Crossing Continents

It has been a year since chainsaw-wielding Javier Milei won the Presidency in Argentina. During his campaign, his chainsaw became a symbol of how quickly and drastically he wanted to cut the Argentin…

Climate change is intensifying, sea levels are rising and the very existence of low-lying Pacific Islands is under threat. The Cook Islands, though, has a plan to assure their peoples’ future. Enter …

Low harvests, economic and climate batterings, changing tastes - is French wine in crisis? The French wine harvest has dropped 18% in one year. For some famous French wine-making regions the reductio…

The Taliban edict that women's voices should not be heard aloud renders women up and down Afghanistan inaudible as well as invisible in public. Women are already denied most forms of education and e…

The journey from cocoa to chocolate in Ivory Coast. The price of cocoa - the essential ingredient in chocolate - has more than quadrupled on the international market in the last two years. Yet many o…

The once glamorous Cypriot beach resort of Varosha has stood empty and frozen in time since war divided the island 50 years ago, but it is now partially open to tourists and there are hotly contested…

Why Armenians in Jerusalem say they are fighting an existential battle. Is the identity of the Old City of Jerusalem changing - house by house? This small patch of land is of vital importance to Chri…

Industrialisation, modern cityscapes and strong economic growth promote an image of a youthful, vigorous Malaysia. But the country is now ageing rapidly, and this sudden transformation seems to have …

The so-called ‘parents’ revolution’ is happening in America - and it’s a revolt against the public education system. School choice campaigns are gaining ground across the country, fighting for tax-fu…

The Italian town of Monfalcone on the Adriatic coast has an ethnic make-up unique to the country. Of a population of just over thirty thousand, more than six thousand are from Bangladesh. They’ve com…

Since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas last year, the cry “From the River to the Sea” has been heard more and more as a pro-Palestinian slogan. But what river? What sea? And what exactly…

The Caspian Sea is the largest inland body of water in the world. Bordered by Kazakhstan, Russia, Iran, Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan it spans 371,000 square kilometres and bridges Europe and Central A…

In 1897 British colonial forces attacked and looted the ancient Kingdom of Benin in what is now southern Nigeria. Thousands of precious objects were taken including stunning sculptures made of bronze…

Last year in Italy the biggest anti-mafia trial in 30 years reached a climax. On the stand were the Calabrian ‘Ndrangheta: they are estimated to run 80 percent of Europe’s cocaine and to make more mo…

It's a quarter of a century since Kosovo emerged from a brutal war, one which pitted local ethnic Albanians against Serbs. Twenty-five years on, the government in Pristina is pressing ahead with refo…

For three decades Armenians ruled Karabakh – literally “Black Garden” – an unrecognised statelet inside neighbouring Azerbaijan. Many saw it as the cradle of their civilisation. But as Azerbaijan ret…

Reggaeton’s the soundtrack to Puerto Rico. The globally popular music reflects what’s going on in the cultural and political scene of the Spanish-speaking Caribbean Island.

It started out as undergrou…

Thousands of people every day are on the move across Mexico towards the border with the US. But for migrants, this is one of the most perilous journeys in the world: land routes are dominated by powe…

Belarus has huge numbers of political prisoners - around three times as many as in Russia, in a far smaller country. Almost industrial scale arrests began after huge, peaceful pro-democracy demonstr…