Newsletter Archive

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Burqas are now banned in Mosul because Islamic State fighters are hiding among the population dressed as women. That works for the people who’ve grown to hate  everything IS loved — including the face veil. But other women still want to be able to choose to wear a burqa.

QUICK TAKE VIDEO: A Kurdish female commander is helping lead the assault on the Islamic State’s self-proclaimed capital. VOA meets Klara Reqa in Raqqa, where she leads thousands of US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces. After watching IS oppress women, she plans to work to empower Yazidi, Arab and Kurdish women.

Women and girls account for about 70 percent of cybercrime victims in Bangladesh. Whether it’s ex-boyfriends posting intimate pictures or others superimposing girls’ faces onto the bodies of nude models, the results can be devastating to the victims, damaging their reputations and even driving some to suicide. That’s why the government is now teaching female students how to fight back against cyber criminals.

To someone like Alexei Romanoff, you’re never too old to fight for what’s right. The Russian immigrant, who came to the US at the age of 4, helped organize one of the first mass gay rights demonstrations in the nation. Now, at age 80, he’s still leading the charge for what is now LGBT rights.

VIDEO: The prom. It’s a rite of passage for many American teenagers — a final time to formally celebrate with high school friends before going off to college or heading out into the real world. VOA follows a couple of high school students to their prom for an inside look at this decades-old tradition.

Hub of the wheel. They compare themselves to the captain of the Enterprise or the chief operations officer of a corporation. They wear a headset known in the industry as the ‘God mike,’ but they’re not eligible for Broadway’s highest honor, even though, without them, the show could not go on.