The World: Latest Stories

The Brazilian town of Santa Bárbara d’Oeste is known for one thing above all — its annual Confederate festival. Descendants of thousands of people who emigrated to Brazil from the US South after they lost the Civil War celebrate their American heritage. Typically, the Confederate flag stands out. But recently, the City Council voted to ban the flag because of its racist symbolism.

The president-elect, who has served as deputy president for the past 10 years, has been elected at a time when Kenya's flailing, debt-laden economy has left a lot of people struggling to make ends meet.

Since Brittney Griner was arrested, detained, and later sentenced in Moscow, her supporters have been advocating for the Biden administration to do anything possible to secure her release. The US and Russian officials have been in talks about a potential prisoner swap. The person that has come up most frequently as the man who could be released in exchange for Griner is Viktor Bout.

Bison once roamed the United Kingdom freely, but like many native animals, agriculture and human development killed them all off. This month, for the first time in 6,000 years, three wild bison were released into a forest near Kent.

Every August, the neighborhood celebrates the Festa Major de Gràcia, or Gràcia Street Festival. The weeklong event running through Sunday, features a contest for the best-decorated street, with residents working hand in hand for months to produce the most impressive ornaments, often employing recycled materials.

​​​​​​​For much of the pandemic, West African countries have lacked the vaccines needed to protect their populations against COVID-19. Now, supply in the region has finally caught up with demand for the vaccine. Still, too few people are vaccinated.

The World’s Marco Werman spoke to Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala about the shipments, the slowdown in global trade and how it's contributing to world hunger.

The World’s Marco Werman spoke to Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala about the shipments, the slowdown in global trade and how it's contributing to world hunger.

The New York-based duo makes music about a wide variety of themes but often come back to songs about Peruvian shamanism.

Sri Lankan families who have never had to worry about putting food on the table are now struggling. Even those with a financial cushion are seeing their lives being upended.

While countries around the world have begun congratulating the president-elect, within Kenya, the results remain controversial and disputed.

An arms control policy expert says that a military video put out by North Korea in March may have been faked to cover up an unsuccessful ballistic missile launch. His team deconstructs the images to try to verify them.

A group of young female skateboarders in Bolivia are using their attire to break stereotypes across society. Spanish colonizers introduced polleras to the country centuries ago, and they became a symbol of the Quechua and Aymara ethnic groups of South America.

A million Brazilians have signed a letter in "defense of democracy" in anticipation of turmoil surrounding the upcoming presidential election in October. President Jair Bolsonaro has been questioning whether the upcoming election, in which he is running for a second term, will be fair. Critics say he is laying the groundwork to challenge the results.

This summer, Turkish inflation reached levels not seen since the 1990s, and nowhere is it more clear than the rental market. Tenants are seeing their rents double, or even triple, in just one year.

Since the war in Ukraine started, there’s been a wave of interest in Ukrainian history, culture and writing. That means publishers are scrambling and Ukrainian literary translators are working in overdrive.

A recent UNICEF assessment in Sri Lanka found that many people are skipping meals or eating less to get by. Rising food prices and cooking gas shortages have spurred a Sri Lankan nonprofit to provide hot meals to those in need.

Sri Lanka imports at least 80% of its drugs and medical supplies, and the economic crisis has left it with inadequate foreign reserves to pay for them.

A recent wave of attacks against police has put Colombia’s security forces on edge. The government has blamed most of the recent police killings on the Gulf Clan, a drug-trafficking group that runs extortion rackets and exports cocaine to the US.

Voters say they hope for a peaceful transition of power after previous elections were marred by violence — often along ethnic lines. This time, voter turnout is low, but those casting ballots are focused more on issues than ethnic affiliation.

As the US finds itself embroiled in another war, though not with troops, we are reairing our series, "How Wars End," which first ran in 2008.

​​​​​​​The French Alps region is getting hit hard by drought, most likely exacerbated by climate change. And that's putting the entire economy there in serious jeopardy, because where there's no water, there are no tourists.

US Ambassador to Kenya Meg Whitman has just arrived in the capital Nairobi ahead of the country's heated presidential elections. She gave her first press conference over the weekend. While Whitman is more known for leading Fortune 500 companies than diplomacy, she says she will leverage her experience in this new role.

Ahead of Kenya's presidential election on Tuesday, Afropop stars Sauti Sol are using their music to encourage young Kenyans to vote. “A lot of the youth in Kenya feel like their voice doesn't really count,” said band member Bien-Aimè Alusa.

Temple-mosque disputes have been flooding Indian courts in recent years. The current Gyanvapi mosque dispute stokes fear that violence could once again erupt between Hindus and Muslims over claims to the contested site.

In Moscow on Thursday, WNBA star Brittney Griner was sentenced to nine years in prison on drug charges. Griner was detained at the airport in Moscow in February, after security found vape cartridges with cannabis oil in her luggage. Last month, Griner pleaded guilty to possessing the drugs, but said she packed them by mistake.

It is the first time a large carnivore is being moved from one continent to another and reintroduced into the wild.

Bike shops in Sri Lanka’s largest city have reported higher sales — with the largest domestic bike manufacturer seeing a 300% increase in demand.

Sightings of the native magnolia flower had not been recorded since 1925. Expedition leader Eladio Fernandez said the search was like "an act of faith."

President Joe Biden has announced that the US has killed al-Qaeda’s top leader Ayman al-Zawahiri in Afghanistan. Zawahiri was on the US' most-wanted list and had a $25 million bounty on his head.

In a few months, the MareNostrum 4 will be replaced by the 5. It will be able to compute in one hour what the 4 needed an entire year to complete.

Using a keyboard, a saxophone, a bass guitar and percussion, Eblis Alvarez is recreating the classical salsa sound developed by Latino immigrants in New York in the 1970s and giving it somewhat of a psychedelic twist.

The song “PAF.no,” one of the biggest hits in Norway this year, features a chorus in Arabic that has everyone singing along — and also discussing what it means to be Norwegian.

Mexico’s Centla wetlands are part of an ecological reserve in the southeastern Tabasco state that has been impacted by deforestation, cattle grazing and man-made fires. In recent decades, conservationists with Casa del Agua have promoted reforestation and community education to save the wetlands.

This past week, the Zimbabwean government launched a gold coin priced at about $1,800, hoping that when people buy it, it will reduce the number of bills in circulation and eventually stabilize the Zim dollar. But some are dubious about the plan.

Open Arms, a sea rescue nongovernmental organization, has a new vessel with a hospital and room for over 1,000 people, but says Spain is using bureaucracy to block its departure.

​​​​​​​Plastic is everywhere. Scientists have found the stuff in just about every corner of the planet, even through the high seas. But getting a better understanding of what's going on here, where the plastic waste comes from, and what it is, can still be challenging. That's especially true along shallow coastlines.

Indigenous communities in Brazil have long had a difficult relationship with Christian missionaries. Experts say it's not about religion, but mineral riches.

​​​​​​​As evangelicals grow in number and political influence in Brazil, members of other religious traditions are feeling uneasy. Some have even been attacked. Evangelical activists have targeted many Afro Brazilian religious centers and destroyed icons, and have even attacked clergy members.

Protestant evangelicals from Brazil and the United States have a long history of close relations. Today, Capitol Ministries is a powerful player in that relationship. And in Brazil, the group has strong ties with President Jair Bolsonaro's government.

Protestant evangelicals are a fast-growing segment of the country. Politically, President Jair Bolsonaro is their candidate.

When Julie Sedivy was four, her family fled their native Czechoslovakia and settled in Canada. Years later, a return trip to the Czech Republic made her realize she could quickly recover her mother tongue through memories. Sedivy recounts her linguistic journey in a new book called "Memory Speaks."

Iraqi protesters aligned with Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's political movement stormed the heavily militarized Green Zone and Iraqi Parliament building on Wednesday. The World's Marco Werman spoke with Hamzeh Hadad, a visiting fellow with the European Council on Foreign Relations, about the protesters' demands and the political gridlock plaguing Iraq.

In the Turkish city of Istanbul, police have continued a stepped-up campaign of random ID checks in immigrant neighborhoods. This week, officials acknowledged that 19,000 people have been deported over the past eight months. It’s not clear how many of them are Syrians.

Sri Lanka, which imports its fuel, currently lacks enough dollars to buy adequate supplies of gasoline, diesel, cooking gas and kerosene. That's impacting the country's fishing industry, with people running out of fuel for their boats.

Rosalía, who hails from a sleepy town near Barcelona, Spain, is often confused for a Latina artist. But her music does adopt some styles from Latin America. Before her latest song, “Despechá” had been officially released, a clip from it had already been viewed millions of times.

Rosalía, who hails from a sleepy town near Barcelona, Spain, is often confused for a Latina artist. But her music does adopt some styles from Latin America. Her latest song, “Despechá” hasn't been officially released yet, but a clip from the song has already been viewed millions of times.

Soccer may be China’s national sport, but enthusiasm for frisbee — a quintessential American sport — is growing in China. Ultimate Frisbee is one of the few no-contact, mixed-gender sports in the country. And that may be one of the reasons that women, especially, are now flocking to it.

The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act has been in effect one month. Human rights lawyer Rayhan Asat said that it's the first time that a US law imposes demanding standards on importers to disprove the use of forced labor in their goods coming into the US.