Sometimes it’s only when we look away from the mainstream news agenda that we catch sight of the most uncomfortable truths about the world we live in. That certainly felt like the case to me with our cover story this week, about the forgotten victims of rape at the hands of military forces in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Last June, a summit fronted by the then-UK foreign secretary William Hague and Hollywood actor Angelina Jolie pledged to eradicate sexual violence in war zones, with a particular focus on eastern Congo. A year later, the world’s gaze has moved on and it’s a familiar story for the Congolese women and girls whose attempts to find justice have been crushed by vested power and corrupt officialdom. The Observer’s Mark Townsend reports from the town of Minova, scene of an infamous mass rape by government troops during the civil war, on a quest for justice that the world forgot.
In the Middle East it was a bad week for al-Qaida, who insiders claim have been torn apart by Islamic State in the internecine struggle between the rival extremists. Guardian Middle East correspondent Ian Black, meanwhile, explains why Israel views the chaos on its doorstep from an increasingly comfortable perspective.
In Honduras, a government social security swindle has led to widespread fury on the streets. A world away in Europe, a social activist was sworn in as Barcelona’s new mayor with a pledge to hand back power to the people.
Australia’s migration policy is again under the spotlight amid allegations its government paid smugglers to turn around asylum boats bound for the country. In the Pacific, residents of the remote Northern Mariana Islands fear a US troop buildup amid geopolitical tensions in the South China Sea. And from South Asia, the Washington Post reports on why an Indian military incident on the Burmese border has set increasingly fragile Indo-Pakistani relations on edge.
In the US, the race for the White House has an eerily familiar feel as Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton emerged as favourites to face off for the 2016 presidential election. (After this, head straight to the Books pages for one of my favourite pieces this week, about unreadable political memoirs.) On our Finance page, there’s a moving Washington Post piece from the American heartlands on the flip side of falling oil prices from the perspective of Oklahoma’s struggling former drilling workers.
You’ll need more than a David Bowie LP and a bar of chocolate to get on the first manned flights to Mars, our Weekly Review section reveals, as volunteers hoping to settle on the red planet tell us why they want to go. From Cuba the Washington Post reports on how loosening social controls are leading to a surge of religious interest. In Paris, finds Le Monde, luxury hotels are in the doldrums following the Islamist terror attacks earlier this year.
Discovery reports on progress in medical science’s ongoing efforts to eradicate the world’s major diseases. Male readers may allow themselves a mini-fist bump over the Books section’s piece about the unspoken depths of friendship between men. Culture meets Natalie Portman, the actor turned director who has made a controversial film about the founding of Israel, her country of birth.
The Notes & Queries community gets introspective as they consider the nature of the human species. In Good To Meet You, a Brazilian-born reader explains why he appreciates the Weekly’s fabulously low-tech, non-rechargeable properties.
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