Bigger battles are rising from the ashes of the war on ISIS
Updated 0759 GMT (1559 HKT) October 21, 2017
The last ISIS fighters in Raqqa have been killed or surrendered, and the terror group that once held territory the size of the United Kingdom and ruled over ten million people has been pushed back to a few dusty towns straddling the Syrian border with Iraq.
The campaign to eradicate the Islamic State has taken three years and nearly 25,000 coalition airstrikes, in addition to thousands by Russian, Iraqi and Syrian aircraft.
In the process, dozens of towns and cities in Syria and Iraq have been pulverized, among them Raqqa, Aleppo, Mosul, Fallujah and Ramadi.
Iraq’s lost generation: ‘I have forgotten what happiness is’
Zanab Ismail wanted to be a doctor, Raghda Ali was studying to be a nurse – then Isis destroyed Mosul. Three years on, can they start over?
When Mosul was finally liberated on 9 July, Zanab Ismail was 50 miles away, watching events on TV. Her family had left their home in Iraq’s second largest city on the morning of 26 August 2014, after shouts from the street warned them that Isis had entered the area. Rumours had preceded the invasion of what Isis fighters were doing to families with connections to Iraqi forces – beheadings, executions – as well as their treatment of women and girls, the rapes and forced marriages. Zanab was 17 at the time. Her father Mohammed, a property developer and teacher, wanted to get his family out of Mosul as fast as possible, particularly his son, Amir, 26, who worked for the police force.
They arrived at Baharka, a camp for people fleeing Isis, near Erbil, with almost nothing. They imagined they would stay for a few months, then go home. Three years later, they were still there: Zanab, her parents, five brothers and sisters, living among row upon row of small grey tents, spread across the bleak plains of northern Iraq.
Czech Republic's 'answer to Donald Trump' Andrej Babis on course for election success
The businessman and media mogul is one of the richest men in the country. He accepts that his story could be compared to Trump's – with one exception: 'I was never bankrupt'
He has been referred to as the “Czech Donald Trump”. And like the US billionaire, businessman Andrej Babis is on course to achieve election success on a wave of popular support, anti-immigrant sentiment and a widespread distrust of traditional politics.
Voting in the Czech parliamentary election began on Friday and will continue into Saturday, with opinion polls predicting victory for Mr Babis’ centrist ANO movement and other protest parties.
This despite the fact that the country’s economy is performing well and immigration into the Czech Republic, a country of 10 million people, is virtually non-existent.
Could the Artemisia plant be the cure for malaria?
Could Artemisia annua, also known as the sweet wormwood plant, be the key to curing malaria? The FRANCE 24 Observers team spoke to a leading biologist who specialises in the plant, a Congolese health practitioner who has used the plant to treat his own family and a woman who has launched her own effort to grow and distribute this plant in a malaria-ridden town in the Democratic Republic of Congo. They all swear by its effects and lament the fact that more research isn’t being done on its potential healing powers.
The Artemisia plant is originally from China. People across Asia have been using it for centuries to treat fevers and malaria, a deadly infectious disease that is transmitted by mosquitoes and mostly affects children. According to the World Health Organization, a child dies of malaria every 30 seconds in Africa.
Today, an increasing number of scientists, health practitioners and malaria sufferers are convinced that using the entire Artemisia plant – which they say might be even more effective than just its artemisinin extract – could play a key role in the eradication of malaria. Because Artemisia is easy to grow, its advocates say that using it as a tea is the perfect solution for the African continent, which faces limited access to healthcare and medicine.Candidates make last-ditch plea to voters
By Richard Carter
Candidates in Japan made a last-ditch plea to voters Saturday on the last day of campaigning before an election expected to return Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to power with a comfortable majority.
Polls show Abe and his conservative Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) are clear favorites to win Sunday's election, handing him a fresh mandate for his hardline stance on North Korea and Abenomics growth strategy.
Abe's coalition is on track to win around 300 seats in the 465-seat lower house of parliament, according to a projection published by the Nikkei daily.
Spain expected to impose Catalonia direct rule
The Spanish government is holding a special cabinet meeting to approve measures to take direct control of the semi-autonomous region of Catalonia.
The meeting comes almost three weeks after the region held a controversial independence referendum, which was ruled illegal by the supreme court.
Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont argues that the referendum result gave him a mandate to pursue independence.
But Spain's government disagrees and is preparing to take back power.
How did we get here?
Catalonia's regional government held a referendum on 1 October to ask residents of the region if they wanted to break away from Spain.
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