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Iranian activists have warned that the government could use a visit to Iran by a special UN rapporteur for propaganda purposes. The UN rapporteur, Alena Douhan, has also faced controversy in the past over her visits to autocratic countries.

Amid calls from the Chinese Embassy in Prague for his exhibition to be cancelled, dissident Chinese artist Badiucao unveiled a new collection that criticizes China's policies in Hong Kong and Xinjiang and takes aim at Beijing's embrace of Russian President Vladimir Putin and his war in Ukraine.

Anastasia Konchakovska, 5, is recovering from surgery to remove part of a bullet from her skull following a Russian ambush on her father's car. She has yet to learn her parents were killed.

To address a growing deficit, Iran’s cash-strapped government is cutting major government subsidies. But the move is likely to come at a cost: potential civil unrest.

Tajik officials are demanding that hundreds of students be conscripted into military service or face expulsion from their universities, several students and officials claim. Many Tajiks try to avoid serving in the military, which is notorious for hazing that has led to deaths or severe injuries.

Russia's invasion of its smaller neighbor Ukraine is analogous to the biblical tale of David and Goliath, Ukraine's honorary Patriarch Filaret has told RFE/RL. He criticized Russian Patriarch Kirill, who has backed the Kremlin's invasion, for "embarking on a path of untruth."

Amid the Ukraine war, Beijing has targeted the Western military alliance as the root cause of the conflict and looks to be intensifying its criticism as the bloc looks further toward Asia.

Alicia Garcia Herrero, a Hong Kong-based chief economist at the investment bank Natixis and former adviser at the European Commission, explains the limits of Chinese economic help to Russia and how Beijing is looking to protect itself from similar Western pressure in the future.

Leonid Kravchuk, a key figure in ushering in the largely peaceful dissolution of the Soviet Union three decades ago and the first president of independent Ukraine, has died. He was 88.

The U.S. blacklisting of Iran's IRGC has split hundreds of families. Former IRGC conscripts, who have families in the U.S., are barred from entering the country. In interviews with RFE/RL, the men and their families said they should be treated differently.