Global Dispatches -- World News That Matters

Something different on the podcast this week! I recent sat down with a number of officials at the United Nations as part of Talk Radio Day 2014. This is an annual event hosted by the United Nations F…

From the perspective of the United Nations, the crisis in Iraq cannot be disaggregated from the crisis in Syria.

In this special edition of Global Dispatches, I speak with the United Nations Deputy S…

In 2022 Qatar will host the World Cup. Migrant workers, mostly from Southeast Asia, are living in harsh conditions and dying in large numbers as they construct the infrastructure for the World Cup…

Egypt's ex Army Chief Abdel Fatah al Sisi won election this week (with an astounding 96% of the vote!) The ascent of this Mubarak-era military functionary speaks to the profound failure of Egypt's 20…

President Obama's commencement address to West Point Graduates this week was billed by the White House as a major foreign policy address. But there were some conspicuous absences from the talk. What …

Libya today is arguably closer to a full blown civil war than at any time since the fall of Muammar Ghaddafi in 2011. A renegade general named Khalifa Haftar is on the March, seeking to upend an Isl…

The largest excerise in democracy in the history of humanity is coming to an end. Narendra Modi will cruise to victory, but what does his ascent mean for India's relationship with Pakistan, China,…

Boko Haram is in the news for all the wrong reasons. A series of audactious attacks, including the kidnapping of hundreds of school girls, has provoked international outrage. But why would Boko Hara…

The scion of Ted Turner is forging a new philanthropic path, focusing on reproductive health and environmental issues. She talks to Mark Leon Goldberg about growing up a Turner, her focus on reprodu…

Iraq is in the midst of an unrelenting descent into violence. Every day brings news of another bombing or attack that leaves scores of people dead. This has been the case for the past several months…

The historian Gary Bass has penned a new book that is getting rave reviews. The Blood Telegram: Nixon, Kissinger and a Forgotten Genocide tells the story of the muted American response to a human ri…

Mark Leon Goldberg speaks with the demographer and economist Mark Montgomery about global population trends. It turns out that adolescent girls in the developing world hold a tremendous amount of de…

Doing things a little differently this week. Mark conducts a series of back-to-back-to-back interviews with experts from around the United Nations. Interesting, wonky discussions were had! Here are t…

In this special edition of Global Dispatches, Mark Leon Goldberg interviews Shelly Pitterman of the UN Refugee Agency. Today, June 20th, is World Refugee Day and earlier this week the UN High Commiss…

Mark Leon Goldberg speaks with Suzanne Nossel, author of the influential Foreign Affairs article "Smart Power." Nossel served as a deputy assistant secretary of state during president Obama's first …

We are doing something a little different  today. Instead of one in depth interview, Mark chats with several experts who work for various arms of the United Nations. 

Here's the set up: The UN Founda…

On the line this week is PJ Crowley, the former Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs. Mark and PJ talk about the role of public diplomacy in US foreign policy, PJ's long career in the Air …