reassured Abe that he has no intention to sever diplomatic ties with the U.S., Hagiuda said.

Manila's relationship with Washington has quickly become strained.

Japan is a staunch U.S. ally and hosts 50,000 American troops, while Duterte has repeatedly spoken of distancing his country from Washington, often in crude terms.

The presence of U.S. troops in five Philippine military camps was established under a security deal signed under Duterte's predecessor as a counter to China's growing military assertiveness in the region.

"I want to be friends to China,"

"The South China Sea issue is directly linked to the region's peace and stability and a matter of interest for the entire international society,"

canceling planned joint military exercises with the United States, and preparatory meetings for next year's joint combat exercises between American and Filipino forces

Officials declined to provide details of their second round of talks, in which Abe was expected to ask Duterte specifically about his foreign policy. Their joint statement focused largely on Japan's contribution to Philippine maritime security and other projects totaling a 21 billion yen ($210 million) loan.

id not signal any level of comfort with Trump’s sometimes bombastic style

The move marks a big about-face for Ryan, who four weeks ago declared he was “not there yet” in terms of endorsing Trump and questioned whether the controversial businessman was even a conservative

Ryan and Trump met once in person in mid-May when the billionaire crisscrossed Capitol Hill for meetings with House and Senate leaders.

Throughout the talks, neither side agreed to switch any of their policy positions,

endorsement should not be construed as the sort of “real unification” of Republicans

Ryan’s move may also signal that the speaker and other top Republicans are worried about keeping the House and Senate in Republican hands come November, and believe the best way to do that is to unite the party.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) was among the first top leader to say he would back Trump.

Ryan became the last senior Republican congressional leader to throw his weight behind Trump’s candidacy.

Ryan’s chief communications adviser, Brendan Buck, said reporters need not mince words to figure out what it all meant.

“Paul Ryan in many ways is the antithesis of Donald Trump; he’s everything that Donald Trump is not. He’s a decent human being. He is a conservative. He is steeped in public policy. He cares about ideas. He’s a person who conducts himself with civility and grace in public life. He doesn’t put down his opponents,”

Ryan’s column in his local newspaper left no doubt where he stood after speaking “at great length” with Trump since he initially declared hesitation about his candidacy.

House Republicans will be inseparably tied to their toxic front-runner in November, case closed,

Ryan’s dragged out decision underscores how truly vulnerable Donald Trump makes House Republicans in swing districts

at odds with Trump’s positions on key policy planks dear to mainstream Republicans of the past 40 years

free trade agenda and the effort to rein in federal spending on entitlements.

Those issues were the hallmark of Ryan’s early congressional career and Trump stands squarely against them.

Trump’s proposals to ban all Muslim travel into the United States and the candidate’s brusque comments regarding minorities, women and the disabled gave Ryan pause.

Those concerns appear to remain, and Ryan vowed to speak out against Trump if he crosses lines again.

sought to cement the power of the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, with whom Mr. Ri is considered close.

Mr. Ri’s visit continued efforts by Mr. Kim to court China, the North’s main trading partner and benefactor, as the country feels the effects of United Nations sanctions.

Still, China has been frustrated enough by the North’s continued testing of nuclear weapons and launching of missiles that it agreed to the international sanctions in March

Mr. Kim may have ordered Tuesday’s missile test to coincide with Mr. Ri’s visit,

reminding the Chinese that North Korea can and will elevate tensions in the absence of others’ willingness to provide assistance

The attempted missile launch would almost certainly rule out an audience with Mr. Xi, said Cheng Xiaohe, associate professor of international relations at Renmin University.

don’t seem to appreciate the complex forces that drive the energy system,

A central question confronting the next president will be how to address climate change.

Mr. Trump said that in his first 100 days in office, he would “rescind” Environmental Protection Agency regulations established under Mr. Obama to curb planet-warming emissions from coal-fired power plants.

will not have the legal authority to unilaterally rescind the climate rules

justices, rather than the president, will determine its fate.

agreement gives foreign bureaucrats control over how much energy we use on our land

Mr. Trump also repeatedly emphasized “energy independence” — the idea that the United States could isolate itself from global oil markets and cease importing fuels.

any country wishing to withdraw would have to wait four years to do so.

But there would be no legal consequence if the United States, the world’s second-largest greenhouse gas polluter

“stop all payment of U.S. tax dollars to global warming programs.”

And as secretary of state, Hillary Clinton pledged that rich countries, including the United States, would commit $100 billion annually by 2020 to help poor countries adapt to the ravages of global warming.

“We’re going to bring back the coal industry, save the coal industry,” he said. “I love those people.”

No government has control over the emissions-reduction plans of other governments.

“I’m hoping he’s going to support the oil industry, open up some new plays — in Pennsylvania, maybe — keep Texas going and help out in North Dakota,”

“I want to see what his stance is on oil fracking, oil renewables and coal,

“I would like to see coal be part of the energy mix.”

less than half a percentage point

The close result meant that she and Mr. Sanders would effectively split the state’s delegates.

With a lead in delegates that is almost impossible for Mr. Sanders to overcome, Mrs. Clinton is moving closer each week to claiming the Democratic nomination.

Last weekend, bitter feelings from Mr. Sanders’s supporters spilled into view at Nevada’s state convention, which descended into chaos, prompted death threats against Nevada’s Democratic chairwoman and raised the prospect of discord at the national convention in July in Philadelphia.

With Mr. Sanders pressing on with his campaign and Mr. Trump now the presumptive Republican nominee, Mrs. Clinton has been campaigning against two opponents at once, trying to defeat Mr. Sanders in state after state while also building an argument against Mr. Trump.

where she warned about Mr. Trump while urging voters to support her on Tuesday.

she faulted Mr. Sanders for voting against the auto industry bailout, a claim that is not as clear-cut as she suggested it was.

He, too, looked toward the general election, arguing that he, not Mrs. Clinton, was the more formidable candidate to take on Mr. Trump, citing polls of hypothetical matchups.

“There are a lot of people out there, many of the pundits and politicians, they say, ‘Bernie Sanders should drop out. The people of California should not have the right to determine who the next president will be.’”

“We are in till the last ballot is cast.”

With her overwhelming support from superdelegates, the party leaders who can vote as they wish, Mrs. Clinton could clinch the nomination by June 7, when six states

California and New Jersey

based on his strength against Mr. Trump.

In this year’s campaign, Mr. Sanders has been embraced by white working-class voters and young people in many places

Kentucky is one of the nation’s biggest coal-mining states, and Mrs. Clinton stressed her commitment to coal miners.

A senior defence ministry official in Moscow, which supports Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, said on Sunday negotiations were taking place to "establish a regime of calm also in Aleppo province", Interfax news agency reported.

Syria's army confirmed the extension of the lull around Damascus but did not mention Aleppo.

"We will not accept under any circumstances... regional ceasefires,

These are critical hours," Kerry said,

Both sides have rained bombardments on residential areas for nearly 10 days, killing more than 250 people including at least 40 children

shelled at least one area on Sunday, killing at least three people

Fifteen air strikes by the government side hit rebel-held areas in the city

Full control of Aleppo would be a huge prize for Assad

Government forces and their allies also fought Islamic State near Palmyra in central Syria

recaptured from the jihadists in March

But they also recognize that Mr. Trump has proved adept at reading the electorate and at dominating news coverage — and that Mrs. Clinton must parry his attacks without overplaying her hand or further eroding her standing with male voter

“He’s going to have to deconstruct Hillary Clinton if he’s going to run against her,

Aides to Mr. Trump, three of whom insisted on anonymity to discuss the campaign’s internal deliberations, suggested he would likely return to that line of attack as his campaign prepares for a fall contest with Mrs. Clinton.

Some Republicans, similarly, cringed. “When people rally around her are when people bring things up about her husband’s infidelities and when it appears as though she’s being attacked by the boys’ club,” said Katie Packer, who runs an anti-Trump group and co-founded a consulting firm that helps Republicans communicate to women.

With the Democratic primary winding down, Mrs. Clinton’s advisers say they have been analyzing why Mr. Trump’s attacks were so damaging to Republican rivals like Jeb Bush and Senator Marco Rubio to determine how Mrs. Clinton can avoid the same pitfalls.

On the debate stage, Mrs. Clinton will not respond in kind to personal attacks: No jokes about Mr. Trump’s hair or the size of his hands

By taking gender head-on, Trump refuses to cede women voters and so-called women’s issues to Hillary just because she is a woman,”

In a sign of how closely Mrs. Clinton’s aides are watching Mr. Trump’s every step, after his advisers signaled last week that Mr. Trump would start behaving more “presidentially,”

But by Tuesday night, after Mr. Trump had appeared to shift course again, Clinton aides adjusted. In her victory speech in Philadelphia, Mrs. Clinton’s prepared remarks included a line meant to rev up female voters at Mr. Trump’s expense: “If fighting for women’s health care and paid family leave and equal pay is playing the ‘woman card,’ then deal me in,” she said.

That may yet come. On Thursday, Mrs. Clinton’s campaign appealed for donations by offering supporters their “very own official Hillary for America woman card” — a hot pink credit card with the words “Congratulations: You’re in the majority!”

With the Islamic State in control of territory in Iraq and Syria; expanding into Libya, Afghanistan and elsewhere; and having carried out attacks in Paris and Brussels, it is perhaps easy to forget that the group rose in the first place as a consequence of the failure of politics in Iraq

Writing last year in Foreign Affairs, Mr. Khedery said Washington should “abandon its fixation with artificial borders”

“I generally believe it is ungovernable under the current construct,”

Even today, her legacy is felt: This week, Mr. Abadi put forward Sharif Ali bin Hussein, a descendant of King Faisal, who was chosen by Ms. Bell in 1921 to rule Iraq, as foreign minister. But lawmakers rejected him as a reminder of Iraq’s failed monarchy.

Mr. Biden has worked to promote Iraqi unity, despite his proposal a decade ago to divide Iraq into thirds. But in comments on Thursday to American diplomatic and military personnel in Baghdad, he harked back to that proposal.

Much of what troubles Iraq today is the legacy of Saddam Hussein’s brutality.

Shiites and Kurds, oppressed under Mr. Hussein’s Sunni-dominated administration, have been unable to overcome their grievances.

“Iraq, it seems, has a long memory but is short on vision,”

“It is like a vehicle traveling over rocky terrain, with a large rearview mirror but only a keyhole for a windscreen

Divisions within the Shiite leadership — with Mr. Maliki and others pushing back against Mr. Abadi’s efforts at restructuring — are also at the core of the current political crisis.

Hadi al-Ameri, a Shiite rival to Mr. Abadi, who runs a powerful militia that is supported by Iran, is seen by many as harboring ambitions to replace him.