A week of extreme emotions in Colombia ends with a Nobel Peace Prize for its president. But will it help the country avoid descending back into civil war?
Juan Manuel Santos: changing how we think about peace.
Jose Gomez/Reuters
Why would anyone award a prize to a rejected peace deal?
Colombians march in the city of Cali to support the peace deal that was narrowly rejected in an October 2 plebiscite. The 50%-50% vote showed how polarized the country is.
Jaime Saldarriaga/Reuters
Nobel Prize aside, Colombia continues to choose war over peace and uncertainty over resolution. Is it something ingrained in the national psyche, or the product of a tangled-up political process?
Duterte has, among other things, mobilised nationalist antipathy against foreign interference to deflect criticism of his violent drug crackdown.
KING RODRIGUEZ / PPD / HANDOUT
Duterte used his “tough on crime” approach to win the election as a political outsider, promising to restore law and order with strongman rule. His approval rating has since soared to over 90%.
Hong Kong pro-democracy activist Joshua Wong shows a notice of expulsion offered by Thai immigration.
REUTERS/Bobby Yip
Kevin Hewison, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Since the Thai military grabbed power in 2014, it’s been widely accepted that the country has moved closer to China, forsaking its former position as a staunch political and economic ally of the West.
The idea that there’s a moral imperative for humans to expand beyond Earth is echoed by influential proponents of space exploration.
Tamara Craiu/Flickr
Technology had enabled humans to explore the deep sea, the Earth’s poles, and outer space. But we shouldn’t forget historical lessons about frontiers in the process of traversing them.
A 16-year-old Karen boy, swims in the Salween River at the Myanmar-Thai border.
Adrees Latif/Reuters
Government strategies promoting economic growth through the development of the biodiverse Salween river basin should not be at the cost of human rights.
ISIS fighters celebrating in Mosul, Iraq, in 2014. Criminological studies suggest terrorists would use diverse tactics to neutralise feelings of guilt.
Reuters
Do ISIS fighters feel guilty about the violence they perpetrate? Not likely, according to criminological research, which suggests terrorists “neutralise” their guilt, just as many other criminals do.
Um Radwan, a female fighter in the Free Syrian Army, looks through a curtain in Aleppo’s Bustan al-Basha district, October 3, 2013.
Muzaffar Salman/ Reuters
Encounters with Western countries continue to colour political discourses, including on gender in turbulent Syria. But women’s influence is more diverse and powerful than what is portrayed.
Abdurrashim, 72, who served 12 years in detention for links to the communist party, attends a state-backed event on the controversial 1965 anti-communist purge.
Reuters/Darren Whiteside
For decades, Indonesia’s official national history was silent about the murders and incarceration of hundred thousands of people. Moving beyond that will require a new understanding of what happened.
El Salvador stands at the centre of the current refugee crisis in Central America. But gang violence is not the only reason why its people are fleeing their country.
One of the questions most discussed on Italian social media is whether the same thing would have happened to a male writer who had made the same choice for privacy.
dawolf-/Flickr
In her novels, in numerous articles and in correspondence, Elena Ferrante has chosen to depict the world from a female point of view. She has always claimed that the woman’s gaze is decisive.
Muslim women are often criticised for their lack of political involvement, but Algerian women have embraced both anti-colonial and feminist movements.
The preserved body of late former president Ferdinand Marcos lies in public view in a mausoleum in his home province in northern Philippines.
REUTERS/Romeo Ranoco
The facts contradict Donald Trump’s anti-Mexican rhetoric, but US mischaracterisation of its southern neighbor isn’t new to this election season - nor will it end in November.
The Indian government risks a serious escalation of violence if the Pakistani government and militant groups in that country respond with even more attacks.
Mukesh Gupta/Reuters
Professor in Practice on Environmental Innovation, School of Social and Environmental Sustainability, University of Glasgow, UK, National University of Singapore