Christa Pike's survival has exposed a contradiction that capital punishment normally conceals. The state can declare a life forfeit, but when its machinery of death fails, it suddenly becomes responsible for keeping
Once again, the spectre of the hangman has returned to Sri Lanka’s policy discourse. At the “Ratama Ekata” National Operations Council convened at the Presidential Secretariat on 10 August 2026, the imposition
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Note From the Editorial Team Nineteen years ago today, on 16 August 2007, we began. Nineteen years after we began during Sri Lanka’s civil war, governments have changed, crises have multiplied and
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“I have two minutes of phone time left. I don’t know if I will still be alive tomorrow. If we speak again, I will be very grateful to you.” Those were the
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A two-month negotiating period between the United States and Iran has ended without a final agreement, with the prospects for renewed diplomacy appearing increasingly uncertain. Instead, tensions have intensified over Iran’s nuclear
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China is once again facing uncertainty over preparations for a high-level meeting with US President Donald Trump, with less than six weeks remaining before Chinese President Xi Jinping’s planned visit to Washington,
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by Our Correspondent in Washington DC Sri Lanka has been named alongside Bangladesh, Cambodia, Laos and the Philippines as a Southeast Asian “microhub” within what a US report describes as China’s global
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Pakistan is experiencing one of its deadliest periods for terrorism in more than a decade, with violence in 2026 increasing in both frequency and lethality. July alone recorded more than 600 deaths,
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Each year, as India marks 15 August with flag-hoisting ceremonies and official celebration, a starkly different observance takes place in Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir and among Kashmiri diaspora communities abroad. For them,
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This article is adapted and abridged from a speech delivered by the author at the Sarmaya Art Foundation, Mumbai, on 8 August 2026. The text is based on the author’s two books
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On July 30, 2026, enormous crowds crossed from Morocco into Spain’s North African enclave of Ceuta. Within hours, Spanish authorities estimated that roughly 72,000 had entered Ceuta, overwhelming a city of just 83,000 residents.
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The wars that have reshaped the Middle East since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, have entered a diplomatic phase marked by a striking common obstacle: the parties involved
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While shooting a documentary at Göbeklitepe, I encountered strikingly different historical interpretations of the site. An international group of New Age seekers seemed to be searching for extraterrestrial connections there, but when I pointed
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For much of Dario Amodei’s rise to the summit of artificial intelligence, almost nothing was publicly known about his private life. Even his marital status remained a mystery until only a few
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Across Africa, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) presents itself as the custodian of macroeconomic stability. Its latest Article IV staff reports on Ethiopia. Malawi, Nigeria, South Africa, and Zambia are written for economies with very different histories and
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Nearly 80 years after the dissolution of British India produced the independent states of India and Pakistan, public opinion in both countries continues to be shaped by deep mutual distrust. A new
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