Dispatch
The view from the ground.
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Indonesian officials boarded the luxury yacht 'Equanimity', reportedly worth some $250 million and owned by Jho Low, a former unofficial adviser to the Malaysian fund 1MDB, at Benoa Bay in Bali on February 28, 2018. (RULLY PRASETYO/AFP/Getty Images) Malaysia’s $6.5 Billion Scandal Almost Sank Its Democracy
The cover-up of the 1MDB affair was taking the country toward autocracy — until the people won the day.
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Markus Söder of the Bavarian Christian Social Union and the new governor of Bavaria conducts a brass band at the Bavarian state parliament on March 16, 2018 in Munich, Germany. How Far Will Bavaria’s CSU Go to Fend Off Germany’s Far-Right?
Angela Merkel’s sister party, the Christian Social Union, is taking an extreme line on refugees and threatening to bring down her coalition.
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Joe Magee for Foreign Policy In China’s Far West, Companies Cash in on Surveillance Program That Targets Muslims
The firms profiting from China's rights abuses are often backed by Western investors.
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An Ethiopian U.N. peacekeeper patrols the Amiet Market in Abyei. The market has become the largest trading hub in the region and a symbol of peace between the Misseriya nomads from Sudan and the Ngok Dinka from South Sudan. Local leaders use the market to resolve issues of conflict and are working together to bring stability to the area, which has been contested for more than ten years. Conflict in Abyei Could Reignite South Sudan’s Civil War
If the U.N. withdraws peacekeepers from a long-contested oil-rich enclave, it's likely to spark further fighting in an already unstable region.
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Pedestrians pass a billboard urging a 'no' vote in the referendum to preserve the eighth amendment of the Irish constitution in Dublin on May 13, 2018. Ireland’s Nasty No Campaign
Anti-abortion activists are deploying every imaginable scare tactic to defeat a referendum that would grant Irish women the right to choose.
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(William Thomas Cain/Getty Images/Ozan Kose/AFP/Getty Images/Foreign Policy illustration) Erdogan’s Flying Carpet
Istanbul’s massive new airport fits with Turkey’s grand neo-Ottoman ambitions, but it may be too big for its own good.
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Rohingya refugees in Balukhali camp on January 13, 2018 in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh. The Rohingya Have Fled One Crisis for Another
As the monsoon season looms, hundreds of thousands of refugees are living in overcrowded Bangladeshi refugee camps at risk of an imminent cholera outbreak.
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Former Malaysian prime minister and opposition candidate Mahathir Mohamad celebrates in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on May 10. (Manan Vatsyayana/AFP/Getty Images) Everyday Anger Brought Down Malaysia’s Government
Corruption and incompetence pushed Malaysians to end decades of one-party rule.
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Supporters of former Malaysian prime minister and opposition candidate Mahathir Mohamad celebrate in Kuala Lumpur on May 10. (Mohd Rasfan/AFP/Getty Images) Malaysia’s Elites Ride The People’s Tsunami
Amid a democratic triumph, the new boss is still literally the old boss.
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Jordan’s Chinese CH-4 drone on display at this year’s SOFEX arms show. (Sharon Weinberger/Foreign Policy) China Has Already Won the Drone Wars
Chinese companies are proving that America is not first in the UAV export market. Can Trump roll that back?
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A torn up campaign poster for Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, for the upcoming parliamentary elections in the capital of the northern Iraqi Kurdish autonomous region Arbil. (SAFIN HAMED / AFP) Welcome to Iraq’s First Post-Sectarian Election
Iraqi politicians are finally crossing ethnic and religious lines. But how long can the good vibes last?
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Sara Danius, Permanent Secretary of the Swedish Academy, gives a press conference to announce the laureate of the 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature at the Swedish Academy in Stockholm, Sweden, on Oct. 13, 2016. (JONATHAN NACKSTRAND/AFP/Getty Images) The Nobel Scandal Has Become a Swedish Foreign-Policy Crisis
Have allegations of sexual assault at Sweden's most famous institution harmed the country's reputation — or helped it?
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A member of Iran's Revolutionary Guard stands under a national flag on the wreckage of a captured U.S. Air Force helicopter during a ceremony in Tehran in April 2010. (ATTA KENARE/AFP/Getty Images) Iran Will Never Trust America Again
When the nuclear deal was signed, Revolutionary Guards told me they wanted a better relationship with America. Not anymore.
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An image released November 13, 2017, shows detainees staging a protest inside the compound at the Manus Island detention center in Papua New Guinea. There’s No Escape From Australia’s Refugee Gulag
One branch of Canberra's notorious offshore detention system has closed. But the men who were imprisoned there are now stranded on a remote Pacific island that doesn't want them.
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Recep Tayyip Erdogan makes a speach to supporters during a rally on June 16, 2013, in Istanbul. (OZAN KOSE/AFP/Getty Images) Erdogan’s Motley Opponents Have United to Take Him Down
Turkey’s strongman might not be strong enough to survive the early elections he wanted.
