India: ‘A broken country, a country in torment’

The special security pact announced between UK, US and Australia has been welcomed by John Bolton, the former US National Security Adviser and Ambassador to the United Nations. He said, “Australia, the UK and the US are reacting to China. They didn’t put it that way, but there aren’t many other threats in the Indo-Pacific…

With growing concerns about a humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, the authorities in Turkey have stepped up security on their border and warned they won’t accept an influx of Afghan migrants and refugees. Turkey already has the world’s largest refugee population of around 4 million people – 3.6 million of whom are Syrians – but there…

The timeline for developing coronavirus vaccines has been rapid, but safety was never compromised the head of the Global Vaccine Alliance (Gavi) has said. Speaking to BBC Hardtalk Dr Seth Berkley described the progress as “extraordinary”, explaining that he thought the development of Covid vaccines would take around 18 months to two years. “We squeezed…

President Ashraf Ghani was “gutless” to flee Afghanistan as the Taliban advanced to take power, the former Afghan MP Elay Ershad has said. She told BBC World News: “He left his people behind and he left his country behind. He could have stayed. I am so angry I don’t have words to explain it.” Mr…

On 4 August 2020, Lebanon’s capital was rocked by a catastrophic blast as hundreds of tons of ammonium nitrate exploded in the port, killing at least 200 people and injuring thousands. An investigation is underway but has not yet been made public. The country’s ambassador to the UK, Rami Mortada, told BBC World News that…