December 2024
How China won over Prince Andrew and infiltrated the palace
Publicly shamed over his links to Jeffrey Epstein and with no official role to speak of, the Duke had few places to turn.
How Assad hoodwinked a naive West
Bashar al-Assad, Putin, Gaddafi – the free world too often gets its hopes up about despots.
May 2024
Political bombshell hits Israel’s leaders over Gaza war
The application by the ICC prosecutor for the arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu is loaded with symbolic and practical implications.
September 2023
Disastrous floods a rallying cry for divided Libya
The Derna dam tragedy has ramped up pressure on the country’s leading politicians, viewed by some as the architects of the catastrophe.
December 2021
Gaddafi’s son free to stand in Libya election
Gaddafi, who was sentenced to death in 2015 for war crimes during a battle to save his father’s 40-year rule, has been cleared by a court to stand in elections aimed at ending decades of turmoil.
July 2021
Netflix’s How to Become a Tyrant is like a YouTube manual
This six-part show reminds us that the alternatives to democracy aren’t as appealing as we might think.
March 2021
Banker, warlord, princess: the many lives of Asma Assad
Here’s how a girl from west London became the unlikely winner of Syria’s war.
February 2021
A decade after Arab Spring, autocrats still rule the Middle East
The popular uprisings of 2011 mostly failed, but they gave the region a taste for democracy that continues to whet an appetite for change.
January 2020
America should drop the ‘Dr Evil fallacy’ on assassination
Taking out a famous bad guy almost never yields lasting gains in US security or influence, which are the usual measures of foreign-policy success.