Seeking Security

For the first time in four years, Egypt is no longer under a state of emergency. The government of President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi made the decision following years of criticism from human rights advocates.President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi announced his decision in a Facebook post. He said the move came because “Egypt has become an oasis of security and stability in the region.”Related: Activists look to Congress after Biden requests military aid for Egypt without human rights conditionsEgypt has been under a continuous state of emergency since the assassination of President Anwar Sadat in 1981, with the exception of a few years following the 2011 revolution that ousted Hosni Mubarak. The state of emergency was reinstated in 2017 after two Coptic churches in the country were bombed by an ISIS affiliate.Related: Powerful countries break their silence on Egypt's human rights abusesThe state of emergency allowed for arrests without warrants, the swift prosecution of suspects and the establishment of special courts.

Today in Khartoum, Sudan's capital, calls for civil disobedience came blaring from a loudspeaker attached to a mosque. One voice urged citizens not to go to work to punish the military for betraying the revolution.Related: Protests erupt across Sudan against military coup Yesterday, top generals seized power in Sudan. The military has cut most phone and internet services. Protesters have created blockades of burning tires, and soldiers are pursuing them — reportedly going door to door. Troops fired on crowds a day earlier, killing four protesters, according to doctors.Sudan’s ruling general said Tuesday that deposed Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdock was being held for his own safety and would likely be released soon. But he warned that other members of the dissolved government could face trial as protests against the putsch continued in the streets.Related: Sudan's troubled attempt at education reformThe takeover came after weeks of mounting tensions between military and civilian leaders over the course and the

Across Sudan, people have taken to the streets to protest a military coup that threatens their hopes for a democratic future.For two years, the country has been run by a tense and volatile power-sharing agreement between civilian and military leaders that was established after former dictator Omar al-Bashir was ousted from power.Tensions came to a critical point on Monday when armed forces detained Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, Cabinet Affairs Minister Khalid Omer Yousif and other top civilian leaders.Related: After the revolution, a secular Sudan?“We still don’t know any news about the whereabouts of the prime minister, his wife, five of the ministers and a number of political leaders who were arrested in the early hours of this morning,” said Yousif’s adviser, Abdelmoniem el-Jack, over the phone from Khartoum.Jack, who is currently in hiding, said the military takeover was driven by three contested issues with the civilian leaders: unification of armed forces, reclaiming of economic resources controlled by

A court in Saudi Arabia upheld a 20-year prison term imposed on a Saudi aid worker who had criticized the government on Twitter, drawing a rare public rebuke from the US in another sign of tension between the Biden administration and the kingdom.The ruling, confirmed late Wednesday, also upheld a 20-year travel ban on Abdulrahman al-Sadhan after his release. The case against him may have roots in an elaborate ploy that began in Silicon Valley and sparked a federal case against two Twitter employees accused of spying for Saudi Arabia. The men allegedly accessed the user data of over 6,000 Twitter accounts, including nearly three dozen usernames the kingdom had wanted disclosed.Abdulrahman al-Sadhan's family has said his identity appears to have been among those leaked to Saudi authorities as the person behind an anonymous Arabic Twitter account that had amassed a large following and was critical of the government. His case is the latest example of the continued crackdown against those who criticize the Saudi g

Twenty years ago today, less than a month after 9/11, then-President George W. Bush addressed the nation to announce the US-led invasion of Afghanistan."Good afternoon. On my orders, the United States military has begun strikes against al-Qaeda terrorist training camps and military installations of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan," Bush said.Related: 'Why don’t you have mercy?': Afghanistan’s Hazara people increasingly face eviction, violence under Taliban ruleFast forward two decades, and this year in August, Afghanistan fell to the Taliban again, followed by an address to the nation by President Joe Biden announcing the end of the war."Our mission in Afghanistan has taking many missteps, made many missteps, over the past two decades," said Biden. "I'm now the fourth American president to preside over war in Afghanistan. Two Democrats and two Republicans. I will not pass this responsibility onto a fifth president."Related: The Afghan government and the US lost popular support over corruption in Afghanistan

The Taliban raided an ISIS-affiliated hideout in the Afghan capital Kabul killing several insurgents, hours after a deadly bombing outside the Eid Gah mosque on Sunday that left at least five people dead. No one has taken responsibility for the blast, but the rival ISIS group has ramped up attacks against the Taliban, including the Aug. 26 bombing that killed more than 169 Afghans and 13 US military personnel outside Kabul airport.Related: Former adviser Sarah Chayes: The US failed to understand how Afghans wage warThough many people dread the harsh elements of Taliban rule, the group does not bring with it a reputation of being corrupt — a stark contrast to the government it ousted — which was notoriously rife with bribery, embezzlement and graft.Related: The Taliban want international recognition. Countries are debating.The US has invested some $2 trillion in Afghanistan. Corruption and mismanagement plagued the efforts from the start.One US government agency charged with overseeing money used to rebuild Af

A logistical success, but a strategic failure.That's how top US generals described the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, in the second day of hearings on Wednesday on Capitol Hill, this time before the House Armed Services Committee.A lot of the most intense questioning dealt with intelligence failures and how the US could have missed signs pointing to the rapid collapse of the Afghan government. Related: Gen. David Petraeus: The US has a 'moral obligation' to help those left behind in AfghanistanUS Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin tried to answer for these failures in his opening statement: "We need to consider some uncomfortable truths; that we did not fully comprehend the depth of corruption and poor leadership in their senior ranks; that we did not grasp the damaging effect of frequent and unexplained rotations by President [Ashraf] Ghani of his commanders; that we did not anticipate the snowball effect caused by the deals that the Taliban commanders struck with local leaders in the wake of the Doha agreement

There were hugs, smiles and a tight embrace at Toronto airport earlier this month as a 3-year-old Afghan boy reunited with his father.The boy, who was not named because he is a minor, was separated from his family on Aug. 26, when there was a suicide attack at the Kabul airport in Afghanistan.He was put on a plane out of the country and spent two weeks at an orphanage in Qatar, according to Qatari and Canadian media reports. Officials with the UN as well as the Qatari government helped reach his family in Canada, and he was able to reunite with them.Related: 'We are still here': Afghan UN employees worry about their safetyBut this boy is lucky.In the chaos of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and the mass evacuation from Kabul, a number of unaccompanied minors ended up on flights out of the country. Now comes the difficult task of reuniting them with their families or, for those who don’t have any relatives, helping them find new homes.Right now, there are at least 300 Afghan children who were separated from

This week, as world leaders gather in New York for the United Nations General Assembly, concerns are growing about the safety of UN employees thousands of miles away in Afghanistan.An estimated 3,000 Afghans work for the UN in the country. Most remain there, and many fear being targeted by the Taliban for their work.“We are hoping, we are wishing to be evacuated, too.”Mohammed, Afghan UN employee“We are hoping, we are wishing to be evacuated, too,” said Mohammed, an Afghan UN employee who, along with some of his Afghan colleagues asked to not be fully identified because they fear risking their jobs or chances at evacuation.“Maybe the United Nations cannot help us,” he added. In August, as the Taliban took hold of Afghanistan, many UN international staff evacuated, adding to those who had already left the country to work remotely during the pandemic. All told, there are reportedly about 700 international UN staff with the Afghan mission.Some international staff, although it is unclear how many, are returning t

Mohammed Ammar, 23, works at a lively cell phone repair shop on a bustling street in a largely Syrian district of Istanbul. Quieter than his coworkers and dressed more formally, Mohammed Ammar takes his job seriously, because he knows how hard it is to find one. In the past three months, five of his friends got so desperate for work, they decided to return to Syria, a country they fled years ago.“The pandemic affected [my friends'] decision [to leave Turkey.]  ... When they left, they had no money to live.”Mohammed Ammar, 23, Syrian who works at a cell phone shop in Istanbul, Turkey“The pandemic affected their decision,” said Mohammed Ammar, who asked not to use his last name because he is living with a temporary protection residency in Turkey. “When they left, they had no money to live.”Related: Drought in Iraq and Syria could collapse food system for millionsThese are the tough choices that millions of Syrians are wrestling with around the world.After 10 years of civil war, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad

Think back to 2008. Things were humming along with the global economy and then bang! The bottom fell out of the housing market in the United States. People couldn't pay their loans. And you know what happened next.There's growing fear something like that could play out again, this time starting in China. One of China's largest real estate developers, China Evergrande, is on the brink of insolvency.Related: Aukus security pact sparks Chinese and French ireEvergrande, whose struggle to avoid defaulting on billions of dollars of debt has rattled global markets, says it will pay interest due Thursday to bondholders in China, but gave no sign of plans to pay on a separate bond abroad.The Chinese government, meanwhile, added to investor anxiety Wednesday by staying silent about whether it might intervene to restructure Evergrande Group's $310 billion debt.Related: Chinese suppliers face ambiguous global supply chain Economists say Beijing can prevent a Chinese credit crunch but that it wants to avoid appearing to a

A massive security flaw was discovered in Apple's iPhone this week — and it's a biggie. The phones could be broken into without the user doing anything to trigger the hack. Without even a click, your information could be at risk.That news left iPhone users scrambling to update their devices. It was security researchers at the The Citizen Lab at University of Toronto who realized that spyware from an Israeli cybersurveillance company known as NSO Group was behind it.Related: Security flaw exposed in Germany, followed by criminal investigationApple quickly released a critical software patch to fix a security vulnerability that researchers said could allow hackers to directly infect iPhones and other Apple devices without any user action.Citizen Lab researchers said the security issue was exploited to plant spyware on a Saudi activist's iPhone. The previously unknown vulnerability affected all major Apple devices — iPhones, Macs and Apple Watches, the researchers said. NSO Group responded with a one-sentence sta

Images from Kabul this weekend showed women in black marching in pro-Taliban demonstrations. The women wore long, dark outfits, and their faces were nearly fully veiled.Recently, the Taliban issued a decree calling for female university students to wear clothing that covers their bodies and most of their faces. Taliban leaders say it's a return to Afghan tradition in the predominantly Muslim country. Related: 'Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan' is based on specific ideologyBahar Jalali, a former history professor at the American University in Afghanistan, disagrees. Over the weekend, she launched an online campaign called #DoNotTouchMyClothes to publicize what she considers to be traditional Afghan dress. Related: Afghanistan: Two decades of war and daily life in photosIt all started on Saturday when Jalali saw those images from the pro-Taliban protests by women."I was just really shocked to see that something that is completely and utterly foreign to Afghan culture was being presented as authentic Afghan attire

Nuclear talks between the US and Iran remain stalled, but a new agreement between Iran and the United Nations is providing some hope that those nuclear talks could relaunch.Iran agreed Sunday to allow international inspectors to install new memory cards into surveillance cameras at its sensitive nuclear sites and to continue filming there. Related: US launches airstrikes targeting Iran-backed militiasThe agreement still leaves the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency in the same position it faced since February, however. Tehran holds all recordings at its sites as negotiations over the US and Iran returning to the 2015 nuclear deal remain stalled in Vienna. Meanwhile, Iran is now enriching small amounts of uranium to its closest-ever levels to weapons-grade purity as its stockpile continues to grow. This violates limits stipulated under the nuclear deal known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, which promises Iran economic incentives in exchange for limits on its nuclear program, and is me

When al-Qaeda attacked the Twin Towers on Sept. 11, 2001, it launched a new, so-called “war on terror” across the world.  But 20 years later, the threat of terrorism lives on, and in Africa, the problem has gotten worse.Related: How will the Taliban interact with other terrorist groups in Afghanistan?“Unfortunately, while in much of the world, 9/11 is viewed as in the past, in Africa, the legacy of those attacks lives on."Murithi Mutiga, project director forHorn of Africa, International Crisis Group“Unfortunately, while in much of the world 9/11 is viewed as in the past, in Africa, the legacy of those attacks lives on,” said Murithi Mutiga, project director for the Horn of Africa at the International Crisis Group.“Today, there are more jihadis operating on the continent than there were 20 years ago,” he continued.Indeed, in recent decades, terrorism has become a shared burden between African countries and the United States. Related: ISIS-linked port seizure signals growing terrorism threat in MozambiqueIn 199

When Abdul Saboor steps off the train in Calaís, France, the 28-year-old Afghan gets to work immediately. A group of eight Afghan boys approaches him, asking for advice about getting to the United Kingdom. Some are as young as 13 years old.“There’s no good advice. … I don’t know what to say,” Saboor admitted. Saboor volunteers his time directing migrants to what’s known as the new “Calaís jungle,” a field converted into an outdoor shelter and food distribution point for hundreds of migrants living in or near the northern city of Calaís.Related: Afghan migrants remain stranded at Poland-Belarus border“I know their story. I know why they're here and I know how difficult it is to be an immigrant and have to leave your family."Abdul Saboor, Afghan photographer and volunteer, Calaís, France“I know their story. I know why they're here and I know how difficult it is to be an immigrant and have to leave your family,” Saboor said. Seven years ago, Saboor took a similar journey. While working as a translator for NATO i

This week, the world got a first glimpse into what a Taliban government in Afghanistan might look like.The group named an interim government made up of 33 men, mostly from one ethnic group — the Pashtuns. Two appointees are Tajik, and one is Uzbek. No one from the Hazara community or any other ethnic group were included.Related: Taliban names all-male 33-member interim government in AfghanistanEven before the Taliban takeover this August, Afghanistan was an Islamic country. The official name of Afghanistan included "Islamic Republic."But the Taliban follow a specific interpretation of Sunni Islam which, from now on, will be implemented across the country.Related: Afghan journalist breaks down sociological makeup of today's TalibanThe World spoke to several clerics and scholars in Afghanistan prior to the Taliban’s takeover to get their takes on the version of Islam the group plans to bring to the country. The Taliban’s IslamTaliban ideology is based on a specific version of Islam called the Deobandi school.Th

For Ben Rhodes, like for so many others, 9/11 was a life-changing event. At the time, Rhodes was a graduate student in New York, studying creative writing, but soon after, he went down to Washington and became a speechwriter and deputy national security adviser for strategic communications in the Obama White House.His new book is called "After the Fall: Being American in the World We've Made." Related: NYU chaplain calls for a 'true pursuit of empathy' to heal after 9/11Rhodes joined The World's host Marco Werman to talk about the last 20 years since 9/11, and about his perspective on the end of the US mission in Afghanistan.Marco Werman: Ben, let's start 20 years ago. Where were you on Sept. 11?Ben Rhodes: I was 24 years old. I was working on a city council campaign in New York City, while I was a graduate student. I was at a polling site on the Brooklyn waterfront because that was Election Day. And so, I ended up having a kind of unobstructed view across the river of the attacks. I didn't see the first plan

This Saturday marks two decades since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, on the United States that left nearly 3,000 people dead in New York, Washington DC, and Shanksville, Pennsylvania.Related: Teens, born after 9/11, have a different perspective than those who lived through itThe events of 9/11 touched the lives of just about everyone in the US — but especially for American Muslims, from discrimination to extra surveillance.Related: Why a hate crime survivor tried to save the life of his would-be killerTwenty years ago, Khalid Latif was a sophomore at New York University. He's now the executive director and chaplain for the Islamic Center at NYU. He joined The World's host Marco Werman from New York City to discuss his experiences and the work he's done to bring communities together.Marco Werman: Khalid Latif, you and other NYU students saw the second plane go into the tower. Where were you on Sept. 11, 2001? And what are your strongest memories from that day?Khalid Latif: You know, I was actually on my way to

Ethiopian officials have accused Tigrayan forces of killing more than 120 people in the neighboring Amhara region.It’s the latest sign of how the 10-month conflict has extended far beyond Tigray, with deadly consequences.Related: Tigrayan forces take Ethiopian town known for its ancient churches“In the case of atrocities against civilians, it has been happening in Tigray since the beginning of the conflict in November last year."Saviano Abreu, spokesperson, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs“In the case of atrocities against civilians, it has been happening in Tigray since the beginning of the conflict in November last year,” said Saviano Abreu, a spokesperson with the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. “We condemn any type of atrocities,” he said.This latest atrocity, according to Reuters, took place in the village of Chenna Kebele, near Gondar city in the Amhara region.Related: A 'sick joke': Tigrayan forces reject ceasefire in EthiopiaIn a st