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Europe Edition

International Women’s Day, North Korea, Tariffs: Your Friday Briefing

(Want to get this briefing by email? Here’s the sign-up.)

Good morning.

Plans for a Trump-Kim meeting, the Obamas on Netflix and a conversation with Adam Rippon. Here’s the news:

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Credit...Susana Vera/Reuters

• Some marched with raised fists. Some banged pots and pans. Others went on strike.

Women around the world sent out a call for gender parity on International Women’s Day.

At The Times, we started to right a wrong: In a new series, “Overlooked,” we belatedly publish obituaries of extraordinary women.

We begin with 15 women in what will become a weekly feature. Our editor explained why most obituaries we publish are still of white men. Let us know here if you have a suggestion for someone we missed.

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Credit...Korean Central News Agency

• Kim Jong-un, North Korea’s leader, invited President Trump to meet for nuclear negotiations and, in a breathtaking diplomatic gamble, Mr. Trump accepted.

A South Korean official who conveyed the invitation said Mr. Trump would meet with Mr. Kim within two months. (Here’s a transcript of the official’s remarks.)

Mr. Kim said he understood that joint military exercises involving the U.S. and South Korea would go ahead as scheduled after the end of the Paralympic Games, the South’s envoy also noted. (The Games begin today in Pyeongchang, South Korea.)

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Credit...Doug Mills/The New York Times

• Earlier on Thursday, President Trump defied American allies and his own party by announcing sweeping tariffs on steel and aluminum imports. (Mr. Trump agreed to exempt, for now, Canada and Mexico.)

“If you put tariffs against your allies, one wonders who the enemies are,” Europe’s top banker said. Our fact-checker found Mr. Trump’s claims on Chinese trade practices to be flawed.

(If history is any guide, a 1930s trade war exacerbated the hardships of the Great Depression. No one “won” that one.)

Meanwhile, 11 Pacific countries signed a wide-ranging free trade deal. The U.S. withdrew from the deal a year ago. Now, signatories are opening the door for China to join.

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Credit...Syrian Arab News Agency

• After looking at the U.S.’s dilemma in Syria’s war, we bring you Russia’s:

By effectively tying its fortunes to those of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, above, the Kremlin effectively gave him the power to delay a settlement. And Russia’s competition with Iran over reconstruction contracts risks eroding their alliance.

In Britain, the former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter are in stable condition after what Britain’s home secretary called a “brazen and reckless” attack involving a nerve agent. A police officer who assisted them was also hospitalized. There has been much speculation about Russian involvement.

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• In our latest visual investigation, we show how villages in the Democratic Republic of Congo have been destroyed in recent attacks, forcing 140,000 people to flee.

(This Times Insider piece explains how we used data from NASA and Openstreetmap to bring the atrocities to light.)

The U.S. secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, is on a five-nation tour of Africa. In Ethiopia, he warned against Chinese investment, and he wore a tight smile when President Trump’s insulting January remark about Africa came up. Mr. Tillerson is visiting Djibouti and Kenya today.

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Credit...Michael Probst/Associated Press

• The European Central Bank, unfazed by market turmoil and political instability, took another small step back from crisis mode.

• After years of steadily rising markets, the recent spurt of volatility has rattled many investors. But professional stock traders couldn’t be happier.

• Helmut Maucher, who turned Nestlé into the world’s largest food company, died at 90. We look back at a life of deal making and restructuring.

• After a fix, Amazon’s digital assistant Alexa will warn users before laughing at them, the company said.

Here’s a snapshot of global markets.

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Credit...Mark Wilson/Getty Images

• Barack and Michelle Obama, Netflix stars? Insiders tell us that the former president and first lady are in negotiations with the streaming service to produce a series that would provide them with a global platform. [The New York Times]

• The trial of a Danish inventor charged with murder in the death of a Swedish journalist, Kim Wall, has begun in Copenhagen. Peter Madsen is accused of killing and dismembering Ms. Wall on his submarine. [The New York Times]

• Despite a crackdown in China, dissent is bubbling up over the expected scrapping of President Xi Jinping’s term limit. [The New York Times]

• Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu returns to Israel from a U.S. tour that could be his last in office. Politicians like Naftali Bennett are maneuvering to replace the embattled leader. [Politico]

• Sri Lanka blocked access to Facebook in hopes of stemming mob violence directed at its Muslim minority. [The New York Times]

• False claims posted on Twitter were 70 percent more likely to be shared than true ones, researchers at M.I.T. found. [The New York Times]

• No more “fatherland”? A suggestion to make the German national anthem gender-neutral has drawn a backlash. (Other countries have carried through with similar changes.) [The New York Times]

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

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Credit...Gentl and Hyers for The New York Times. Food stylist: Maggie Ruggiero. Prop stylist: Amy Wilson.

• Recipe of the day: Want an elegant and easy breakfast? Try a “soufflazy.”

• Plan a movie-themed vacation with these tips.

• Travel advice: You can bypass some immigration checks at U.S. airports even if you’re not a U.S. citizen.

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Credit...Soprintendenza Speciale di Roma

• The excavation of Rome’s newest subway line keeps turning up archaeological marvels, like the one above.

• In case you’re visiting the European Fine Art Fair, or Tefaf, this month, here’s a guide to art in and around the Dutch city of Maastricht.

• Plans for a pop concert in Saudi Arabia seemed like another bold move to liberalize the kingdom. Then fans saw the fine print: no dancing and no swaying.

• This week’s print issue of the New Musical Express, out today, is its last. We asked one of its former writers to look back on what was once Britain’s most important music newspaper. (Here are 25 songs that tell us where pop is going right now.)

• And we talked to Adam Rippon, the gay American skater who sparred with Vice President Mike Pence during the Olympics, about where he’s going.

“In skating you have four minutes to show the world what you’ve been working on your entire life,” he said. “If you can’t embrace who you are, how are you going to show a panel of judges or the world who you are in four minutes?”

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Credit...Charles Tasnadi/Associated Press

President Trump has recently conducted a series of televised conversations with lawmakers as well as with regular citizens.

Forty-one years ago, President Jimmy Carter held a similar unscripted discussion, answering questions from callers during a live radio broadcast from the Oval Office.

“Ask President Carter,” moderated by the CBS anchor Walter Cronkite, was broadcast on the afternoon of March 5, 1977. (You can read a transcript here.)

Mr. Cronkite invited listeners to call the White House at 900‐242‐1611. According to CBS, more than nine million Americans tried.

Some of the dozens of questions that Mr. Carter answered were distinctively of the late 1970s: about the gas tax, Mr. Carter’s pardoning of draft dodgers in Vietnam and the early days of the U.S. space shuttle program.

Others — about tax overhaul, drug abuse and relations with Cuba — still resonate today.

One caller asked why members of Congress were getting a $12,000 raise while Mr. Carter was proposing that taxpayers receive a rebate of only $50.

“Gerald, that is a hard question for me to answer,” Mr. Carter replied.

“I’m sure it is,” the caller said. “That’s why I thought I would throw it at you.”

The program caught the public’s attention (“Saturday Night Live” ran a spoof the next week), but it was never repeated.

Chris Stanford contributed reporting.

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A correction was made on 
March 9, 2018

An earlier version of this briefing misidentified the leader of North Korea. He is Kim Jong-un, not Kim Jong-il.

How we handle corrections

Follow Patrick Boehler on Twitter: @mrbaopanrui.

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