People march to protest physical abuse of women and in support of Colombia's peace talks with the FARC, Bogota, Colombia, Nov. 22, 2013 (AP photo by Fernando Vergara).

Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series on the status of women’s rights and gender equality in various countries around the globe. The Colombian government and rebels from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) agreed during peace negotiations last month to promote women’s access to property and to deny amnesty to perpetrators of sexual violence. In an email interview, Felipe Jaramillo Ruiz, a founding member of Colombian Network of International Relations and doctoral student at the Graduate Institute of Geneva, discusses women’s rights in Colombia. WPR: What is the current status of women’s rights and […]

An oil field pump works while wind turbines generate power in the distance, Saskatchewan, Canada, Aug. 29, 2014 (AP photo by Larry MacDougal).

Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series on countries’ risk exposure, contribution and response to climate change. Last month, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in an interview that imposing a “strong” price on carbon is an “essential element” of his government’s climate change policy. In an email interview, Amin Asadollahi, the lead for climate change mitigation at the International Institute for Sustainable Development, discusses Canada’s response to climate change. WPR: How big of an issue is climate change domestically, and what role has Canada played in regional and global efforts to address climate change? Amin […]

A vigil for the victims of a mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub, Orlando, Fla., June 13, 2016 (AP photo by David Goldman).

A bloody summer, with attacks from Orlando to Nice to Bangladesh, has left many wondering what compels an individual, whether a low-level criminal with a history of domestic violence or a student at an elite private school, to massacre civilians in the name of the so-called Islamic State or another extremist group. Even more confounding is how to stop them. That question isn’t new, or unique to the rise of the Islamic State. For years, governments, analysts and observers have worked to understand the drivers of radicalization and how best to block the road to extremism, particularly among youth. In […]

President Joseph Kabila during an independence day celebration, Kindu, Democratic Republic of Congo, June 30, 2016 (AP photo by John Bompengo).

It has become a bit of a surreal experience to fly into Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, or DRC. Visitors are greeted by a modern terminal, opened in 2015 and capable of servicing 1 million passengers a year. The fresh tarmac of a 10-lane highway that glides commuters into the city center is lined with solar-powered streetlights and stops for a new public transit system. Clearly Kinshasa is trying its best return to its former glory, when it was admiringly called “la belle.” On the surface, a lot has changed since the last presidential election in […]

View of the road that leads to Isle de Jean Charles, La., Nov. 23, 2009 (AP photo by Bill Haber).

Climate-driven migration will likely affect millions of people in the coming decades, adding to the displacement of millions from war and instability. States and international organizations will need to dedicate additional resources to climate migrants, but they can already begin by integrating support into essential resilience and adaptation responses currently underway. Climate change policies are beginning to confront the complex dynamics of populations living in areas that are no longer habitable due to sea-level rise, desertification or other effects. Politics and policy choices are starting to play out at various levels. And the migrants themselves are grappling with decisions at […]

Syrian refugee children at a refugee camp in the town of Hosh Hareem, Lebanon, Jan. 4, 2016 (AP photo by Hassan Ammar).

In the early hours of June 27, four suicide bombers detonated their explosive belts in the sleepy Lebanese town of al-Qaa, which lies just a few kilometers from the Syrian frontier. Another four attackers would strike later in the evening, with the two attacks killing five and wounding scores more. In the context of spillover from the Syrian civil war, the violence itself was not an anomaly. Lebanon has been on high alert for retaliatory terrorist activity ever since 2013, when Hezbollah leader Sayed Hasan Nasrallah publicly announced the party’s fighters were active in Syria alongside longtime ally President Bashar […]

Cuban President Raul Castro addresses the 7th Cuban Communist Party Congress, Havana, Cuba, April 16, 2016 (Cubadebate photo by Ismael Francisco via AP).

Shock waves from Venezuela’s precipitous economic collapse have finally reached Cuba. They are forcing drastic cuts in energy consumption, slashing economic growth from 4 percent last year to just 1 percent in 2016, and raising fears of another “Special Period”—the catastrophic economic decline in the 1990s that followed the collapse of Cuba’s previous patron, the Soviet Union. Cuba’s predicament was foreshadowed by the plunging price of oil on the world market and Venezuela’s declining production, down 12 percent in the past year alone. Nevertheless, for several years Venezuela continued to meet its obligation to ship some 80,000 to 90,000 barrels […]

U.S. National Security Advisor Susan Rice and Chinese President Xi Jinping, Beijing, China, July 25, 2016. (AP photo by How Hwee Young).

U.S. National Security Adviser Susan Rice visited China last month, where she held talks with Chinese officials about the threat of terrorism and prospects for improving counterterrorism cooperation. In an email interview, Jeffrey Payne, the Manager of Academic Affairs at the Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Studies, discusses the state of counterterrorism cooperation between the U.S. and China. (The views expressed in this article are his alone and do not represent the official policy or position of the National Defense University, the Department of Defense or the U.S. government.) WPR: How extensive is counterterrorism cooperation between the U.S. […]

Peacekeepers and U.N. police officers conduct a search for weapons and contraband, Juba, South Sudan, July 19, 2016 (U.N. photo by Eric Kanalstein).

The United Nations is constantly embroiled in brutal conflicts, but some do it vastly more political harm than others. The organization has never fully recovered from its failure to prevent the Rwandan genocide and Srebrenica massacre in the 1990s. Now it faces simultaneous crises in South Sudan and Syria that may do it equally severe damage. In South Sudan, peacekeepers have been thrown off balance by an outburst of violence for the second time in three years. The U.N. mission (UNMISS) there was unable to stop the country collapsing into civil war in 2013, but managed to protect tens of […]

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