Much of diplomacy happening between India and Pakistan is "cultural diplomacy", former foreign secretary Shyam Saran today said and credited Bollywood as one of the binding factors in forging people-to- people ties between the two countries. 

For years Kayan women and girls have been driven across the border by poverty and conflict to earn money posing in holidaymakers' pictures in purpose-built Thai villages decried by rights campaigners as "human zoos". Now several have returned to their remote native Panpet area in Kayah state, Myanmar, with an entrepreneurial plan to reverse the flow of departures [...] from decades of solitude.

"This is Dange Nwe Radio, refugee-to-refugee segment, from 8am to 12 noon, broadcast in Kurmanji and Arabic," a female broadcaster announces in a southern Iraqi accent. [...] The new refugee radio program on Dange Nwe (New Voice) Radio is staffed exclusively by Syrian and Iraqi women displaced by the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) and the war in Syria.

For most Americans today, Russia is more of an annoyance than a threat. But if you live in Georgia, a small country on Russia’s southern border, the Kremlin remains a menacing presence. If the Russian bear becomes hungry, Georgia might be a morsel too tempting to resist […] Georgia is seeking to strengthen its ties to the West. It has been persistent in its effort to be granted membership in NATO […]

A surprise awaits beyond a black door adorned with a silver lotus flower at the end of a tangle of alleyways in Gaza's chaotic Old City. Through it and behind imposing stone walls sits a small, Levantine-style palace, some 430 years old and recently painstakingly restored. It is among the rare vestiges of Gaza City's architectural heritage, battered by war, time, population pressure and simple indifference.

Pakistan's smallest religious minority, the Kalash […] fear their unique culture will not endure: Increasingly their youth are converting to Islam, prompting activists to campaign to preserve the traditions of this ancient, diminishing tribe. Their fight to get the Kalash on to UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage List began in 2008, but eight years on remains mired in sluggish bureaucracy.

Brazil launched its occupation strategy in 2008, the year after it won the right to host the 2014 World Cup and a year before Rio won its bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics […] human-rights campaigners argue that armed conflict has increased as a result of major sporting events, imposing a particularly high cost on poor and homeless children.

"My cheeks are sore from smiling," says Loyce Maturu. The 24-year-old, who lives in Harare, Zimbabwe, is posing for a photo at NPR headquarters in Washington, D.C. She's come to be interviewed about her activism. She's a champion for people with HIV/AIDS and TB (she's been diagnosed with both). So really, the pain of smiling is nothing compared to what she's been through.