Kabul, Afghanistan – In an apartment near a Taliban headquarters, a young woman is discreetly moving about. Breshna* is 24 years old. Today, as on every day for the past year, her hands are sweaty and shaking. Yet her movements must be meticulous. She’s cutting the hair of one of…
She walked out of her bedroom a few minutes after I arrived, the pallu of her sari draped, as always, across her right shoulder, Gujarati in style. Shireen* smiled at me as she slowly made her way to the couch, her short grey hair resting on her neck. For the…
Medan, Indonesia – Nusantara, the future capital city of Indonesia, will be inaugurated on the country’s Independence Day on Saturday, as the country looks to replace Jakarta, which has served as the capital since Indonesia declared independence from the Dutch in 1945. A heaving metropolis of at least 11 million…
Kinmen, Taiwan – On Taiwan’s sandy shores, Liu Xi Jiu puts on his goggles as he prepares to race across one of the most dangerous stretches of water in the world. Originally from Beijing, he is competing in the only event of its kind, a seven-kilometre (4.3-mile) swimming race across…
Since Elon Musk took over Twitter, and changed its name to X, he has banned journalists critical of him, and been accused of censoring Democratic voices while simultaneously amplifying those of far-right extremists, even while claiming to be a “free speech absolutist”. While BlueSky, Meta’s Threads and others have gained…
Deir el-Balah, Gaza – In the early hours of Saturday morning, 24-year-old Sajida al-Kafarna was sleeping with her family inside a school classroom when they were woken by a huge explosion. “We reassured each other that we were OK, but when I noticed my father’s empty place, panic set in…
Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas is in Moscow for talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin. In their first face-to-face meeting since 2021, the pair are expected to discuss Israel’s war on Gaza. The Kremlin has maintained relations with both Israel and Palestine, but experts say its actual sway over the conflict…
When the deposed Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina fled Dhaka by military helicopter on August 5, following weeks-long deadly protests against her government, there was little doubt about where she was headed. India has supported Hasina and it is where she spent many years in exile after almost her entire…
At a London sports ground, Maya Hassan looks on with pride as about 30 women, nearly all Muslims and from ethnic minorities, join a self-defence class that she organised in response to a wave of riots that saw violent, racist attacks on Muslims and ethnic minorities. The 28-year-old martial arts…
San Basilio de Palenque, Colombia – Overlooking the usually sleepy, languid town of San Basilio de Palenque is a statue of Benkos Bioho, runaway slave, town founder, and symbol of the town’s heritage and unique nature. “Africa is everything to me, it’s everything to us Palenqueros,” says Nuno Bembele, education…
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