Newsletter Archive

The Iran protests are being closely watched in Southern California’s ‘Little Persia,’ home to the largest concentration of Iranians outside Iran. The clerical government in Iran is widely viewed as incompetent and corrupt in this neighborhood, and while the US government has expressed support for the protests, people in Little Persia say the US should tread carefully when it comes to Iran.

The protests in Iran are resonating with China democracy advocates who hope a similar uprising could happen in China, leading to an end to tight controls on civil rights and freedoms. Meantime, Chinese authorities have moved quickly to tighten censorship controls online and limit discussions of the anti-government demonstrations in Iran.

VOA INTERVIEW: National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster tells VOA contributor Greta Van Susteren that while it is key to let the Iranian people speak for themselves, strong voices are also needed across the world on behalf of the protesters. McMaster says the Iranian regime must be denied the resources needed to continue its ‘murderous campaigns,’ and that the US might use diplomacy as well as sanctions to make that happen.

After acquiring a taste for cigars, entertainment lawyer Rocky Patel decided to make his own even though friends said he was crazy to try — after all, what did an American lawyer of Indian descent know about making quality cigars? Patel spent time learning from top-end growers and tobacco plantations abroad, and today his is one of the best-known names in the world of premium cigars.

Crazy or canny? President Trump and the US intelligence community disagree on the mental health of North Korean’s Kim Jong Un. In one tweet, the president said the North Korean leader is ‘obviously a madman.’ Yet the Central Intelligence Agency calls Kim a ‘very rational actor’ who displays ‘clarity of purpose’ as he antagonizes and provokes on the world stage.

Bonna Neang Weinstein wept as she watched a New York performance of the first major symphonic work to remember the 1.7 million Cambodians who died under Khmer Rouge rule. For Weinstein, a survivor who arrived in the US in 1984, the concert brought back painful memories. The production is a collaboration between a composer and filmmaker who both survived the brutal regime, which killed about 90 percent of Cambodia’s artists. They are part of a movement to revive and preserve the ancient arts that the Khmer Rouge tried to destroy.