内容摘要：Women, from the Gadaba Indigenous communities, gather tendu leaves to sell in Hatipakna village, Koraput district, in India’s eastern state of Odisha, Wednesday, April 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool)

Women, from the Gadaba Indigenous communities, gather tendu leaves to sell in Hatipakna village, Koraput district, in India’s eastern state of Odisha, Wednesday, April 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool)

Just two months ago, the Trump administration wasn’t sold on Syria’s interim government led by Ahmad al-Sharaa, the onetime al-Qaida-affiliated insurgent. They worried the Syrian president didn’t have the legitimacy to govern the country’s ethnically diverse population.Clashes broke out in early March, killing hundreds and targeting many more members of the Alawite religious minority to which the ousted Syrian leader Basher Assad belongs.

The moment gave the Trump White House pause about easing sanctions on Syria. But Trump signaled Monday that he was having a change of heart and was moving toward lifting the Syria sanctions. A day later, he announced the move during an address to Gulf leaders.Trump then took it another step by agreeing to meet al-Sharaa.Trump said he was impressed with al-Sharaa, who not that long ago had a $10 million U.S. bounty on his head. The president called him a “young, attractive guy” with a “very strong past.”

Trump said it was recommendations from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman that nudged him to take a chance on al-Sharra.“President Erdogan called me and said: ‘Is there any way you could do that? Because if you don’t do that, they don’t have a chance,’” Trump said. “So, I did it.”

Throughout the trip, Trump felt more than comfortable dishing out exaggeration and hyperbole.

“This has been an amazing trip.” Trump told reporters Thursday as Air Force One was about to land in Qatar. “We’ve raised trillions of dollars of investment for our country.” A little later he put the figure at $4 trillion.It is molded into noodles and sheets and fermented into wine. In busy markets, motorcyclists lug 10-kilogram (22-pound) bags to their homes. Barges haul mountains of the grain up and down the Mekong River. Rice kernels are then dried and hulled by machines before they’re packed for sale in factories, lined from floor to ceiling with sacks of rice.

Rice shop owner Vo Tan Nha and his wife eat bowls of rice for lunch in their shop in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)Rice shop owner Vo Tan Nha and his wife eat bowls of rice for lunch in their shop in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

Van has been working with one of Vietnam’s largest rice exporters, the Loc Troi Group, for the past two years and is using a different method of irrigation known as alternate wetting and drying, or AWD. This requires less water than traditional farming since his paddy fields aren’t continuously submerged. They also produce less methane.Using the drone to fertilize the crops saves on labor costs. With