A protester displays a mock target with an image of an alleged victim of extrajudicial killings during a rally in Manila, Philippines, Dec. 10, 2017 (AP photo by Bullit Marquez).

CALOOCAN, Philippines—The battlefield of this war looks like any other bustling urban district in the Philippines. The sidewalks are crammed with street vendors selling everything from food to underwear. Pedestrians zigzag through the roads, avoiding motorized rickshaws known as tricycles and careening jeepneys, the colorful converted jeeps that are the country’s most common form of public transportation. The air is thick with smog and heavy with the sound of blaring horns and screeching tires. Set back from the streets are rows of makeshift homes stitched together by pieces of wood, corrugated steel and tarpaulin. This is Bagong Silang, an informal […]

1

Recent controversies involving the U.S. military in Africa highlight how the Pentagon uses ambiguous language and outright secrecy to obscure its activities. At times, this has involved subverting democratic processes in partner countries, an approach that runs counter to years of diplomatic engagement. AGADEZ, Niger—In early May, Gen. Thomas D. Waldhauser, the head of U.S. Africa Command, addressed a group of journalists gathered in a staid, gray room at the Pentagon. The press conference had been called to disclose the main findings of the Defense Department’s investigation of an ambush seven months earlier in the West African nation of Niger. […]

British Prime Minister Theresa May leaves 10 Downing Street, London, April 26, 2018 (AP photo by Frank Augstein).

In early October 2002, the British Conservative Party gathered at the Bournemouth International Centre on the south coast of England for its annual conference. Still traumatized by a second consecutive landslide defeat against the Labour Party, then headed by Tony Blair, the Tories had come together to plot their return to government after five long years out of power. On the opening day of the conference, the party chairwoman, Theresa May, took to the stage in an all-black outfit that added to the funereal atmosphere of the event. She told her fellow Tories something that many people were thinking, even […]

A Bolivian coca leaf producer packs 50-pound bags of the dried plant to be sold and delivered to traditional market retailers, La Paz, Bolivia, March 28, 2006 (AP photo by Dado Galdieri).

Just as the expulsion of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration removed a check on drug-related corruption at the highest levels of Bolivia’s government, it has also created space for an alarming increase in lower-level illicit activity. Nevertheless, President Evo Morales maintains he has the market for cocaine in Bolivia under control.On a Thursday evening this past February, two Bolivian men met at a public plaza in the country’s capital, La Paz, to discuss a major cocaine sale. Though they had been texting back and forth all week, each was wary of the other. One of the men, Luis, was an […]

Soldiers destroy illegal coca plants with machetes during a government-organized media trip to the Villa Nueva community of Chimore, Bolivia, Feb. 26, 2016 (AP photo by Juan Karita).

Editor’s note: This is the first installment of a two-part series on Bolivia’s relationship with coca, funded by WPR’s International Reporting Fellowship. The second installment can be found here. Ten years ago, Bolivian President Evo Morales expelled the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, which had been tasked with curbing the production of coca in Bolivia, the main ingredient in cocaine. Since then, Morales has championed a nationalized, legal coca market, but critics accuse him of fostering the rise of a narco-state. On a Monday afternoon this past February, around 300 residents of the small jungle town of Chimore in central Bolivia […]