NEED TO KNOW No U Turn It's been about eight months since the impeachment of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff. Many observers were skeptical of the grounds for Rousseff's ouster – manipulating Brazil's federal budget. Nonetheless, they believed her exit would give the country a fresh start to deal...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW The Final Fight After six months of fighting, the battle for Mosul – the Islamic State's last remaining stronghold in Iraq – is reaching a fever pitch. Backed by US-led air strikes, Iraqi forces launched a campaign to reclaim the city in October. Iraqi leaders...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW A Studied Approach Prime Minister Viktor Orban has consolidated power and undercut civil liberties in Hungary for years. Now he’s squaring off against one of the richest men in the world and one of the most respected institutions that arose from the ruins of his...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW A Legal Coup Despite years of political repression, human rights abuses, economic crises and food shortages, much of the world has held out hope that President Nicolás Maduro would maintain democracy in Venezuela. That faith has now been exposed as wishful thinking. On Thursday, news...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW More Than Words After Germany and the Netherlands blocked Turkish officials earlier this month from lobbying Turkish expatriates in the two European countries to vote in favor of an upcoming constitutional referendum, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused Dutch and German leaders of...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW Lucky 777 Carrie Lam, Hong Kong's former number two leader, became the city's chief executive after winning two-thirds of the vote in elections on Sunday. But her win amounted to only 777 votes in a territory of over 7 million people. Despite calls for popular...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW The New Norm of Low Tech Investigators are still trying to figure out why 52-year-old British national Khalid Masood drove a car into a group of pedestrians on Westminster Bridge last week before trying to storm the Houses of Parliament in London. They still...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW Of Flags and Ducks The tug of war between protesters and police over opposition leader Alexei Navalny in the streets of Moscow on Sunday was an apt metaphor for Russia today. While CNN’s Fareed Zakaria recently dubbed President Vladimir Putin “the world’s most powerful man,”...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW Closing the Door A year and a half after Europe's refugee crisis began, the question of what to do with the staggering amount of people still camped out on the continent remains, even as more continue to attempt the journey –aid workers fear...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW Attention Please! Another bleaching event is already striking Australia's Great Barrier Reef on the heels of the one that just ended – its third and most severe die-off in 20 years. Last year's unprecedented event killed or reduced 90 percent of the reef's corals to...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW Zebras and Stripes Many in Israel girded for a renewal of violence in the Gaza Strip when militant ex-convict Yehya Sinwar became the new leader of Hamas last month. One of 1,000 Palestinian prisoners released in 2011 in exchange for a single Israeli soldier, he...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW The Beginning of the End After nine months of speculation following last year's Brexit referendum, the UK has announced it will trigger Article 50 on March 29, officially beginning negotiations for its exit from the European Union. It could take as long as two years for the UK to...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW Home, Bubbling, Home After much debate in Berlin in recent years, concerns about the skyrocketing cost of housing in the German capital erupted into full-blown demonstrations this past weekend. "Massive crowding is happening to the extent that a lot of people can't pay their rent,...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW Mutti Goes to Washington German Chancellor Angela Merkel flies to Washington Friday to meet with US President Donald Trump for the first time since he took office in January. The stoic chancellor and the outspoken president may have their personal differences. But when the two...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW Broken Promises, New Hopes Troubled Somalia enjoyed a rare moment of exuberance last month when thousands poured into the streets of Mogadishu to celebrate. The festivities stemmed from the Somalian parliament electing Mohammed Abdullah Mohammed – also known as Farmajo – as president...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW The Dutchman Add Geert Wilders to the list of anti-European Union, anti-Islamic, convention-demolishing far-right politicians at the height of their powers. Wilders and his anti-immigration Party for Freedom have been leading in the polls for Dutch parliamentary elections Wednesday throughout much of the race...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW Of Victories and Uncertainties Pollsters and economists were quick to argue that the crackdown on cash Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi initiated last year – also known as radical demonetization – would put a severe dent in both the Indian economy and Modi's...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW A Funeral, A Festival The crowds in Seoul on Sunday symbolized South Korea’s two minds on the impeachment of former President Park Geun-hye. CNN described the demonstrators who came out in support of Park as mostly older folks who saw Park’s departure as a...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW Of Nukes and Wild Hogs Japanese foodies love wild boar meat. Unfortunately, they can't dine on the hundreds of boars roaming the environs of Fukushima, the town where an earthquake and tsunami caused its namesake nuclear power plant to melt down six years ago Saturday. The...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW A State of Limbo The elections were due to take place in November. But the electoral commission said it didn’t know how many voters there were in the Democratic Republic of Congo. So it was given time, in spite of the outrage on...
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