'I grew up with my ancestors having orange beards or hair. It is so common in our culture that I hardly took any notice of it. As time went on, however, I found out that dying hair with henna has a special place in Muslim culture. I was curious to ...

After yet another rickety craft packed with migrants heading for Europe sank in the Mediterraneon on 3 October 2013 with a loss of 368 lives, the Italian government decided to put together a flotilla of five warships that would patrol the sea and ...

As the sky brightens, fresh gusts of air sweep along the empty streets where a few 'pexeiras' (fish sellers) are preparing their trays filled with that morning's catch which they carry on their heads from door to door. People jog along Cabral Canela ...

Straddling the equator in the gulf of Guinea lies the island nation of Sao Tome and Principe, the second smallest African nation and the smallest among Portuguese speaking countries. Previously uninhabited, it was discovered around 1470 by Portuguese...

From the early 16th century onwards, Portuguese settlers who had come to the new colony of Sao Tome and Principe started importing slave labour from the African mainland to work on the sugar plantations (or rocas) that were spreading across the lush ...

On 25 April 2015 a devastating earthquake measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale struck Nepal, killing over 8,000 people and injuring almost twice that number, destroying or damaging more than 700,000 houses, and displacing 2.8 million people. The ...

In some of Thailand's toughest prisons, where murderers and rapists rub shoulder with career criminals of all stripes, an ancient combat sport has become an unusual means of encouraging inmates to reform themselves, potentially working toward an ...

On 20 July 2015, Chad's former dictator Hissene Habre, who ruled the country from 1982 until 1990, will stand before a court in Senegal, accused of crimes against humanity, torture and war crimes. The court that is prosecuting him, the Extraordinary ...

Almost 200 years after the death of the famous writer, Jane Austen continues to enthral enthusiasts from around the world who flock in their thousands to the many locations, both real and fictional, that are forever linked to Austen and her works. ...

Rice is the second most produced grain in the world. Around 480 million tonnes were produced in 2013. At 70 million tonnes, Indonesia is the third largest producer, behind China and India. Indonesian have a multitude of words for 'rice' and even ...

Life is tough in Makoko, a sprawling slum of some 100,000 inhabitants, built on stilts into the putrid waters of Lagos Lagoon in Nigeria. The fish in the lagoon are dying, there is no electricity or running water and raw sewage laps at the floors of ...

Even though levels of violent crime in Chicago are down from their epidemically high rates of the early 70s and 90s, the city is battling a consistent scourge of violence that has seen it in the top three US cities with the most murders every year ...

Even though the spread of the deadly Ebola virus, which started in Guinea in the spring of 2014 and spread light wildfire across a number of West African countries, has markedly slowed, countries such as Sierra Leone are still struggling to contain ...

They used to be found in every village and whistle stop. Everyone knew who they were. People often laughed at them but more often than not they laughed with them. At other times people were afraid of their strange ways - afraid of the village ...

On 27 January 1945 the most notorious of Nazi Germany's concentration camps in the small Polish town of Oświęcm, hereafter seared into the collective memory as Auschwitz, was liberated by advancing Soviet forces. It is estimated that ...

6 July 2015 marks the 600th anniversary of the martyrdom of Jan Hus in Konstanz on the shores of Lake Constance in southern Germany. A century before Martin Luther and two hundred years before the split between Catholicism and Protestantism was to ...