Long Reads
Long Reads News
Tigrayan refugees in Sudan bear scars, wounds of 'ethnic cleansing' at the hands of Ethiopian govt
The Ethiopian government of Nobel Peace Prize winner Abiy Ahmed is accused of teaming up with Abiy's ethnic group — his mother was Amhara — and soldiers from neighbouring Eritrea, long an enemy of Tigray's now-fugitive leaders, to punish around 6 million people. Witnesses say they have split much of Tigray between them, with the Amhara in the west and Eritrean forces in the east.
A haunting silence pervades cafes, restaurants in Greece as the country's second lockdown continues for six months
Restaurants, bars and cafes, whose nature it is to gather groups of people closely together, have remained shut since November when the Greek government imposed a second lockdown to curb the spread of COVID-19 infections
Two decades since the world's first legal same-sex marriages, where do we stand now?
Same-sex marriage is now legal in 28 countries worldwide, as well as the self-governing island of Taiwan. That includes most of Western Europe. Yet its spread has been uneven — Taiwan is the only place in Asia to take the step; South Africa is the only African country to do so.
Story of Indian Mujahideen jihadist on death row casts light on lives of terrorism’s foot-soldiers
Ariz Khan’s journey casts light on the largely unknown rank-and-file of the Indian Mujahideen, and their seduction by a cult of blood.
As COVID-19 vaccination drive revs up across globe, scavengers, trash collectors in urban centres struggle for access to shots
Scavengers or trash collectors are among the estimated 20 million people around the world — in rich nations and poor — who are pivotal in keeping cities clean, alongside paid sanitation employees.
Bangladesh celebrates 50 years of independence: Tracing East Pakistan's nationalist movement, in pictures
For years, hostilities and strikes dominated East Pakistan as calls for independence grew louder.
A year since India's COVID-19 lockdown, photographers talk us through their most defining images of the pandemic
A collection of images that defined the year since the 24 March 2020 lockdown, narrated in the voices of photographers who shot them.
The double lives of gay men in China's Hainan province: Navigating visibility and invisibility in public spaces
How gay men in Hainan understand themselves, build communities and negotiate the pressures to conform to the heterosexual life script of marriage and reproduction.
A Million Steps for Love: Exhibition captures moments from a documentary on pilgrimage of 'love' to Jerusalem
The documentary takes the audience on a journey through the beautiful and barren landscape of Palestine and shares the message of love.
After pandemic year, a weary world looks back, and forward
A year later, some are dreaming of a return to normal, thanks to vaccines that seemed to materialise as if by magic. Others live in places where the magic seems to be reserved for wealthier worlds.
Once denounced as forgery, fragments of old Biblical manuscript earn credibility, a scholarly article claims
In a just-published scholarly article and companion book, Idan Dershowitz, a 38-year-old Israeli American scholar at the University of Potsdam in Germany, marshals a range of archival, linguistic and literary evidence to argue that the manuscript was an authentic ancient artefact.
A decade after Japan's 2011 earthquake, many still hope for 'recovery' from trauma
More than 30 trillion yen (US$ 280 billion) has been spent on reconstruction so far in Japan. But while the government has charged ahead with new buildings, it has invested less in helping people to rebuild their lives, for instance, by offering mental health services for trauma.
Indian artists design comic strips to raise awareness about water consumption in the fashion industry
With their works, these seven artists have tried to showcase the absurdity of the fast fashion industry, with the hope that viewers will take note, lend a thought to the cause and thus make responsible decisions.
In Brazil, world's largest tree-borne fruit is either danger or delight: Journey of the jackfruit in southern hemisphere
Jackfruit is abundant during the Southern Hemisphere’s summer, but many Brazilians are loath to eat it. Historically, it has been consumed more by the poor or enslaved; in barbecue-mad Brazil, the idea of fruit substituting for meat is viewed with suspicion.
Medical teams in Turkey travel to remote mountain villages as part of vaccination drive against coronavirus
After traveling snow and ice covered roads, medical workers arrived in the small settlement of 350 people some 140 miles (230 kilometres) from the provincial capital, to vaccinate older villagers.
In Bangladesh, a fishing community lives in a boat village, dissociated from mainland, government assistance
The locals consider them to be lower caste people. The land dwellers are the main customers of these fishers, as they do business with the ‘Babaija’. It is a relation of monetary transactions, not one of kinship.
Central to disaster relief efforts in Pakistan's mountain villages, women scale heights with rescue teams
Dedicated teams of women volunteers are an important part of working with communities in effective ways during disaster relief operations.
In photos: The story of Nepal's first, and now nearly forgotten, hydropower project
This was only 30 years after the installation of the world’s first hydropower plant on Fox river of Appleton, Wisconsin, in 1882, and a year before China built its first hydropower plant in 1912 in Yunnan province.
Encountering architectural riches while travelling through Gandhara, the land of forgotten Buddhist relics
A peep into the heritage sites and museums of Pakistan and Afghanistan gives an idea of the beauty of Gandhara’s architectural wealth.
Markhor struggles to survive in Kashmir as its Hirapora habitat is overgrazed, fragmented by roads and power lines
Markhor (Capra falconeri) – the largest wild goat in the world – was in the near-threatened category on the IUCN red list when the most recent assessment for the species was made in 2014. The mountain goat’s habitat ranges over the north-western parts of the Hindu Kush Himalayas, in Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India.