Expect right-wing parties to win big when 400 million voters in 27 countries elect new members of the European Parliament from June 6 through June 9, the Guardian said. After a tough five years since the last election thanks to Brexit, the pandemic, the war in...
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A few years ago, Belgium famously had no elected government for more than 600 days, as politicians negotiated a coalition agreement. Now, reflecting that history of instability, Belgians are seriously discussing splitting the country into Dutch-speaking Flanders in the north and French-speaking Wallonia in the south. “We...
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Around 60 years ago, when rabies was widespread in Europe’s fox population, Switzerland invented an innovative way to stop the disease. Officials in the wealthy Central European country stuffed chicken heads with vaccines and dropped them from helicopters. The vulpine scavengers gobbled up the laced meat,...
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The southwest African country of Namibia has long been isolated geographically and politically. A former German colony that came under a White-minority government under South African control after World War I, Namibia only gained its independence in 1990. Now, however, things here are changing fast. As MercoPress...
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At least nine people died and around 50 more were injured when a stage collapsed in northern Mexico while presidential candidate Jorge Álvarez Máynez was addressing supporters. Máynez of the center-left Citizen Movement was uninjured, the BBC reported. But the incident was the latest ugly...
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A 700,000-year-old glacier called Snæfellsjökull almost appeared on Iceland’s presidential ballot for June 1. “It’s time to challenge the status quo and elect a candidate that symbolizes endurance, resilience, and global interconnectedness,” said campaigners who collected signatures for the glacier, which is featured in Jules Verne’s...
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Since the racist apartheid regime in South Africa ended 30 years ago, the African National Congress party, whose crusaders brought down white minority rule, has won every election, with support in the high double digits. That track record of success is predicted to end, however,...
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Voters in Vanuatu, an archipelago in the South Pacific, will decide on May 29 whether to approve two constitutional amendments that would compel their lawmakers to choose – and stick with – a single political party rather than switch in the middle of their terms. The...
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The funeral for Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, who died along with the Iranian foreign minister and other officials on May 19 in a helicopter crash near Azerbaijan, was muted compared with the procession for Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani, killed by an American drone strike...
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Ghana is pressing the African Union (AU) to leverage the worldwide African diaspora to bolster the case for reparations for the trans-Atlantic trade in slaves, reported Yen, a Ghanaian news outlet. It is “important for the self-worth and self-confidence of descendants of enslaved people,” it...
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Chilean truckers staged protests in the mining region near the capital of Santiago recently. The drivers demanded that the government of leftist President Gabriel Boric take action to reduce violent crime in the country. Murder rates decreased slightly last year, but in 2022, they spiked by...
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Leaders meeting at the 33rd Arab Summit in Bahrain recently denounced “Israel's obstruction of ceasefire efforts in the Gaza Strip and … the occupation forces’ persistence in expanding their aggression against the Palestinian city of Rafah, despite international warnings of the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of...
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On June 15, 2023, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and its Arab allied militias attacked a convoy of locals as it proceeded through El Geneina in West Darfur, killing civilians as they ran through the streets, trying to find refuge in homes or mosques,...
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Sri Lanka has been grappling with political and economic instability since the end of its 26-year-long civil war 15 years ago. After the pandemic, miles-long lines began appearing for fuel. Power cuts were the daily norm. And even dal (lentils) and fish, daily staples of Sri...
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When President Luis Abinader of the Dominican Republic assumed office in 2020, the Caribbean country’s economy had contracted 7 percent amid the coronavirus pandemic. In the succeeding three years, a tourism wave propelled economic growth increases of 12 percent, 5 percent, and 3 percent each...
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A few months ago, photos surfaced of Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko standing next to a map depicting battles that had occurred in Ukraine, battles that had yet to occur in Ukraine and, curiously, another former Soviet republic: Moldova. Specifically, reported the Hill, the plans showed Russian...
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The chairwoman of Hong Kong’s weightlifting and powerlifting association mistakenly referred to “13 countries” in her sport’s Asian conference recently. That conference includes Hong Kong, a former British colony where Chinese officials have been expanding their control, and Taiwan, an independent island that Chinese leaders...
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Barred from staging street protests, Ugandans are leveraging social media to shine a light on the misdeeds of their corrupt and incompetent leaders. The latest online protest, or “exhibition,” is trending under #UgandaParliamentExhibition on X (formerly Twitter), and it details how bureaucrats are abusing public...
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Rebuilding Gaza after Israel’s devastating military operations in the Palestinian territory since Oct. 7 could cost $50 billion. “We have not seen anything like this since 1945,” said United Nations development program director Abdallah Al Dardari, according to Al Jazeera. “That intensity, in such a short...
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Few countries have supported Ukraine’s fight against Russia more than Lithuania, a former Soviet republic on the Baltic Sea bordering Russia whose leaders have made eminently clear that they will live free of Moscow’s influence or die. For example, earlier this year, Lithuania’s President Gitanas Nausėda...
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