Trump targets high prescription drug prices. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Monday directing drugmakers to lower the prices of their medicines to align with what other countries pay. Drugmakers will be given price targets within the next 30 days and must make “significant progress” toward lowering prices within six months. Mr. Trump said he was seeking cuts of between 59% and 90%. The United States pays the highest prices for prescription drugs, often nearly three times more than other developed nations. – Reuters

White South African refugees arrive in the U.S. Monday. They were granted refugee status by Mr. Trump on the basis of racial discrimination. Washington has blocked mostly nonwhite refugee admissions from the rest of the world, but is prioritizing Afrikaners, the descendants of mostly Dutch settlers. The move has drawn a mixture of alarm and ridicule from South African authorities, who say the Trump administration has waded into a domestic issue it does not understand. – Reuters
Related Monitor coverage: Donald Trump says white South African farmers are victims of persecution. The reality is more complex.

An Israeli American hostage is freed from Gaza. Hamas released Edan Alexander on Monday, the Palestinian militant group said. Mr. Alexander’s release was presented to Israel as a goodwill gesture from Hamas to Mr. Trump and came as a global hunger monitor said Gaza’s entire population is at critical risk of famine. The release, after four-way talks between Hamas, the U.S., Egypt, and Qatar, could open the way to freeing the remaining 59 hostages held in the Gaza Strip. – Reuters

Albanians appear to favor EU membership. Preliminary results in Albania’s parliamentary election show the ruling Socialist Party leading, with voters supporting the country’s uphill effort to join the European Union and Prime Minister Edi Rama’s bid for a fourth term. Mr. Rama, under whom EU membership negotiations restarted last October, highlighted achievements in infrastructure and justice reform in his campaign. His party also aims to accelerate a tourism boom and increase pensions and pay. – The Associated Press

Gavin Newsom focuses on homeless encampments. The California governor urged its cities Monday to clear homeless encampments. Mr. Newsom’s administration drafted a local law that counties, cities, and towns can directly adopt or modify to achieve the Democratic governor’s goals. He’s also releasing $3.3 billion in voter-approved funds to expand housing and treatment options for homeless residents. “The time for inaction is over. There are no more excuses,” Mr. Newsom said in a statement. More than 187,000 Californians are in need of housing. – AP
Related Monitor coverage: In San Francisco, a nonprofit gives cellphones to people facing homelessness, with a friend on the other end.

The prospect of a U.S.-China decoupling proved untenable for both sides, leading to an easing of the trade crisis. President Donald Trump slashed the 145% tariff – or tax – on Chinese imports down to 30%. China reciprocated with a cut from 125% on U.S. imports to 10%, according to a joint statement released Monday. Now the two sides have 90 days to negotiate an agreement. “This is a temporary respite,” says Scott Kennedy, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “It certainly doesn’t resolve any of the outstanding fundamental issues between the U.S. and China.”

Earlier this month, the German government opened the door to outlawing the nation’s second-most-popular party, the far-right Alternative for Germany, by officially declaring it an extremist group. Memories of Nazism prompted modern Germany’s founders to give the Constitutional Court authority to ban such parties. But there are many reasons officials might not follow through with such an extraordinary step. What Germany chooses to do next could reverberate as a model for how democracies defend themselves or as a political Frankenstein’s monster.

Unlike cryptocurrencies, meme coins aren’t forms of money. But as speculative investments, they can generate huge yet highly volatile value. Coin issuers earn money on sales and from trading fees. What happens when a sitting president gets into the game, as Donald Trump did shortly before his inauguration earlier this year? Some say meme coins are no different from other forms of fundraising. Some in Congress, however, are considering new rules barring politicians from using or sponsoring cryptocurrencies and other digital tokens to prevent corruption.

Young Africans are driving political change across the continent. But in Senegal, the president they swept into office last year has left many young voters disillusioned. Bassirou Diomaye Faye’s administration says its predecessor left Senegal “in ruins,” and has asked for patience amid delayed infrastructure projects and cuts in public spending. It has also made high-profile reforms to show it’s serious about creating jobs and ending dependence on foreign aid. But many young voters are upset with an economy that, if it hasn’t worsened, has not improved.

Separation is not a quality associated with the well-being of people in communities. But for Indigenous Ecuadorians who choose to live without contact with others, a court said it is a human right to remain undisturbed. And in South Africa, protections for endangered penguins give them more space.

In a decisive shift toward peaceful change, Turkey’s long-outlawed major separatist group is disbanding. The announcement Monday by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) brings a welcome end to four decades of armed conflict and the loss of nearly 40,000 lives.

Turkey is not the only country feeling the repercussions of this decision. Some 25 million to 35 million ethnic Kurds live in mountainous areas that share porous borders between Iraq, Syria, and Iran, as well as Turkey. Turkish forces have pursued Kurdish separatists in cross-border raids in Iraq and Syria over the years. The president of Iraq’s Kurdistan region immediately hailed the PKK’s move as signaling “political maturity” and strengthening regional stability.

Despite having 15 million Kurds – 20% of its population – Turkey did not recognize their distinct identity for most of the 20th century. Aiming to establish a Kurdish homeland, the PKK took up arms in 1984, attacking civilian and military targets. In recent years, the Turkish military has forcefully limited the PKK’s reach and abilities.

With founder Abdullah Öcalan in prison since 1999, the PKK has transitioned from seeking independence toward seeking greater rights within Turkey. On Monday, the PKK said it had “broken the policy of denial and annihilation ... and brought the Kurdish issue to a point of solving it through democratic politics.”

The conflict’s end provides Turkey’s leaders with the opportunity to craft a transparent and fair agreement that enables progress and addresses legitimate Kurdish demands. The population is tired of simmering conflict and is ready for peace. But it is also tired of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s autocratic rule, as street protests in March indicated.

Officially recognizing Kurdish rights will require amending Turkey’s Constitution. This, critics say, could create an opening for another amendment – one removing term limits, thus allowing the president to extend his rule for an unprecedented fourth term in 2028.

An official rapprochement should allow needed resources to flow to Turkey’s impoverished southeast, where much of the fighting took place. Calm there would also help neighboring Syria, which has experienced recent outbreaks of sectarian violence.

The PKK’s dismantling offers an opening for the new government in Damascus and the Syrian Kurds – and perhaps the Alawite and Druze factions – to define a path to integrating religious and ethnic minorities. It might even influence moves in Lebanon to bring the Hezbollah militia into normal, peaceful politics.