NEED TO KNOW BURUNDI Never Again, Again Marguerite Barankitse, an advocate for refugees in Burundi, recently appealed to Canadians to help stop a genocide that she fears is imminent in the central African country. “You don’t hear about it on the news anymore but the killing never stopped in...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW ITALY Garbage, Potholes and Exploding Buses Italian leaders are squeezed from above, below and within. Their constituents are angry over their inaction. The European Union is chastising them over their recently announced budget. And some partners in the Mediterranean country’s governing coalition are arguing over whether...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW AFGHANISTAN The Enemy of My Enemy...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW BHUTAN Ballots, and Shangri-La Bhutan could be the greenest country in the world. The forests that cover 70 percent of the Maryland-sized kingdom between China and India absorb around three times more carbon dioxide than the country of around 750,000 people emits, CNN reported. Bhutan charges...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW THE CAUCASUS A New Great Game US National Security Adviser John Bolton is visiting Russia and three Caucasus nations this month. His trip comes at an important time, Radio Free Europe reported. Russo-American relations are poor due to allegations of Russia’s interfering in the 2016 US presidential...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW NIGERIA Magic Snakes and Rag Pickers When $100,000 in state exam fees disappeared from a Nigerian government office, the clerk accused of embezzling it came up with a creative excuse. "She claimed that a magical snake had slithered into the safe and eaten the money," Matthew...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW LUXEMBOURG Bread and Circuses The Grand Dutchy of Luxembourg held elections Sunday. Whoop dee doo, right? Wealthy Luxembourg is slightly smaller than Rhode Island, so such an event understandably doesn’t generate big headlines globally. Even so, at stake are issues that reflect the enormous divides among many voters...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW BAVARIA The Iron Chancellor The Christian Social Union is the Bavarian counterpart of the Christian Democratic Union, the political party of German Chancellor Angela Merkel. When the latter is in power, so too is the former. The Christian Social Union (CSU) has run the Bavarian state...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW CHINA Ploughshares, Swords and Chips Vice President Mike Pence delivered what some saw as a rather incendiary speech recently on Sino-American relations. In part, the speech echoed a popular talking point on the American political right and left that challenges moderates who have argued for decades...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW LAKE CHAD Canaries and Bullhorns One of the largest lakes in Africa, Lake Chad is the economic engine of the border region between Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Nigeria. Humans have lived there for as long as humans have inhabited western and central Africa. Its wildlife and ecology...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW SYRIA Hot Deserts, Cold Wars The fighting in the Syrian civil war has cooled down but it’s far from over. In fact, it might continue for years. US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis recently said American troops would remain in Syria to fight the Islamic State, Politico...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW NICARAGUA Truth, Lies and Death Squads Around 200 killers, thieves and prostitutes holed up in a church in Nicaragua recently until brave citizens banded together to bring them to justice. Or at least that’s what police loyal to Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega wanted 20-year-old Dania Valeska...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW BRAZIL The Murky Years To Come In political campaigns, as in warfare, there’s a lot of posturing, skirmishing and distracting before the real fighting starts. In Brazil, the real fighting has started. Former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, 72, has pulled out of the country’s Oct. 7...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA War and Peace Bosnia was one of the most dangerous places in the world in the 1990s, when 100,000 people died in the fighting that followed the break-up of the former Yugoslavia. Some believe it could become so again. Unemployment, corruption, an exodus of...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW ROMANIA The Soul of a Nation The Constitutional Court of Romania recently decided that same-sex couples deserved the same rights as their heterosexual counterparts. “The court says a same-sex family is worth as much as a heterosexual family,” gay-rights activist Teodora Ion-Rotaru told the Associated Press. Ion-Rotaru...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW MAURITANIA Where Shackles Are the Norm Things are a little mixed up in Mauritania. Rape victims don’t report their abuse in this West African country because officials might jail them for having sex outside of marriage, Reuters reported. Police recently visited a would-be opposition political candidate, Biram...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW GUATEMALA Heads in the Sand New laser maps of Guatemala show a lost, ancient civilization sprawling yet hidden under the jungle canopy. But indigenous peoples and cultures have disappeared more recently, too. A tribunal of judges ruled last week that during Guatemala’s brutal civil war, which...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW MACEDONIA Pride and Prejudice Numerous civilizations, religions and ideologies have dominated the Balkan Peninsula over the millennia. Greeks, Slavs, Turks and others have jostled for supremacy over the centuries, securing and sloughing off fealty to one another at different points. In the context of that deep and...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW PAKISTAN Watch me! With the recent election of former cricket star Imran Khan as prime minister, many believed that Pakistan would change direction. They would be right. Khan last week extended an invitation to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the two nations’ foreign ministers to meet...
Read full story →NEED TO KNOW SOUTH SUDAN Same Song, Different Refrain? The government and rebel factions in South Sudan signed an agreement to end the East African nation’s civil war this month. The peace deal, inked in the capital of Ethiopia, was supposed to end a conflict that has killed at...
Read full story →
Thank you for visiting, DailyChatter, the only daily newsletter focused exclusively on world events. We hope you enjoy reading (or listening to) this edition.
Want to receive DailyChatter directly to your inbox each morning?
Your paid subscription supports independent, non-partisan, and fair journalism.
Friends of paid subscribers get 20% off for the first year on their paid subscription!
Our Global Education Initiative helps university and high school students know the world better.
University students or faculty with valid .edu email addresses can sign up for a FREE subscription.
High school students and teachers can also subscribe for FREE with valid school email addresses.
We understand that some school districts and individual schools do not use .edu email addresses. We will work with you to verify your email.
Questions?
Email us at [email protected]