Newsletter Archive

What’s left of cities recaptured from Islamic State after months of occupation and the horrific battles that liberated them?  VOA’s Heather Murdock takes you to Mosul and Tal Afar in Iraq and Raqqa in Syria – for an inside look at what happens when cities fall.

The official report into the stampede that killed 23 people at a rail station in Mumbai triggered outrage for failing to acknowledge failing infrastructure that contributed to the tragedy.  Activists and passengers who spoke to VOA said the stampede highlights the need to prioritize fixing the existing network over new projects like a bullet train project inaugurated two weeks ago by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Bangladesh is pressing ahead with plans to combine two settlements for Rohingya refugees from Myanmar into one large camp that those inside will not be allowed to leave, a senior government official told VOA.  But the founder of an NGO that’s investigating abuses against the Rohingya in Myanmar called the mega camp a “terrible and dangerous idea.”

The legacy of the Boy Scouts is important to scouts –and former scouts–in Ottawa, Ill., the hometown of W.D. Boyce who founded of the Boy Scouts of America.  So you might expect the organization’s decision to allow girls to join would surprise and even anger people like Matt Skelly, an Ottawa resident who grew up in scouting.  But as he tells VOA, the new rule provides him an opportunity to share the tradition with his daughter.

President Trump’s new policy on Afghanistan may be pushing Pakistan to take more action against terrorists, experts say.  It may even have contributed to Pakistan’s effort Thursday to free an American woman and her family, who were being held by one the most lethal terror groups in the region.

China will host one of the biggest events of its political cycle next week, a once-in-five-year Party Congress. Anticipation is building about how Chinese leader Xi Jinping will use the gathering to further solidify his power as the country’s supreme leader.