Margot Buff is a multimedia editor for RFE/RL.
When Anastasia Ivleyeva, a popular online influencer, invited Russian celebrities to a party with the theme "almost naked," she did not expect a nationwide backlash. One guest was charged with hooliganism and "gay propaganda," while other attendees said advertisers had canceled their contracts.
A gunman opened fire at a university in downtown Prague on December 21, killing at least 14 people and wounding many others. The shooter was also reported dead following the attack. A professor and students described being caught in the midst of the violence.
A group of disabled Armenian veterans has teamed up with a dance troupe to bring an unusual performance to Yerevan: choreographed wheelchair dance. Participants say the project has forged friendships, boosted their spirits, and challenged some of the limited expectations they face in society.
Russia has amassed an estimated 127,000 troops near the borders of Ukraine. In the event of an invasion, some Western experts believe Kyiv's forces could be quickly overwhelmed. But analysts point to some resources that make Ukraine a stronger power than it might appear.
A public defender, a rights activist, small business owners: these women have seen their lives and careers upended by the Taliban's return to power in August. After 100 days of Taliban rule, they take stock of the personal and economic harm caused by the regime's repressive policies.
When Armenians bake the flatbread known as lavash, they incorporate Christian rituals and family knowledge -- but few people still practice this culinary craft at home. Knarik Torosian is one baker who still makes lavash in an underground wood-fired oven.
As a migrant crisis intensifies on Belarus's borders with the EU, some travelers from war-torn countries describe paying a high price for the unfulfilled promise of reaching Western Europe. One family from Iraq's Kurdistan region were forced to pay traffickers to return home after a failed trip.
An ongoing crisis on Belarus's border with Poland escalated in recent days as migrants seeking to cross into the EU clashed with Polish security forces. With temperatures dropping, some migrants who had camped out by the border have now moved to a shelter in Belarus where they await deportation.
In parts of Yakutia, in Russia's Far East, many residents raise reindeer to make a living, relying, in part, on modest government subsidies to make ends meet. Their livelihood is part of a traditional way of life, but it's threatened with obsolescence as young people leave in search of better jobs.
An ancient skeleton excavated at a site near Tbilisi has been kept at Georgia's National Museum for nearly a century -- but archaeologists are now giving it a closer look. They say the woman who was buried with jewelry and a sword is the oldest female warrior ever identified.
On September 29-30, 1941, a ravine near Kyiv called Babyn Yar became the site of a massacre that foreshadowed the horrific scale of the Holocaust. Occupying Nazi forces, with the help of collaborators, shot and killed nearly 34,000 Jews at the site in the first of a series of mass killings.
Since the Taliban took power in Afghanistan, the militants have made vague statements about allowing girls to get an education, but so far, that female secondary-school students have stayed home. Students told Radio Azadi about their fear that their educations have been cut short.
Millions are out of work, the country's foreign reserves are frozen, cash has mostly dried up, and markets are running low on imported goods. Afghanistan's collapsing economy has had devastating personal impacts, with some unemployed Afghans selling off their household items to buy food.
In July, a planned LGBT Pride March in Tbilisi was called off after right-wing protesters attacked activists and journalists, whom they accused of spreading "anti-Georgian sentiments." In the wake of the violence, LGBT activists say their sense of purpose and solidarity is stronger than ever.
In 2020, 31-year-old Alyaksey Sanchuk joined a group of street drummers, part of a wave of mass protests over the presidential election in Belarus that was widely seen as rigged. He was arrested, charged with financing and organizing illegal protests, and sentenced to six years in prison.
Allyson Reneau, a mother of 11 and an expert in U.S. space policy, welcomed the Afghan girls' robotics team when they traveled to the United States in 2019 for a technology conference. In mid-August, as Taliban militants descended on Kabul, Reneau quickly helped the young engineers flee to safety.
Lithuanian officials say waves of illegal migrants arriving from Belarus have reached a new peak, with nearly 300 detentions reported in one day alone. Most of the detainees are Iraqis who crossed the border via Belarus with apparent ease.
As Afghanistan faces a resurgence of the Taliban, the hard-won rights of Afghan women hang in the balance. One young female reporter for RFE/RL's Radio Azadi says it's her mission to tell women's stories as they fight to defend their rights.
With Afghanistan facing a wave of coronavirus infections, oxygen is in short supply at the country's underfunded hospitals. To help meet the demand, faculty and students at Kabul Medical University have built an oxygen-concentrating machine that pulls the vital gas from the air.
Some 1,500 people have illegally crossed from Belarus into EU member Lithuania this summer -- more than 20 times the number in all of 2020. Lithuanian leaders say Belarus is allowing migrants from third countries to transit to the European Union as a form of retaliation against the bloc.
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