In the news...

Shinzo Abe meets with Donald Trump in Washington…The Japanese prime minister is having his seventh one-on-one with Trump to reaffirm Tokyo’s close ties to the US ahead of its summit with North Korea.

…While Singapore’s foreign minister visits Pyongyang. Vivian Balakrishnan will meet with the president of North Korea’s Supreme People’s Assembly and ceremonial president, Kim Yong Nam, as his country prepares to host next week’s Trump-Kim summit.

Canada is likely to legalize marijuana.The senate will vote on bill C-45, which would make Canada the first G20 nation to legalize the drug. All eyes will be on the short- and long-term effects legalization has on the country’s economy, crime levels, and health system.

Trump commuted Alice Johnson’s sentence.. The 63-year-old was sentenced to life without parole for working in a mid-1990s drug trafficking operation. Trump’s decision followed a plea from reality TV star Kim Kardashian to release Johnson, and is also thought to be part of Jared Kushner’s push for prison reform.

Vladimir Putin holds a live Q&A.The Russian president will answer questions from citizens in his annual live television call-in show, Direct Line With Vladimir Putin (paywall). The event has been criticized for being entirely staged.

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