Newsletter Archive

After Islamic State followers threw her son off the roof and took her husband away, an Iraqi mother of six made a desperate escape from the terror group. VOA meets Um Hamad at the Hassan Shams Camp in the Kurdish area of Iraq, where she has fled with her children and wonders if she will ever see her husband again.

Did Russian spymasters really collect compromising information on President-elect Donald Trump? The future U.S. president strongly denies the unsubstantiated reports and it turns out Russian analysts agree with him. VOA is in Moscow talking with Russian political and security experts, as well as average Russians on the street, to find out what they think.

VIDEO: When a Chinese immigrant realized that working long hours at her Silicon Valley job was taking a toll on her fitness, she founded her own start up to take care of the problem. Since Meng Li didn’t have time to get to the gym, and couldn’t afford a pricey personal trainer, she developed her own personal coach — in the form of an inexpensive wearable device that keeps her — and others — honest during workouts.

Tens of thousands of Namibia’s indigenous Herero and Nama people were killed by German troops after they revolted against colonial rule in the early 1900s. Germany has not issued a formal apology for the genocide, but the issue has been discussed between the two governments for at least a decade. Now, the elected chief of the Herero people is seeking justice in an unlikely place: a U.S. courtroom.

VIDEO: New York City is home to a half-million undocumented residents. Immigrant-friendly organizations, as well as the mayor, vow to protect undocumented city residents against any potential immigration crackdown under President Donald Trump — work that has taken on new urgency as the inauguration approaches.

Technology gives China a critical advantage when it comes to Asia’s most contested tract of water — the South China Sea. That technology keeps less equipped countries away from Beijing’s massive maritime claims. China could use the sophisticated equipment it has deployed in the region as evidence of its sovereignty in the South China Sea.