White House senior adviser Jared Kushner during the opening session of the “Peace to Prosperity” workshop, Manama, Bahrain, June 25, 2019 (Bahrain News Agency photo via AP).

President Donald Trump views foreign policy through the narrow lens of economic self-interest. He has reduced the notion of American power and influence to a question of whether the United States is getting a “good deal,” measured only in terms of who is paying for what—say, the cost of basing U.S. troops. Gone are any references to the intangible benefits of international cooperation, let alone the common good. It’s how he has approached relations with NATO and with America’s allies in Asia. In recent days, this economic-centric view of U.S. foreign policy has been on display in Trump’s clumsy and […]

Thousands of supporters surround a bus from where Ekrem Imamoglu, the new mayor of Istanbul from Turkey’s main opposition opposition Republican People’s Party, makes a speech after he took over office, in Istanbul, June 27, 2019 (AP photo by Emrah Gurel).

A maxim among Turkey’s political strategists is that the road to Ankara starts in Istanbul. Turkey’s largest city accounts for one-third of the country’s economy and is home to a quarter of its population. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose meteoric political rise began while he was the city’s mayor in the 1990s, knows it as well as anyone. He himself has often remarked that “whoever wins Istanbul also wins the country.” That is why Erdogan applied pressure to dubiously contest the results of March’s mayoral election, which his handpicked candidate, former Prime Minister Binali Yildirim, lost to Ekrem Imamoglu of […]

A street cleaner walks past a poster promoting Peruvian President Martin Vizcarra and his proposed reforms aimed at tackling corruption, in Lima, Peru, June 4, 2019 (AP photo by Martin Mejia).

Martin Vizcarra is Peru’s accidental president, elevated to office after Pedro Pablo Kuczynski resigned in March 2018, when it became clear that he could not survive a second impeachment vote over corruption allegations. Vizcarra’s administration started warily, leading many observers to assume he would be just a caretaker president with a deferential attitude toward Congress, which is controlled by opposition leader Keiko Fujimori and her right-wing, Popular Force party. But after revelations last year of widespread corruption in the upper echelons of the judiciary and the timid congressional response, Vizcarra changed course. He announced he would put a series of […]

An Ebola health worker at a treatment center in Beni, Democratic Republic of Congo, April 16, 2019 (AP photo by Al-hadji Kudra Maliro).

GULU and KAMPALA, Uganda—Earlier this month, a family with a five-year-old boy left the Democratic Republic of the Congo and entered Uganda. They skirted the official crossing point, using an unmarked footpath. The family had attended the burial of a relative in Congo, who had died of Ebola. Since the Ebola epidemic in Congo began in August 2018, more than 1,500 people have perished, making it the largest Ebola outbreak ever in Congo and the second-largest on record. The virus has been notoriously difficult to treat and contain, due to Congo’s instability and its porous borders. Unrest in Congo has […]

French President Emmanuel Macron at a press conference in Brussels, Belgium, June 21, 2019 (AP photo by Riccardo Pareggiani).

Editor’s Note: This article is part of an ongoing seriesabout press freedom and safety in various countries around the world. During his campaign for the presidency in 2017, Emmanuel Macron assiduously cultivated good relationships with the French press. He appeared to enjoy his interactions with the media, and his message always seemed tailored to his audience. In his interviews with mainstream newspapers and networks, he peppered his answers with philosophical references, projecting a sense of genuine intellectual engagement. When he spoke with the tabloids, he answers were soft and frivolous, and the coverage was fawning. The campaign was “a masterpiece […]

A member of the Syrian Civil Defense, known as the White Helmets, searches for survivors in a collapsed residential building in the village of Saraqib in Syria’s Idlib province, June 22, 2019 (DPA photo by Anas Alkharboutli via AP Images).

Since late April, tens of thousands of civilians have fled their homes in the Idlib region in northwestern Syria as President Bashar al-Assad’s air force pummels Islamist-controlled towns. Amid the fighting, Russia and Turkey continue to negotiate for a restoration of a broken cease-fire in Idlib, with each seeking changes that will shore up its own influence over the conflict. As ever in Syria’s civil war, there are key questions about this latest escalation—from the fundamental facts on the ground in Idlib, to the interests of outside powers and the potential endgame. The region of Idlib, which also includes insurgent-held […]

School security guards check students’ national ID cards and testing ID cards to allow admittance to the gaokao, China’s college entrance exam, in Gejiu, China, June 7, 2019 (Photo by Matthew Chitwood)

GEJIU, China—Luo Xing stood on the sidewalk outside Gejiu Third High School reviewing her Chinese language and literature test prep guide. She and hundreds of classmates were cramming last-minute for China’s high-stakes college entrance exam, known as the gaokao, as if 12 years of preparation were not enough. The bell finally rang and the school gates opened, allowing Luo Xing and the mass of students to push past throngs of anxious parents, SWAT police and a brigade of motorcycle cops. They disappeared into the school compound to face one of the hardest tests in the world. More than 10 million […]

Lilit Martirosian, a founder of the Armenian transgender organization Right Side, during an interview for the Associated Press in Yerevan, Armenia, April 26, 2019 (AP photo by Sona Kocharyan).

On April 5, Lilit Martirosyan, the first registered transgender woman in Armenia, became the first member of the country’s LGBT community to speak in the Armenian parliament. LGBT people in Armenia, she told the National Assembly, have been “tortured, raped, kidnapped, physically assaulted, burned, stabbed, murdered, robbed and unemployed.” It was a courageous public appearance in a country where homophobic and transphobic sentiments are widespread. Sadly, but not surprisingly, Martirosyan’s speech was followed by a torrent of death threats and verbal abuse. The chairperson of the parliamentary session she spoke at denounced her appearance. Days later, a crowd of more […]

Indonesian President Joko Widodo, left, and Chinese President Xi Jinping shake hands at a welcome ceremony at Yanqi Lake during the Belt and Road Forum, Beijing, May 15, 2017 (Pool photo by Roman Pilipey via AP).

The ballots hadn’t even been counted yet when the deals were announced. On April 26, just two days after Election Day, Indonesia signed 23 memorandums of understanding with China, worth $14.2 billion in all, for several major infrastructure projects. They came after months of silence about Chinese investment in Indonesia—by design, as President Joko Widodo feared attempts by the opposition to paint him as being too pro-China. It worked, as, in the end, the issue of Chinese investment did not play the same divisive role in Indonesia that it did in elections in Malaysia, the Maldives and Sri Lanka. Instead, […]

El Salvador’s newly sworn-in president, Nayib Bukele, delivers his inaugural address in Plaza Barrios in San Salvador, El Salvador, June 1, 2019 (AP photo by Salvador Melendez).

“CICIES! CICIES!” the crowds chanted at the inauguration of El Salvador’s new president, Nayib Bukele, on June 1. Salvadorans had a message for the members of the Legislative Assembly, too, whom they booed. “Give us back what you have stolen!” Implementing “CICIES”—an international commission against impunity in El Salvador—was the key campaign promise that helped the 37-year-old Bukele win the presidency in February. More than half the population believes that Bukele’s administration will fight corruption within the Salvadoran government, according to polls. The name CICIES is directly inspired by its counterpart next door, the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala, […]

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, center, reviews an honor guard as he is welcomed by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, left, in an official arrival ceremony at the Saadabad Palace in Tehran, Iran, June 12, 2019 (AP photo by Ebrahim Noroozi).

In March 1953, the Japanese oil tanker Nissho Maru set sail from Kobe, in western Japan, bound for the Iranian port of Abadan. Its mission—to transport a shipment of Iranian oil back to Japan—was risky. Two years earlier, Iran’s government had nationalized the Iranian assets of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, which would later become British Petroleum. The British had responded with economic sanctions and a naval blockade, threatening to seize any vessel involved in the transshipment of Iranian oil. With limited trading options, the Iranians were desperate for buyers. Sazo Idemitsu, the founder and president of the oil company Idemitsu […]

Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage at a Brexit Party rally in Peterborough ahead of the upcoming by-election, June 1, 2019 (Press Association photo by Danny Lawson via AP Images).

Just two weeks after the far-right Brexit Party emerged as one of the winners of the European Parliament elections, Nigel Farage’s new political outfit was presented with its first opportunity to win a British parliamentary seat. It was in a by-election in the constituency of Peterborough that appeared firmly slanted in its favor. Peterborough voted to leave the European Union in the 2016 referendum by a clear majority of nearly 61 percent. Its disgraced Labour MP, Fiona Onasanya, who was only elected in 2017 by a paper-thin margin of 607 votes, had been recalled by her own party after being […]

Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Daqlou, top right, the deputy head of Sudan’s Transitional Military Council, waves to supporters during a rally in the town of Garawee, northern Sudan, June 15, 2019 (AP photo).

On June 3, the eve of the 30th anniversary of China’s bloody dispersal of demonstrators in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square, Sudan’s military authorities launched their own massacre of unarmed pro-democracy protesters. State-linked paramilitaries attacked a peaceful sit-in in the capital, Khartoum, claiming, without proof, that it had been infiltrated by drug dealers and criminals. More than 100 people were killed, according to doctors’ groups in Khartoum. Scores of bodies were dumped into the Nile River, women were reportedly raped and hospital staff attacked as they tended to the injured. That the atrocities echoed those conducted in Darfur for more than a […]

Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki, right, is welcomed by Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed at the airport in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, July 14, 2018 (AP photo by Mulugeta Ayene).

ASMARA, Eritrea—The streets of Eritrea’s capital in the runup to this year’s Independence Day celebrations on May 24 were unusually quiet. But cafes and restaurants were full of many Eritreans from the diaspora who had traveled back to mark 28 years of national independence. “I come every year on this occasion,” an Eritrean living in Germany told me, “to celebrate my country.” Most of the people I know who put up with life in Eritrea the whole year, however, do not feel like celebrating. For them, the holiday is a day off work that they will spend at home, in […]

Malawi’s president, Peter Mutharika, greets supporters during his inauguration ceremony at Kamuzu Stadium in Blantyre, Malawi, May 31, 2019 (AP photo by Thoko Chikondi).

President Peter Mutharika was sworn in for a second term in Malawi late last month, but opposition protesters are challenging the legitimacy of his recent reelection, based on widespread allegations of vote-rigging. Lilongwe, Malawi’s capital, has been rocked over the past two weeks by steady protests that have included demonstrators storming government buildings to demand that opposition leader Lazarus Chakwera, who finished a close second in the election, be sworn in as president instead. Last Thursday, police used teargas to disperse a rally outside the headquarters of the opposition Malawi Congress Party, which Chakwera heads. That clash occurred while Chakwera […]

Thailand’s prime minister, Prayuth Chan-ocha, speaks after the royal endorsement ceremony at Government House in Bangkok, June 11, 2019 (Pool photo by Lillian Suwanrumpha via AP images).

Earlier this month, the retired general who led a military coup in Thailand five years ago, Prayuth Chan-ocha, was formally confirmed as prime minister by King Vajiralongkorn, after parliament unsurprisingly voted to hand the position to the former coup leader. Of course, Prayuth, who did not even run in Thailand’s elections in March, was in the position to win the parliamentary vote because, since the coup, the junta he led had essentially hand-picked the upper house of parliament, after rewriting the constitution to make the Senate appointed, and overseen other constitutional changes that weakened large and anti-military parties. Then, after […]

Former First Lady Sandra Torres, who is running for president with the National Unity of Hope party, UNE, shows her candidate ID to supporters during a campaign rally, Mixco, Guatemala, May 25, 2019 (AP photo by Moises Castillo).

Guatemalans vote Sunday in what looks like one of the most unpredictable elections in their country’s recent history. Across an extremely fragmented field, a total of 19 candidates, whittled down from the original 24, are competing for the presidency. Nearly two dozen political parties are also chasing seats in the 160-seat, single-chamber Congress and in 340 municipalities around the country, which, with a population of more 17 million, is the largest in Central America—and where a landmark fight against corruption has taken a U-turn. In a field otherwise skewed to the center and to the right, opinion polls favor former […]

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