Archive

August 19, 2024

Ganamos

NEED TO KNOW Ganamos VENEZUELA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/d79e9c71-a431-5182-dcdd-2f3c65026880.png"] Tens of thousands of Venezuelans took to the streets around the world over the weekend, demanding that authoritarian President Nicolás Maduro recognize the results of last month’s election they say he lost. In the capital Caracas and other cities across Venezuela, in the...

Read full story →

August 16, 2024

Getting Rich, Right

[announcement] NEED TO KNOW Getting Rich, Right GUYANA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/e90aa670-d4c1-59cf-7f80-e9a728dcecc3.png"] Past efforts at reforming the constitution of Guyana have yielded little change. Now, however, as the small South American nation prepares to dole out the benefits from new oil drilling, advocates say the recently empaneled Constitution Reform Commission must create a...

Read full story →

August 15, 2024

Flipping the Script

NEED TO KNOW Flipping the Script RUSSIA-UKRAINE [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/58cb2c25-272d-3084-4995-06c00b6e444c.png"] Top Ukrainian commander Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi boasted this week that his troops now control almost 400 square miles of Russian territory in the Kursk border region, capturing 28 villages and forcing more than 100,000 Russians to flee. “Russia brought war to...

Read full story →

August 14, 2024

Atoll Power

NEED TO KNOW Atoll Power KIRIBATI [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/9dae539b-011f-16cb-1078-f5416b010637.png"] Around 1,300 miles south of the American state of Hawaii, Kiribati is a country of 115,000 people living on 150 square miles of atolls that stretch across more than 1.3 million square miles of the South Pacific. This strategic location blessed...

Read full story →

August 13, 2024

‘Mother’ of Change

NEED TO KNOW ‘Mother’ of Change ITALY [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/1d0451b2-7f9a-d2e0-7330-2b957ccfbb51.png"] Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni calls her plan to change the structure of governance in the country the “mother of all reforms.” Her critics call it a naked bid to seize power for the prime minister’s office and government, and...

Read full story →

August 12, 2024

The Tyranny of Doubt

NEED TO KNOW The Tyranny of Doubt MALAWI [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/87290663-ce6f-a91e-8a1b-ae0d9b187ea9.png"] In March last year, Cyclone Freddy ripped through Malawi and southeast Africa, killing 679 people, displacing almost 660,000, and causing property damage totaling more than $500 million. Thirty-nine-year-old mother Gladys Austin was one of those hundreds of thousands who had...

Read full story →

August 09, 2024

Human Shields

[announcement] NEED TO KNOW Human Shields RUSSIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/989f50dc-b625-45fc-b227-955fe993f545.png"] The return of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, former US Marine Paul Whelan and other foreign prisoners in Russian custody in the biggest prisoner swap since the Cold War ended the latest round of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s so-called “hostage...

Read full story →

August 08, 2024

Playing Chicken

NEED TO KNOW Playing Chicken MIDDLE EAST [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/7d5d13a4-f151-0ed2-ad36-8136fa782109.png"] Iranian leaders recently warned commercial airlines and others to avoid Iranian airspace as the country appeared poised to launch a war against Israel. The warning came as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told the Group of Seven foreign ministers...

Read full story →

August 07, 2024

Nothing to Lose

NEED TO KNOW Nothing to Lose KENYA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/6a6f20fb-6a89-3416-50d9-989b3f051e12.png"] In late June, Kenyan President William Ruto blinked. After winning the 2022 general election on his plans to reform the economy, he scuttled planned tax hikes and conceded that he was reversing his position in the wake of protests by...

Read full story →

August 06, 2024

‘The People’s War’

NEED TO KNOW ‘The People’s War’ BANGLADESH [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/b7de63f5-7c9c-8a5a-21d9-09f6627b8cf2.png"] On July 16, two police officers clashing with student protesters at Begum Rokeya University in the northwestern Bangladeshi city of Rangpur allegedly fired 12-gauge shotguns into the chest of 25-year-old student protest organizer Abu Sayed. The birdshot in the shotguns,...

Read full story →

August 05, 2024

Pull Harder

NEED TO KNOW Pull Harder GREECE [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/1af41250-c849-a5ef-523d-c57cb452726c.png"] Greece recently adopted a six-day working week to maintain its workforce as its population ages, but also to clamp down on tax evasion stemming from undeclared work. Under the new law – which only applies to industries that operate 24 hours a...

Read full story →

August 01, 2024

Carrying On

[announcement] NEED TO KNOW Carrying On UKRAINE [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/1145e69e-0993-82c7-7183-cecfc2a2ac34.png"] Tatiana Putria is a nurse in the Kherson region of Ukraine. “I am not a hero, I am a medic,” Putria told the United Nations Population Fund. “Often we are afraid to drive to certain areas. Sometimes, the residents say to us,...

Read full story →

August 01, 2024

Baby Onboarding

NEED TO KNOW Baby Onboarding ASIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/07abf1df-0286-1628-c001-b2b23952f483.png"] In Japan, a diapers company recently announced that it would be switching its focus from babies to adults – it’s been years since the sales of its products for seniors vastly outpaced those for infants. Across East Asia and elsewhere on the...

Read full story →

July 31, 2024

Growing Back Limbs

NEED TO KNOW Growing Back Limbs IRAQ/ SYRIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/26810b8b-421c-70eb-c736-3fda34a28a4e.png"] The terrorist group known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (or ISIS) no longer makes headlines like the wars in Eastern Europe and the Middle East do. Ten years ago, however, it was a different story. Then, amid...

Read full story →

July 30, 2024

Mirror Image

NEED TO KNOW Mirror Image WEST AFRICA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/01d49cdb-61dd-cd7c-a674-0b4da8c2471a.png"] Earlier this month, a triumvirate of military leaders who oversee military juntas in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger signed a pact to establish the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), a new confederation that they said would combat jihadism and foster...

Read full story →

July 29, 2024

Port of Call

NEED TO KNOW Port of Call LATIN AMERICA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/4e55dce7-9684-6d7d-8212-42e469c7fa1f.png"] American Gen. Laura Richardson, who oversees US military operations in Latin America, recently told the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado that the US needs a new approach to counter Russian and Chinese – especially Chinese – influence in the...

Read full story →

July 26, 2024

The Three-legged Stool

[announcement] NEED TO KNOW The Three-legged Stool VENEZUELA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/d79e9c71-a431-5182-dcdd-2f3c65026880.png"] Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro is running for reelection for a third term on July 28. His strategy includes appearing on the ballot 13 times as the endorsed candidate of different political parties. His main rival, Edmundo González Urrutia, meanwhile, appears...

Read full story →

July 25, 2024

So Far, So Close

NEED TO KNOW So Far, So Close POLAND [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/0056703f-d4b7-c8a4-3260-3657af178440.png"] From the mid-16th Century to the late 18th Century, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was a European power that dominated Central and Northeastern Europe while pioneering democratic models of government. Poland has been at odds with Russia ever since. In 1610, for...

Read full story →

July 24, 2024

The Practical Prince

NEED TO KNOW The Practical Prince SAUDI ARABIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/41fc0990-4945-0edc-6ee1-a971e46ec742.png"] Chinese solar panel companies TCL Zhonghuan and Jinko Solar reached a $3-billion deal with Saudi Arabian leaders recently to build new solar farms. The agreement highlights how Saudi Arabia has been investing heavily in renewable energy – including billions...

Read full story →

July 23, 2024

When the Waters Come

NEED TO KNOW When the Waters Come LATIN AMERICA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/4e55dce7-9684-6d7d-8212-42e469c7fa1f.png"] Climate change allegedly has claimed many victims. Temperatures as high as 117 degrees Fahrenheit were recently causing fatal heat strokes in Pakistan. The South Asian country is on track to warm by almost nine degrees Fahrenheit by the 2090s...

Read full story →