August 25, 2023

All the Spoils

NEED TO KNOW All the Spoils GABON [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/8b6af594-29cd-4ef9-63c5-84ef31e981ea.png"] Gabon and the Bank of America recently finalized a “debt-for-nature swap,” the first on the African continent, to reduce its debt payments in exchange for promises to invest in conservation measures. Specifically, Gabon will expand a marine park and reform...

Read full story →

August 24, 2023

The Fraying Chains

NEED TO KNOW The Fraying Chains IRAN [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/aa73e799-3df4-4d8a-8ec5-35a9feeb2bb4.png"] Almost a year ago, a 22-year-old woman named Mahsa Amini died while in the custody of Iran’s so-called morality police. Her offense was refusing to wear her hijab – a headscarf – contrary to the Islamic Republic’s harsh laws. Amini’s death...

Read full story →

August 23, 2023

Lose, Lose

NEED TO KNOW Lose, Lose ZIMBABWE [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/32d2805e-affb-4474-9ba4-8fc5eae44e98.png"] Police in Zimbabwe arrested 40 leaders of the opposition Citizens’ Coalition for Change (CCC) party on charges of blocking traffic about a week before the southern African country’s voters go to the polls to choose a new president, parliament, and local...

Read full story →

August 22, 2023

A Playing Field

NEED TO KNOW A Playing Field PAPUA NEW GUINEA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/dbe527fc-305d-4a67-99b3-558321dd4d0f.png"] The world is wooing Papua New Guinea, a poor country to the north of Australia that shares an island with Indonesia. As the Economist wrote, French President Emmanuel Macron, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Indonesian President Joko Widodo, American...

Read full story →

August 21, 2023

Bregret

NEED TO KNOW Bregret UNITED KINGDOM [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/db250264-45f9-48fa-be6e-ab4d2ef0d6a5.png"] Seven years ago, a majority of British voters opted to remove their country from the European Union. Now many are having second thoughts – or “Bregret,” as the New Statesman termed it. The United Kingdom’s exit from the EU is estimated to...

Read full story →

August 18, 2023

Promises, Betrayed

NEED TO KNOW Promises, Betrayed AFGHANISTAN [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/2beac6fe-a680-4765-a2ff-d329629a897c.png"] This week, the Taliban marked two years since it returned to power following the US-led troop withdrawal. Men and boys waved Taliban flags from armored vehicles, played Taliban songs and spoke about how “happy” they were to finally have freedom, NBC News...

Read full story →

August 17, 2023

Taming Through Terror

NEED TO KNOW Taming Through Terror ECUADOR [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/7dbfcec9-d17b-43ce-97b7-0ce48bb12d1f.png"] Just a few years ago, Ecuador, sandwiched between narco-states Peru and Colombia, then grappling with their own civil conflicts, was an oasis of relative prosperity and peace in the region. Now, as voters go to the polls on Aug. 20 to...

Read full story →

August 16, 2023

An Unholy Temperature

NEED TO KNOW An Unholy Temperature SWEDEN [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/3c7156af-17ce-455f-85b2-83980fe2f678.png"] Parents with children throwing tantrums in public to get attention often just try to move to the side, avoid eye contact with bystanders and pray the outbursts will pass quickly without too much notice. That approach hasn’t been working out too...

Read full story →

August 15, 2023

Squeaky No More

NEED TO KNOW Squeaky No More SINGAPORE [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/7975032b-ee5e-4c38-bc1f-27c01a1778c5.png"] There’s a tacit agreement between Singapore’s rulers and the population: We the People will settle for less freedom in exchange for safety and prosperity, all overseen by a squeaky-clean government with unquestionable moral rectitude. That pact means that Singaporeans can be...

Read full story →

August 14, 2023

The War on Culture

NEED TO KNOW The War on Culture UKRAINE [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/02995f03-84bd-afba-0f89-00fc09873ecb.png"] As Ukrainian soldiers dig in to make advances on the battlefield in what many say is a stalled offensive, another front in the war has been more successful: the war on Russia’s cultural legacy. It’s an offensive years in the...

Read full story →

August 11, 2023

Opaque Waters

NEED TO KNOW Opaque Waters JAPAN [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/ab764327-df98-4918-badd-17c2c79d5685.png"] Chef Kazuyuki Tanioka owns a sushi restaurant called Toya in the Chinese capital of Beijing. Life hasn’t been easy for him in the past few years. China’s coronavirus restrictions nearly ruined him. Now he’s worried about another existential threat to his...

Read full story →

August 10, 2023

On the Side of Life

NEED TO KNOW On the Side of Life COLOMBIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/80e582e1-1ef0-4fb5-a86a-699a8cf7cddf.png"] Pablo Beltran recently visited Bogota, the capital of his native country Colombia, for the first time in 31 years. Beltran is a leader in the National Liberation Army – known by its Spanish acronym ELN – a Marxist...

Read full story →

August 09, 2023

There, and Back Again

NEED TO KNOW There, and Back Again EUROPEAN UNION [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/597ff6f5-aa2a-4913-81c8-7a38f364a41b.png"] Tunisia recovered more than 900 bodies of migrants who drowned in the Mediterranean Sea from the beginning of the year through July 20, according to Interior Minister Kamel Feki. The North African country this year has been handling a...

Read full story →

August 08, 2023

Wobbly Stools

NEED TO KNOW Wobbly Stools WEST BANK & GAZA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/c7446631-e728-4689-8f2d-ebddc1f4962c.png"] Late last month, globetrotting New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman announced that American officials were considering a new security pact with Saudi Arabia. The pact would function like a three-legged stool: The US would give iron-clad security guarantees to...

Read full story →

August 07, 2023

Watch Your Step

NEED TO KNOW Watch Your Step UKRAINE [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/02995f03-84bd-afba-0f89-00fc09873ecb.png"] Some say the Ukrainian counteroffensive against Russia appears to be failing. “I think that the Ukrainians expected the counteroffensive to gather sufficient momentum to allow them to continue to push south at a much faster rate,” military intelligence expert Konrad Muzyka...

Read full story →

August 04, 2023

An Antiquated Model

NEED TO KNOW An Antiquated Model BOLIVIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/8ed01a1e-5cea-4b63-b4c0-c3727f7de51c.png"] China has invested more than a billion dollars in lithium and other mines in Bolivia. Former President Evo Morales and current President Luis Arce – both of the leftwing Movement for Socialism political party – actively cultivated this capital for...

Read full story →

August 03, 2023

Dimming Star

NEED TO KNOW Dimming Star BANGLADESH [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/46a3120a-34a1-40f2-8221-240a899a0fd0.png"] The foreign minister of Bangladesh recently called ambassadors from the United States, Britain, France, and 10 other Western countries together in Dhaka to complain about their condemnation of an attack on a political candidate running against the country’s ruling Awami League...

Read full story →

August 02, 2023

Palace Intrigue

NEED TO KNOW Palace Intrigue NIGER [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/770c49e5-a303-44c1-86fc-05e51df3933a.png"] Two years ago, the president of Niger, Mohamed Bazoum, was elected in the West African country’s first peaceful, democratic change of government since independence from France in 1960. He almost didn’t make it – a coup was attempted to thwart him from...

Read full story →

August 01, 2023

To Be Reasonable

NEED TO KNOW To Be Reasonable ISRAEL [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/2f7ce1b6-fa2d-e80d-cdee-e2c83f69c720.png"] Left and right in Israel are split over the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu curtailing the country’s high court from citing the “reasonableness doctrine” in its decisions. As the Atlantic magazine explained, the doctrine is a British common law tool...

Read full story →

July 31, 2023

Going A-Courting

NEED TO KNOW Going A-Courting RUSSIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/db8acf88-8b4f-4b1c-bf9a-1e71d4eee94b.png"] Russian President Vladimir Putin was on a charm offensive at the recent Russia–Africa Summit in St. Petersburg. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – or the “special military operation”, as it’s called in Moscow – was likely a hot topic of conversation at...

Read full story →