Good, bad and ugly: the Taliban and Afghanist...

As attention has focused on war in Iran, Israel sees an opportunity to crush a weakened Hizbullah in Lebanon. Our correspondent says it would be far better for the Lebanese state to do so. As south-east Asia is modernising, Islam is counterintuitively gaining greater primacy in c ...  Show more

A rash entry into a war of choice exposes President Donald Trump in a number of ways—and he may prove more dangerous as he becomes weaker. Turkey’s foreign entanglements mask the democratic backsliding at home; that is bad news for an opposition figure whose trial just began. And ...  Show more

Their return to rule is unequivocally bad for the country’s women and girls. But wholesale collapse has not come and some aspects of government have <a href="https://www.economist.com/asia/2023/05/01/life-under-the-rule-of-the-taliban-20?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio.podc ...

The enforcers of the hardliners’ mores may have been disbanded; it is <a href="https://www.economist.com/middle-east-and-africa/2022/12/04/irans-rattled-government-may-be-backing-down?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio.podcast.np&utm_source=theintelligence&utm_content=discovery.c ...  Show more

Criminal networks <a href="https://www.economist.com/international/2023/04/24/how-the-war-split-the-mafia?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio.podcast.np&utm_source=theintelligence&utm_content=discovery.content.anonymous.tr_shownotes_na-na_article&utm_term=sa.listeners" rel="noo ...

When the Taliban resumed power, there were hopes that women might not be as excluded, repressed and abused as they were previously. Those hopes <a href="https://www.economist.com/asia/2022/04/02/the-taliban-are-pushing-females-out-of-public-life?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio ...  Show more