Global Dispatches -- World News That Matters

In April 2019, Sudanese dictator Omar al-Bashir was ousted in a coup after nearly 30 years in power. The coup followed months of mass civilian protests against his regime.  The transition from dictat…

Humanity is tantalizingly close to killing off the last Guinea Worm. This is a water born parasite that when ingested grows and grows until it painfully exits the body through a lesion in the skin. T…

Nagorno-Karabakh  is an ethnic Armenian enclave within the internationally recognized borders of Azerbaijan. In the early 1990s Armenia and Azerbaijan fought a bloody war resulting in Armenia's de-fa…

The Dadaab Refugee Complex in Kenya hosts about 310,000 refugees, most of whom are Somalis who have fled conflict and drought. 

Dadaab has been around for about 30 years. And  over the decades, it ha…

We are in the midst of an escalating cycle of violence in Israel and Palestine. On Thursday, January 26 Israeli forces killed at least 9 people in a raid in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank. T…

My guest Reed Brody is a veteran war crimes prosecutor and author of the new book "To Catch a Dictator: The Pursuit and Trial of Hissene Habre." 

Hissene Habre was the brutal dictator of Chad from 19…

Since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24th, 2022 there have been numerous examples of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by Russian soldiers. Many of these crimes are being investiga…

Peru is in the midst of the worst political violence experienced in the country in decades. Protests began in December following the ouster of former President Pedro Castillo. He was impeached and ar…

On February 25th, Nigeria will hold federal elections. Nigeria is the largest democracy in Africa and one of the largest multiparty democracies in the world. Incumbent Muhammadu Buhari is respecting …

Agathe Demarais was a treasury official in the French government working in Moscow and Beirut when she saw, first hand, some of the unintended impacts of US sanctions. Agathe Demarais is the global f…

According to the International Monetary Fund, 22 countries in Africa are either in debt distress or at high risk of debt distress --that is, they are unable to fulfill their financial obligations to …

In December protests erupted in cities across Bangladesh, including the capital Dhaka. The proximate cause was skyrocketing inflation triggered in part by Russia's war in Ukraine. But as my guest Mic…

In this episode, we are joined by Chris Miller, author of the new book "Chip Wars: The Fight for the World's Most Critical Technology." The books tells the story of microchip, including its history a…

As 2023 begins the world is beset by crises driven by conflict, climate change and the nexus of the two. But some places are expected to be hit harder than others as the year unfolds and this episode…

The border region of Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger is home to violent extremist groups eager to recruit young men to their ranks. To counter the lure of groups like the Islamic State officials have ex…

The United States has several hundred military bases scattered across the world. But how do citizens within countries hosting US troops feel about those bases and US military personnel? 

In this epis…

Negotiations for a new Global Treaty on Plastics formally kicked off in early December. Delegates from around 160 countries met in Uruguay for the first round of talks aimed at reducing the harmful i…

Delegates from nearly every country in the world are meeting in Montreal for the UN Biodiversity Conference known as COP15. Their goal is to come up with a new global action plan to preserve nature a…

On December 8, the World Health Organization released its latest annual report on the global fight against Malaria.

The World Malaria Report found that progress against Malaria has begun stabilize af…

This episode of Global Dispatches is a bit different than usual. Rather than the host, Mark Leon Goldberg interviewing someone, he is the one being interviewed.

Moderators at the WordNews page on Red…