News Watch

On Aug. 8, an earthquake of 5.7 magnitude occurred near the town of Bozkurt in southwestern Turkey’s Denizli province. At least 23 people were treated for injuries after the quake. Thousands of homes and businesses were damaged throughout the region.

On Sept. 26, an earthquake measuring 5.7 occurred south of Istanbul in the Sea of Marmara near the Bosporus strait. Eight people were treated for minor injuries from the quake, which did not cause any major damage in the city.

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In Afghanistan on Sept. 17, 26 people at an election rally in the town of Charikar were killed by a suicide bomber from the Islamist militant group the Taliban, and 22 more were killed in a main square in Kabul by another suicide bomber. More than 90 people were injured in the two attacks. Afghanistan’s president had been scheduled to speak at the election rally.

The Taliban had been involved in peace negotiations with the US until President Trump ended the process on Sept. 7...

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At least 23 people were killed in the city of Wamena in the Indonesian province of West Papua on Sept. 23 when protesters, most of whom were students, set fire to several buildings. The students began protesting after hearing reports that a teacher had made racist comments against ethnic Papuans.

On the same day, in Jayapura in the province of Papua, students holding a protest in solidarity with the one in Wamena attacked a police officer with rocks and machetes, forcing police to...

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Beginning on Oct. 2, thousands of protesters took to the streets in Baghdad and other Iraqi cities, protesting government corruption and a lack of jobs. In response, the Iraqi government instituted a curfew, which was defied by protesters, and limited Internet access. Police and security forces blocked major roads to prevent the protests from spreading. In clashes with security forces, more than 100 protesters had been killed as of press time and hundreds of others had been wounded.

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Large anticorruption protests were held over four days in major cities in Egypt starting on Sept. 23, leading to the detention of more than 1,900 people. These were the largest protests since President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi took power in 2013. Since that time, public gatherings of more than 10 people without prior government approval have been illegal.

Many protesters called for Sisi to step down. Some of those arrested did not attend the protests but were accused of inciting unrest...

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At least 20,000 people protested in Moscow on Sept. 29, demanding that the more than 1,000 people arrested during protests in July be released. The July protests were over upcoming city elections — which were held peacefully on Sept. 8 — in which a number of opposition and independent candidates had been removed from the ballot due to a technicality.

Despite the loss of several candidates, opposition parties won one-third of the city council seats previously held by United...

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Following more than a year of unrest and clashes between civilian and military factions in Sudan, a power-sharing deal was signed between military leaders and the country’s pro-democracy movement on Aug. 17.

In April, after having been in power for 30 years and following weeks of massive protests, the former president, Omar al-Bashir, was deposed by the military. The military then placed a figurehead in charge, leading to further protests and violence, which peaked on June 3...

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The Democratic Republic of the Congo set out to vaccinate more than 800,000 children in September in order to curtail what the World Health Organization (WHO) is calling this year’s largest measles outbreak. During the current outbreak, more than 3,500 people have died of measles complications, more than have died of ebola in the country this year.

Meanwhile, in Europe, the countries of Albania, Czechia, Greece and the UK have lost their measles-free status with WHO. Countries are...

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