox Corp. and Warner Bros. Discovery was “a sports cartel,” one that would crush its business.

A judge agreed based on anti-trust concerns, blocking further development of Venu.

Disney’s deal to acquire 70% of New York-based Fubo ended that litigation.

The combined business will be led by Fubo Chief Executive David Gandler, who co-founded the service, and Fubo’s management team.

“Since Fubo’s founding a decade ago, our vision has always been to build a consumer-first streaming platform defined by innovation and value,” Gandler said in a statement. “Together with Disney, we’re creating a more flexible streaming ecosystem that gives consumers greater choice, while driving profitability and sustainable growth.”

His firm will have access to a $145 million term loan that Disney agreed to provide. Fubo’s ad sales team will join Disney’s sales organization.

The company’s stock will continue to be publicly traded under the FUBO ticker. Existing Fubo shareholders represent about 30% of the company. Shares were up slightly to $3.95 in mid-day trading.

An agreement designed to further liberalise trade between the EU and Kyiv came into force on Wednesday.

It will replace the deal in place since 2016, by expanding tariff-free access for Ukrainian goods and services.

However the new agreement has become a political headache for the European Commission, as Hungary, Poland and Slovakia are not lifting bans on Ukrainian agricultural imports.

“We are engaging with all the parties to try to find solutions,” Commission deputy chief spokesperson Ariana Podesta said on Tuesday.

“We believe (the agreement) is a stable, fair framework, that can be reliable both for the EU and for Ukraine, to ensure a gradual integration in our single market, while providing stable trade flows,” Podesta added.

The new deal includes safeguards limiting imports of certain sensitive products such as grains and oil. Nevertheless, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia have refused to lift their national bans on Ukrainian agri-food imports.

These restrictions were first introduced after the EU opened its market completely to Ukrainian agricultural products following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as the Black Sea — a vital export corridor for Kyiv — was effectively blocked.

The resulting land corridors into the EU, designed to keep Ukrainian exports flowing, sparked anger among farmers in neighbouring countries who accused Brussels of allowing unfair competition.

Politically charged

The issue became politically charged, weighing on Poland’s 2023 general election and fuelling tensions in Slovakia and Hungary.

“After the war, imports of agriculture to the EU doubled. We have 117% increase compared to the pre-war levels,” Tinatin Akhvlediani, an expert at the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), told Euronews.

However, Akhvlediani added that “it has been unnecessarily politicised because these Ukrainian goods were easily absorbed by the neighbouring countries.”

Ukraine’s main agricultural exports — grain, sugar and oil — are largely unprocessed goods.

“This is complementary with the trading of the EU because it mostly exports processed agricultural goods,” Akhvlediani explained.

“Ukrainian goods in fact are highly demanded in the EU market. That explains why Ukraine is the third largest import partner for the European Union after Brazil and the UK.”

The new trade deal includes a “safeguard clause” allowing either side to impose protective measures if surging imports damage domestic industries.

Yet this has not eased concerns in neighbouring countries.

“Although Brussels wants to give farmers’ money to Ukraine, we are protecting the resources, the livelihoods of Hungarian producers and our market,” Hungarian Agriculture Minister István Nagy wrote on Facebook on Monday, as he and his EU peers met in Brussels.

The ongoing dispute illustrates the broader obstacles facing Ukraine’s path to EU membership.

Within the bloc, some are concerned about how Ukraine’s enormous agricultural capacity — 42 million hectares of cultivated land, the largest in Europe — would affect the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), which distributes funds based on farm size.

Even if CAP payments were reformed to focus on production rather than land area, “Ukraine remains quite competitive,” Akhvlediani said.

“The solution could be that the EU puts transition measures in the accession treaty which would limit the benefit from certain policies or not benefit from them at all. This could be the case for the CAP. It’s completely up to the EU,” she concluded.

Romanian President Nicușor Dan, whose country also borders Ukraine, is one of the rare EU leaders to have spoken openly about the issue, saying the discussion about agriculture is “pending”.

According to the Romanian president, the risks of imbalances for the EU are “significant”, especially since Ukraine “does not currently meet the standards that we impose on the agricultural sector in the EU.”

“The discussions taking place are that, in terms of agriculture, Ukraine should have a special status so that it can continue to make significant exports to non-European countries while, in all other clusters, it should be treated as an equal,” Dan said.

Kyiv, Ukraine – Both Russia and Ukraine depend on Chinese-made components for drones, jamming systems and the fibre optic cable attached to the drones to make them immune to jamming.

If Beijing wanted to end the Russia-Ukraine war, it could do so promptly and singlehandedly by banning the imports, according to one of the pioneers of drone warfare in Ukraine.

“Almost each component is made in China,” Andrey Pronin, who runs a drone school in Kyiv, told Al Jazeera. “China could cut off their side – or ours.”

Beijing supplies Moscow with four-fifths of drones, electronic chips and other dual-purpose goods that end up on the front line, keeping the Russian war machine rolling, according to Ukrainian intelligence.

Ukraine is trying to wean off its reliance on Chinese drones amid Beijing’s restriction of exports, but they still account for a staggering 97 percent of components, according to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a think tank in Washington, DC.

United States President Donald Trump hopes that Thursday’s summit with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping can change that.

“I’d like China to help us out with Russia,” Trump said on October 24, two days after cancelling his talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin and slapping sanctions on two Russian oil companies.

Trump is scheduled to meet with Xi in South Korea’s Seoul on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. Their last meeting was held in 2019, in Japan’s Osaka.

Zelenskyy hopes meeting will ‘help us all’

Beijing, which has claimed it is officially neutral regarding the war, denies direct involvement in the Russia-Ukraine conflict. But it plays a role as Moscow’s main political and economic backer.

As Beijing seeks to “return” Taiwan to its fold, Moscow is understood by observers to be sharing with the Chinese military information on the use of drones, the vulnerabilities of Western-supplied weaponry and the management of airborne troops.

Meanwhile, amid mounting Western sanctions, Beijing is buying discounted oil, gas and raw materials, paying Moscow tens of billions of dollars a year.

That is the weak spot Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wants Trump to target in talks with Xi.

If Trump manages to “find an understanding with China about the reduction of Russian energy exports”, he said on Monday, “I think it’ll help us all.”

But Trump’s latest Russia sanctions slapped on state-owned oil giant Rosneft and the private Lukoil company could inadvertently strengthen Beijing.

Both companies will be forced to sell their foreign subsidiaries and diminish their role in international projects – namely, in ex-Soviet Central Asia and several African nations, where their place may be taken by Chinese companies.

According to Volodymyr Fesenko, head of the Kyiv-based Penta think tank, Xi’s role in ending the war is pivotal.

“Without the financial support, without the economic cooperation with China, Russia can’t continue the war,” he said. “China is Russia’s main economic resource.

“Had [Beijing] wanted to end this war, it would have achieved it very fast,” he added. “China’s harsh position in closed-door, non-public talks with Putin would be enough.”

However, Beijing has “no inclination or interest in making a gift to Trump”, said Fesenko.

During his first presidency, ties with Beijing spiralled as the White House sought to curb China’s growing global clout and its access to Western technologies.

China and the US have introduced tariffs on mutual exports as Beijing threatened to cut off the trade in critical minerals, and Washington promised to curb the transfer of technologies. The Russia-Ukraine war is unlikely to dominate the summit, as Trump and Xi have bigger fish to fry as their nations now face a trade war.

‘Freezing the war’

At the same time, Beijing has been boosting its economic clout in Eastern Europe, Moscow’s former stomping ground, investing heavily in new infrastructure.

“The escalation of the war, its spread to Europe, is something that contradicts China’s interests,” Fesenko said.

However, Washington and Beijing may want to keep the war simmering or frozen without letting Moscow or Kyiv win a decisive victory, argued Kyiv-based analyst Igar Tyshkevych.

Washington is not going to benefit from Russia’s “overwhelming victory” as the Kremlin will undoubtedly seek the role of a “third global leader”, he said.

But neither Beijing or Washington could benefit from Russia’s full defeat, as China is concerned by destabilisation near its northern and northwestern borders.

“Washington is active about freezing the war,” Tyshkevych said. “I won’t be surprised if Beijing will be active in the same direction.”

If frozen, there are fears that the war could reignite when Russia recovers economically and accumulates enough resources.

To avoid that, Kyiv would look to building new or strengthening existing partnerships, especially with the European Union and its individual members, as well as countries such as Turkiye and Pakistan that both have cordial ties with Beijing.

And Putin still has plenty of incentives to offer to Trump.

There is a reported proposal to create infrastructure for the Arctic sea route that will shorten the delivery of goods from Asia to Europe by weeks.

Moscow also considered a joint project to sell Russian natural gas to Europe, develop oil and gas fields in Russia’s Far East, and supply rare earths that are crucial for US tech giants.

In a post-war environment, Putin may also propose Russia’s expertise in processing spent nuclear fuel from US power stations – and come up with nuclear security deals, including non-proliferation.

Non-proliferation “is the only field where Russia is ‘equal’ to the United States,” Tyshkevych said.

Getty Images

Golden crowns and grand orders

Reuters

BBC/Leehyun Choi

“Little Mermaid” star Halle Bailey and her rapper ex-boyfriend DDG decided this week to temporarily put their differences aside in their months-long custody battle over their 1-year-old son, Halo.

The pair of musicians, who dated from 2022 to 2024, agreed to drop their mutual domestic violence restraining order requests and settled on temporary custody terms to co-parent their child, according to a stipulation filed Monday in Los Angeles County Superior Court. The stipulation, signed by both parties, is a significant development in the exes’ dispute, which came to a head in the summer.

When Bailey (of the “Do It” sister-singer duo Chloë x Halle) and DDG (born Darryl Dwayne Granberry Jr.) announced their split in October 2024, the latter said “we are still best friends and adore each other” and would work to co-parent their son. But tension between the exes surfaced in May after Bailey secured a temporary restraining order alleging the father of her child was abusive throughout their two-year relationship and had continued to behave badly since their breakup. “Darryl has been and continues to be physically, verbally, emotionally, and financially abusive towards me,” she said at the time, according to court documents. Bailey, 25, requested that DDG, 28, be ordered to stay away from her and their son.

Influencer DDG, known for the 2016 single “Balenciaga,” fired back with allegations against Bailey and a request for his own domestic violence restraining order. He accused his ex-girlfriend of “emotional instability and coercive control,” raised concern about her “repeated threats of suicide and self-harm” and alleged instances where she “endangered the child’s safety while in emotional distress.”

Though the stipulation states both Bailey and DDG must “immediately dismiss” their restraining order requests, they can each file new requests in case of future abuse.

Court documents say that Bailey will have physical custody over Halo except on Wednesdays and certain weekends. The stipulation also outlines a custody agreement for birthdays and the upcoming holidays.

The latest court documents also address each parent’s social media use, which proved to be a point of contention after the breakup. Notably, DDG brought baby Halo with him for Twitch star Kai Cenat’s livestream in November 2024.

“Neither party shall post, upload or disseminate on the internet or any social media platforms, photographs, images, and or/information regarding the Minor Child,” court documents say. Friends and family of the two musicians are also barred from posting about Halo. Additionally, neither Bailey nor DDG can “disparage the party publicly” or in the presence of their child, who turns 2 in December.

Bailey was a fan of DDG years before they became an item. After sparking up a romance via social media DMs, the former pair made their red carpet debut at the 2022 BET Awards. The singer was vocal about how she was smitten with DDG, telling Essence the romance was her “first deep, deep, real love.”

Through their time together, the former couple faced their share of ups and downs — including DDG’s diss track about his ex’s starring role in “The Little Mermaid” and some criticism from Bailey’s older sister Ski Bailey.

Halle Bailey currently has more than just family matters on her plate.

She released her debut solo album, “Love?…or Something Like It,” on Friday. Upon announcing the release earlier this month, she said on Instagram that the project is a “story of first love, heartbreak, and everything that comes after.”

Times assistant editor Christie D’Zurilla and editorial library director Cary Schneider contributed to this report.

Gyeongju, South Korea – As US President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping prepare to meet for the first time since 2019, Washington and Beijing appear poised to reach a deal to lower the temperature of their fierce rivalry.

But while Trump and Xi are widely expected to de-escalate US-China tensions in South Korea on Thursday, expectations are modest for how far any agreement will go to resolve the myriad points of contention between the world’s two largest economies.

Many details of the expected deal that have been flagged in advance relate to avoiding future escalation, rather than rolling back the trade war that Trump launched during his first term and has dramatically expanded since returning to office this year.

Some of the proposed measures involve issues that have only arisen within the last few weeks, including China’s plan to impose strict export controls on rare earths from December 1.

Whatever Trump and Xi agree to on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Gyeongju, there is little doubt that Washington and Beijing will continue to butt heads as they jockey for influence in a rapidly shifting international order, according to analysts.

“I have modest expectations for this meeting,” said Deborah Elms, head of trade policy at the Hinrich Foundation in Singapore.

“I think, no matter what happens this week, we haven’t seen the end of economic tensions, tariff threats, export controls and restrictions, and the use of unusual levers like digital rules,” Elms told Al Jazeera.

Contours of a deal

While the exact parameters of any deal are still to be determined by Trump and Xi, the contours of an agreement have emerged in recent days.

US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent said in media interviews this week that he expected China to defer its restrictions on rare earths and that Trump’s threatened 100 percent tariff on Chinese goods was “effectively off the table”.

Bessent said he also anticipated that the Chinese side would agree to increase purchases of US-grown soya beans, enhance cooperation with the US to halt the flow of chemicals used to manufacture fentanyl, and sign off on a finalised TikTok deal.

While heading off a further spiralling in US-China ties, a deal along these lines would leave intact a wide array of tariffs, sanctions and export controls that hinder trade and business between the sides.

Since Washington and Beijing reached a partial truce in their tit-for-tat tariff salvoes in May, the average US duty on Chinese goods has stood at more than 55 percent, while China’s average levy on US products has hovered at about 32 percent.

Washington has blacklisted hundreds of Chinese firms deemed to pose national security risks, and prohibited the export of advanced chips and key manufacturing equipment related to AI.

China has, in turn, added dozens of US companies to its “unreliable entity” list, launched antitrust investigations into Nvidia and Qualcomm, and restricted exports of more than a dozen rare earths and metallic elements, including gallium and dysprosium.

US-China trade has declined sharply since Trump re-entered the White House.

China’s exports to the US fell 27 percent in September, the sixth straight month of decline, even as outbound shipments rose overall amid expanding trade with Southeast Asia, Latin America, Europe and Africa.

China’s imports of US goods declined 16 percent, continuing a downward trend since April.

“The structural contradictions between China and the United States have not been resolved,” said Wang Wen, dean of the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at Renmin University of China in Beijing, predicting continuing friction and “even worse” relations between the superpowers in the future.

“Most importantly, China’s strength is increasing and will surpass that of the United States in the future,” Wang told Al Jazeera.

‘De-escalation unlikely’

Shan Guo, a partner with Shanghai-based Hutong Research, said he expects the “bulk” of the deal between Trump and Xi to be about avoiding escalation. “A fundamental de-escalation is unlikely given the political environment in the US,” Guo told Al Jazeera.

But with the US having no alternative to Chinese rare earths and minerals in the near-term, Washington and Beijing could put aside their differences for longer than past trade truces, Guo said.

“This means reduced downside risks in US-China relations for at least a year, or perhaps even longer,” he said.

Dennis Wilder, a professor at Georgetown University who worked on China at the CIA and the White House’s National Security Council, said that while he is optimistic the summit will produce “positive tactical results”, it will not mark the end of the trade war.

“A comprehensive trade deal is still not available,” Wilder told Al Jazeera.

“Bessent and his Chinese counterpart will continue negotiating in hopes of a more lasting agreement if and when President Trump visits China next year.”

Trump and Xi’s go-to language on the US-China relationship itself points to the gulf between the sides.

While Trump often complains about the US being “ripped off” by China, Xi has repeatedly called for their relations to be defined by “mutual respect” and “win-win cooperation”.

“The United States should treat China in a way that China considers respectful,” said Wang of Renmin University.

“They have to respect China, and if they don’t, then the United States will receive an equal response until they become able to respect others,” he added.

WASHINGTON — President Trump faces the most important international meeting of his second term so far on Thursday: face-to-face negotiations with Xi Jinping, who has made China a formidable economic and military challenger to the United States.

The two presidents face a vast agenda during their meeting in Seoul, beginning with the two countries’ escalating trade war over tariffs and high-tech exports. The list also includes U.S. demands for a Chinese crackdown on fentanyl, China’s aid to Russia in its war with Ukraine, the future of Taiwan and China’s growing nuclear arsenal.

Trump has already promised, characteristically, that the meeting will be a major success.

“It’s going to be fantastic for both countries, and it’s going to be fantastic for the entire world,” he said last week.

But it isn’t yet clear that the summit’s concrete results will measure up to that high standard.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Sunday that the two sides have agreed to a “framework” under which China would delay implementing tight controls on rare earth elements, minerals crucial for the production of high-tech products from smartphones and electric vehicles to military aircraft and missiles. He said China has also agreed to resume buying soybeans from U.S. farmers and to crack down on fentanyl components.

In return, Bessent said, the United States will back down from its stinging tariffs on Chinese goods.

Nicholas Burns, the U.S. ambassador in Beijing under then-President Biden, said that kind of deal would amount to “an uneasy trade truce rather than a comprehensive trade deal.”

“That may be the best we can expect,” he said in an interview Monday. Still, he added, “it will be a positive step to stabilize world markets and allow the continuation of U.S.-China trade for the time being.”

But U.S. and Chinese officials have been close-mouthed on what, if anything, has been agreed on regarding Xi’s other big trade demand: easier U.S. restrictions on high-tech exports to China, especially advanced semiconductor chips used for artificial intelligence.

Burns said the two superpowers’ technology competition is “the most sensitive … in terms of where this relationship will head, which country will emerge more powerful.”

Giving China easy access to advanced semiconductors “would only help [the Chinese army] in its competition with the U.S. military for power in the Indo-Pacific,” he warned.

Other former officials and China hawks outside the administration have said, even more pointedly, that they worry that Trump may be too willing to trade long-term technology assets for short-term trade deals.

In August, Trump eased export controls to allow Nvidia, the world leader in AI chips, to sell more semiconductors to China — in an unusual deal under which the U.S. company would pay 15% of its revenue from the sales to the U.S. Treasury.

Matthew Pottinger, Trump’s top China advisor in his first term, protested in a recent podcast interview that the deal risked trading a strategic technology advantage “for $20 billion and Nvidia’s bottom line.”

Underlying the controversy over technology, some China watchers warn, is a basic mismatch between the two presidents: Trump is focused almost entirely on trade and commercial deals, while Xi is focused on displacing the United States as the biggest economic and military power in Asia.

“I don’t think the administration has a strategy toward China,” said Bonnie Glaser, a China expert at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. “It has a trade strategy, not a China strategy.”

“The administration does not seem to be focused on competition with China,” said Jonathan Czin, a former CIA analyst now at Washington’s Brookings Institution. “It’s focused on deal making. … It’s tactics without strategy.”

“We’ve fallen into a kind of trade and technology myopia,” he added. “We’re not talking about issues like China’s coercion [of smaller countries] in the South China Sea. … China doesn’t want to have that bigger, broader conversation.”

It isn’t clear that Trump and Xi will have either the time or inclination to talk in detail about anything other than trade.

And even on the front-burner economic issues, this week’s ceasefire is unlikely to produce a permanent peace.

“As with all such agreements, the devil will be in the details,” Burns, the former ambassador, said. “The two countries will remain fierce trade rivals. Expect friction ahead and further trade duels well into 2026.”

“Buckle up,” Czin said. “There are likely more sudden moves from Beijing ahead.”

In the long run, Trump’s legacy in U.S.-China relations will rest not only on trade deals but on the larger competition for economic and military power in the Pacific Rim. No matter how this week’s meetings go, those challenges still lie ahead.

One of the biggest players in television is changing teams.

“Yellowstone” creator Taylor Sheridan will leave his longtime home at Paramount and move his overall deal to rival NBCUniversal in 2029, according to a person familiar with the matter who was not authorized to comment.

Sheridan’s deal with Paramount concludes at the end of 2028. Financial terms were not disclosed.

The move is a blow to Paramount, which has focused on wooing high-profile talent to the studio since its takeover by tech scion David Ellison and his Skydance Media.

The media company — which is now angling to buy Warner Bros. Discovery — has shelled out massive sums to acquire sports media rights, keep the iconic “South Park” cartoon and lure filmmakers away from competitors, including “Stranger Things” creators Matt and Ross Duffer and “A Compete Unknown” director James Mangold.

The NBC deal, first reported by Puck, will take effect in 2029.

Sheridan’s universe of “Yellowstone” shows, in particular, has been a key franchise for Paramount. Company executives specifically mentioned the creator’s shows as a “cornerstone” of the Paramount+ streaming service during a luncheon with reporters this summer.

The western-themed show, which debuted as a cable series in 2018, became one of the hottest scripted series on TV, a remarkable turnaround from its early days when “Yellowstone” was passed on by a number of potential homes before landing at Paramount.

The popularity of “Yellowstone” was a boon to Sheridan, leading to spinoffs such as “1923” and other shows from his production company including “Tulsa King,” “Landman” and “Mayor of Kingston.”

Representatives for Paramount and Sheridan did not respond immediately to a request for comment. NBCUniversal declined to comment.

Brazilian president expects ‘definitive solution’ in the coming days over tariffs raised by US over Bolsonaro jailing.

A trade deal between Brazil and the United States could be sealed within days, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has asserted.

Lula made the statement in Kuala Lumpur on Monday after meeting with US President Donald Trump. Lula has been seeking a deal since the White House slapped a 50 percent tariff on Brazilian exports in July due to legal pressure on Trump ally and former President Jair Bolsonaro.

Lula described his meeting with Trump on Sunday, on the sidelines of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit, as “surprisingly good”, and said he received assurance that a deal can be reached soon.

“He guaranteed to me that we will reach an agreement,” Lula told a news conference. “I am very confident that in a few days we will reach a solution.”

Later, as he made his way to Japan, Trump also signalled that a deal is likely following “a great meeting”.

“We’ll see what happens,” the US president told reporters. “They’d like to do a deal.”

A deal could avert punitive US tariffs after months of animosity between Lula and Trump, whose relationship has warmed since an unscheduled meeting at the United Nations in New York earlier this month.

The Trump administration imposed a tariff of 50 percent on Brazilian products in July. It linked the decision to what the US president described as a “witch hunt” against Bolsonaro.

Lula said that during the meeting in Malaysia he had presented Trump with a document outlining arguments against the tariff hike.

While the document acknowledged the US has the right to impose the measures, its move was based on “mistaken information”, the Brazilian president said.

Trump did not commit to suspending the tariff hikes, but also did not raise any conditions during their talks, Lula said.

“I’m convinced that in a few days we’ll have a definitive solution, you know, between the United States and Brazil, so that life can continue well and happily,” he concluded.

“He guaranteed to me that we will reach an agreement,” Lula said, speaking through an interpreter.

In a separate interview with reporters, Brazil’s Foreign Minister Mauro Vieira described the meeting as “very positive” and “very productive”.

“The meeting was very positive, and the final outcome is excellent. President Trump stated that he will instruct his team to begin a process, a period of bilateral negotiations,” Vieira added.

Lula has previously labelled the US tariff a “mistake”, citing a $410bn US trade surplus with Brazil over the past 15 years.

He has also noted that far-right political figure Bolsonaro, who has been sentenced to 27 years in prison for attempting a coup after losing the 2022 presidential election, had been given a fair trial, and that his case should not factor in their trade negotiations.

“Bolsonaro is part of the past now in Brazilian history,” he said.

Officials signal that trade deal is close as Trump and Xi prepare to meet for the first time since 2019.

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – The United States and China have hailed the outcome of trade talks in Malaysia, raising expectations that Donald Trump and Xi Jinping will seal a deal to de-escalate their trade war at their first meeting since 2019.

US and Chinese officials on Sunday said the sides had made significant progress towards a deal as they wrapped a weekend of negotiations on the sidelines of the ASEAN summit in Kuala Lumpur.

Trump and Xi are set to meet on Thursday on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Gyeongju, South Korea, marking their first face-to-face talks since the US president returned to the White House and embarked on a radical shake-up of global trade.

US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent told reporters in Kuala Lumpur that the sides had come up with a “framework” for Trump and Xi to discuss in South Korea.

Bessent said in a subsequent interview with NBC News that he expected the sides to reach a deal that would defer China’s threatened export controls on rare earths and avoid a 100 percent tariff that Trump has threatened to impose on Chinese goods.

Bessent also said in an interview with ABC News that Beijing had agreed to make “substantial” purchases of US agricultural products, which the treasury secretary said would make US soya bean farmers “feel very good”.

Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng, Beijing’s top trade negotiator, said the sides had reached “a basic consensus” on “arrangements to address each side’s concerns”.

He said they agreed to “finalise specific details” and “proceed with domestic approval processes”, according to a readout from China’s Ministry of Commerce.

Asian stock markets surged on Monday on hopes of easing US-China tensions.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 and South Korea’s KOSPI both hit record highs, with the benchmark indexes up about 2.1 percent and 2.3 percent, respectively, shortly after midday, local time.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng also saw strong gains, rising about 0.85 percent.

After attending the ASEAN summit, Trump on Monday departed for Japan, where he will meet newly sworn-in Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.

The US president is scheduled to then travel on to South Korea on Wednesday.

While Trump has imposed significant tariffs on almost all US trade partners, he has threatened to hit China with higher levies than anywhere else.

Countries have been anxiously anticipating a breakthrough in the tensions, hoping Washington and Beijing can avoid a full-blown trade war that could do catastrophic damage to the global economy.

In a major escalation in US-China tensions earlier this month, Beijing announced that it would require companies everywhere to acquire a licence to export rare-earth magnets and some semiconductor materials that contain even trace amounts of minerals sourced from China or are produced using Chinese technology.

The proposed rules, which are set to take effect on December 1, have raised fears of substantial disruption to global supply chains.

Rare earths, a group of 17 minerals including holmium, cerium and dysprosium, are critical to the manufacture of countless high-tech products, including smartphones, electric cars and fighter jets.

Trump responded to Beijing’s move by threatening to impose a 100 percent tariff on Chinese goods from November 1.

Analysts have cast the tit-for-tat moves as efforts by the Chinese and US sides to gain leverage in their negotiations ahead of the Trump-Xi summit.

Reuters

Trump’s tariff tactics

TikTok deal done?