The World: Latest Stories

The Trump administration has decided not to defend a 20-year-old federal ban on female genital mutiliation despite what activists say about the need to protect young girls.

As genetic information becomes more readily available because of companies like 23andMe, scientists are finding new ways to treat diseases through gene therapy.

From trolling the religious right to being recognized by the IRS as a real religion, the Satanic Temple is on the rise. And with growth comes a new challenge.

Mira Jacob's new book, "Good Talk: A Memoir in Conversation," explores the themes of interracial marriages, racism, and raising a brown child.

Thirty-seven men were beheaded last week in Saudi Arabia. Most of them were from the country’s minority Shia community.

About a half hour east of Reykjavik, the ground seethes with steam — a bizarre, thick fog pouring out of the pebbly earth.

A new Pentagon report counts only a fraction of the civilian casualties confirmed by NGOs, according to numbers reported by Amnesty International and Airwars.

Romanian sex workers are reporting that they're being harassed and threatened with arrest and deportation by police, says the London Collective of Prostitutes. The group has published a pamphlet titled,"Sex workers are getting screwed by Brexit."

The cult punk-folk hero looks back on her cage-rattling, patriarchy-punching early years.

Norwegian writer Karl Ove Knausgård on the raw intensity of his country’s greatest painter, Edvard Munch.

In 2010, Kurt Andersen paid a visit to Pete Seeger at his home. The folk music giant would have turned 100 this week.

An entertaining, yet grueling, look at misogyny in popular songs.

Several former players for the Vancouver Whitecaps women's soccer team have come forward to say the club has mishandled accusations of bullying and sexually suggestive behavior by a former coach. Host Carol Hills speaks to one of the former Whitecaps players, Ciara McCormack.

Kate Nash knows what Lyra McKee's family is going through. She has been waiting almost 50 years to see the man she believes responsible for her brother’s 1972 killing in Londonderry convicted. She also knows that day may never come.

A federal judge recently allowed a lawsuit against ExxonMobil to go forward over the alleged vulnerabilities of the company’s Boston Harbor storage facility to climate disruption.

Ambassador Jon Huntsman sat down with The World's Marco Werman for this exclusive interview in Moscow, Russia.

The Swedish movement of flygskam, or "flight shame," has brought awareness to the toll that air travel has on the environment. It has also given way to tagskryt, or "train bragging."

Since the first Earth Day, on April 22, 1970, much has been done to clean up our air and water here in the US and elsewhere. But the world isn’t yet curbing carbon emissions fast enough, and US leadership on the issue has almost vanished.

One week after the Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka, authorities warn that extremists may be planning more attacks, while religious sites are starting to rebuild from the destruction.

Leaders are accused of embezzling well over a billion dollars earmarked for social and development projects in Haiti, fueling protests that shut down the country.

Last month, when a series of devastating floods hit large swaths of Iran, volunteers went out of their way to help. Ali Asaei was one of them.

Beyond the internationally renowned art scene in Marfa, Texas, lives a reminder of America's history of segregated education for Mexican Americans.

Authorities in Sri Lanka urged people to pray at home instead of in mosques and stationed guards outside those that remained open.

Until recently, Sehuencas water frogs were among the more than 500 species of frogs and other amphibians on the brink of extinction. Just one male, named Romeo, was living in a lab in Bolivia, assumed to be the last of his species. But researchers recently found five more of these frogs in a cloud forest in the mountains of Bolivia. They took one of the females, named her Juliet, and brought her to meet Romeo.

A teenager in the Philippines created a hand-painted gown for high school ball. It's gorgeous — and is now an internet sensation.

Nearly three years on, Colombia's fragile peace process is faltering as armed gangs and drug cartels continue to grip the country.

French President Emmanuel Macron vowed to cut taxes in his national address Thursday. But some social justice activists aren’t satisfied with his plans for reform.

This is the album that helped forge punk’s DIY attitude with its fusion of free-form rock and poetry.

A Baltimore police officer turns to poetry to understand his experiences on the job.

When the curtain never closes on high school drama.

The 37-year-old mayor of South Bend, Indiana, Pete Buttigieg, is running for president. His fans call him Mayor Pete and he was virtually unknown until recently, but this Rhodes Scholar and veteran of Navy intelligence is riding high on a wave of media attention, in part because of his relentless focus on the future instead of the past.

On Tuesday, the UN Security Council passed a resolution condemning sexual violence in war. It should have been an uncontroversial vote.

Doctors inspecting detention centers found problems with recruiting and retaining qualified pediatricians and mental health care providers, and a lack of access to emergency and specialty care, given the remote locations of most of the facilities.

In El Salvador, erratic weather is taking a big toll, agricultural experts say, compounding the challenges for coffee farmers at a critical moment.

Vermont — a state with a declining, aging population and falling birth rates — is trying to be welcoming, but hasn’t quite figured out how to attract new, diverse residents.

The US has told five countries that they must stop buying Iranian oil. But China may continue to import Iranian crude, despite Washington's protests.

When Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke stepped down in January amid multiple ethics probes, his deputy secretary, David Bernhardt, filled in. Now, as the longtime oil and agribusiness lobbyist formally takes the reins at the Interior Department, criticism is mounting over alleged conflicts of interest and government documents indicate that Bernhardt interfered with a key US Fish and Wildlife Service report that detailed the risks pesticides can pose to endangered species.

A Canadian journalist who does impressions on YouTube will voice Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Sunday's episode of "The Simpsons."

More than 100 people were killed in the St. Sebastian church in the village of Katuwapitiya. On Tuesday, the community gathered to mourn their dead in mass funerals.

In Nigeria, many say being a vegetarian is just not ... Nigerian. But a tiny, growing group is trying to promote a vegetarian — even vegan — diet.

With no experience and a limited policy platform, comedian-turned-president Volodymyr Zelenskiy might not change much in Ukraine, but his landslide victory still says something about voters' frustrations.

Loujain al-Hathloul was arrested nearly a year ago for defying Saudi Arabia's band on female drivers. But it's a been nearly a year since her arrest and her family is trying to get their story out in hopes of freeing her.

Pamela Green is the director of a new film about Guy-Blaché called “Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blache.” She says Guy-Blaché changed the course of cinema.

There’s a short stretch of road in the “Little India” section of Jersey City bearing a name unfamiliar to most Americans. But for some Indian Americans, Ambedkar Avenue is almost a pilgrimage spot, for it commemorates their greatest hero — and one with an American connection at that.

Since fomer President Alan García's death, there has been a flood of unverified death-bed photos, doctored audio and rumors published on social media and in tabloids.

We counted the percentage of each page of the report that was redacted. Then we made a song out of it.

Since the 2016 attempted coup in Turkey, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has jailed thousands of people, including doctors, teachers, lawyers — and mothers. A group of Turkish women in the US has found a way to help imprisoned women share their stories in their own voices.

Vogue Portugal's most recent cover features a black woman with albinism, Thando Hopa. A lawyer and activist from South Africa, she's the first model with albinism to appear on the cover of the global fashion magazine.

The long, rich musical and social history of a great old American song — before and after Kurt Cobain and Nirvana took a turn at making it theirs.

Night after night, Iggy Berlin steps on stage at the Met Opera House hoping to blend seamlessly into the background.