I was a 20-year-old smart ass when I first picked up Samantha Power’s book, A Problem From Hell, in the fall of 2004. My international politics professor had assigned her thick chapter on Rwanda, so on the night before class, still smarting from a botched date in Philadelphia and hurtling toward Swarthmore College in a rickety SEPTA train, I opened to page 329. There I read about the inept American response to the massacre of 800,000 human beings in 100 days in 1994. And just like that, Samantha Power’s words changed my mind, and my life.

Allegations of mass, indiscriminate government surveillance have sparked a global spat about its proper limits. In defending their programs, the United States and Britain have exposed a troubling, two-tiered approach to the right to privacy in the digital age. Neither government seems willing to recognize the privacy interests of people outside its borders. One thing is clear: as our lives become more connected through the Internet, the right to privacy has never been under a greater global threat.

President Barack Obama is canceling plans to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow next month — a rare diplomatic snub. The move is retribution for Russia's decision to grant temporary asylum to Edward Snowden, who is accused of leaking highly secretive details about National Security Agency surveillance programs. It also reflects growing U.S. frustration with Russia on several issues, including missile defense and human rights.

While in Washington D.C., the Turkish athletes played wheelchair basketball with American student athletes at local schools and organizations, including George Mason University and MedStar National Rehabilitation Network (MedStar NRH). The athletes traveled to the University of Illinois-Urbana for intensive wheelchair basketball clinics, and team building and conflict resolution activities. Throughout the program, they learned about disability sports culture in the United States.

Through my involvement in labor rights activism, I started organizing direct actions under the USC student-run organization, “Student Coalition Against Labor Exploitation (SCALE).” SCALE is a smaller branch of the national student labor rights movement. Our advocacy program demonstrates how university students engage in public diplomacy with factory workers worldwide. While at the same time, we advocate for the use of hard power inducements to enforce social responsibility on corporations and governments.

The United States temporarily closed nearly two-dozen embassies and consulates last week, mostly in North Africa and the Middle East, with 19 set to remain closed for the rest of the week. The administration of U.S. President Barack Obama cited intelligence about potential terrorist attacks by al Qaeda in Yemen. On Tuesday, Washington stepped up security precautions in Yemen by ordering all non-emergency embassy personnel to leave the country and urging all U.S. citizens to depart immediately as well. Similar actions were taken by Great Britain.

The US has criticised a new internet decree in Vietnam that would restrict online users from discussing current affairs. The law, announced last week and due to come into force in September, says social media should only be used for "[exchanging] personal information". The US embassy in Hanoi said it was "deeply concerned" by the decree.

The State Department has closed a total of 19 diplomatic posts in the Middle East, North Africa, and East Africa and has ordered the U.S. Embassy in Yemen evacuated. But what exactly does that mean for U.S. missions and U.S. citizens abroad? To find out, we talked to a current State Department Foreign Service officer who is on detail at the American Foreign Service Association, a union for diplomats.