The FT Weekend Magazine sent Jon Boone, the Financial Times’ formerKabul correspondent, to Afghanistan in early August. Because theTaliban’s conquest of the country potentially puts their lives injeopardy, we have not photographed most of the subjects and some nameshave been changed. There is less than a minute to go before Afghanistan’s most-watched news broadcast goes
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Afghans were bracing themselves for life under strict Islamic rule on Monday after the Taliban drove the US-backed government of Ashraf Ghani from power to establish control of Kabul. Thousands of residents filled the airport and throngs of people tried to push their way on to planes in a desperate effort to flee after the
Shortly after her 12th birthday, Ameneh — not her real name — was forced to get engaged to her adult, bearded cousin and move into the house of her uncle, a businessman who traded with the Taliban. That was two decades ago. Back then, the Islamist movement was at the height of its power, controlling
Just six weeks ago, Joe Biden seemed confident that the 300,000 men of the Afghan National Defence and Security Forces had the training, equipment and competence to hold off a Taliban takeover of the country after the US withdrew its military forces. “The likelihood there’s going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the
The US Senate is set to pass a $1tn package to invest in America’s crumbling infrastructure with significant Republican support, a bipartisan vote that will be seen as a major legislative achievement of Joe Biden’s young presidency. Senators voted 68-29 late on Sunday to end the debate on the infrastructure bill, setting up a final
The US, UK and Canada have tightened sanctions against the regime of Alexander Lukashenko in Belarus, exactly one year after he won re-election in a presidential ballot that he has been accused of rigging. Also on Monday, Latvia said it was poised to declare a state of emergency on its frontier with Belarus and build
The world is likely to temporarily reach 1.5C of warming within 20 years even in a best-case scenario of deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, a landmark report on climate change signed off by 234 scientists from more than 60 countries has concluded. Even with rapid emissions cuts, temperatures would continue to rise until “at
The spread of the Delta strain of the virus that causes Covid-19 through the US has prompted a flurry of state-level proclamations over the weekend relating to mask mandates and vaccinations. The US is averaging about 100,000 new Covid-19 infections a day, according to Johns Hopkins University data, compared with 11,000 cases a day in
For decades, Kuwait was a critical hub in North Korea’s network of foreign outposts. Every year, thousands of labourers would take an Air Koryo flight from Pyongyang via Islamabad before being dispatched to construction sites across the oil-rich Gulf state or elsewhere in the Middle East and Africa. At its peak, the sweat of about
The Pentagon plans to make Covid-19 vaccines mandatory for US troops by mid-September, as the country grapples with a rise in cases caused by the spread of the contagious Delta variant. “To defend this nation, we need a healthy and ready force,” wrote Lloyd Austin, defence secretary, in a memo to US forces released on
Robinhood shares surged as much as 82 per cent at the start of trading on Wednesday, prompting multiple trading halts as the market capitalisation of the newly listed US brokerage briefly climbed to $71bn. The rally, which lifted the stock to a high of $85, has accompanied a furious start to trading in the company’s
New York City will require proof of vaccination for a variety of indoor activities from dining to health clubs and concerts, Bill de Blasio, the city’s mayor, announced on Tuesday. The city is believed to be the first in the US to introduce such restrictions as the highly infectious Delta coronavirus variant causes a rise
Some US cities and companies are reintroducing face mask requirements, even for people who are fully vaccinated, in an effort to counter a spike of Covid-19 infections caused by the more transmissible Delta variant. San Francisco and six other Bay Area counties on Monday reinstated a universal mask mandate for indoor public places. “Indoor masking
House prices are booming in almost every major economy in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, forging the broadest rally for more than two decades, and reviving economists’ concerns over potential threats to financial stability. Of the 40 countries covered by OECD data, just three experienced real-terms house price falls in the first three months
A leading US bond manager has warned of inflationary pressure from housing rental costs that could push interest rates higher and overturn a sense of complacency among investors. The comments by Dan Ivascyn, chief investment officer at Pimco, which has $2.2tn under management, comes after US 10-year interest rates eased in recent months to about
Chinese technology stocks listed in the US are set for their worst month since the global financial crisis after global investors dumped shares following a regulatory crackdown by Beijing. The Nasdaq Golden Dragon China index, which tracks Chinese tech stocks listed in New York, has fallen 22 per cent in July, putting it on course
Apple, Microsoft and Alphabet said on Tuesday that their latest revenues and earnings had surged above the stock market’s already optimistic expectations, confirming that demand for their digital services and gadgets continued to soar as some countries began to emerge from the pandemic. Apple Apple’s profits almost doubled in its latest quarter to $21.7bn, as
The value of Chinese shares on Wall Street has soared from just a few billion dollars to $2tn over the past two decades as investors turned a blind eye to the precarious legal structure underpinning many of the country’s biggest US listings. But a crackdown by Beijing on China’s $100bn tutoring industry over the past
The British government is exploring ways to remove China’s state-owned nuclear energy company from all future power projects in the UK, including the consortium planning to build the new £20bn Sizewell nuclear power station in Suffolk, according to people close to the discussions. The change in mood at the top of government also affects proposals
Roughly every other glass of orange juice drunk around the world comes from the orchards of São Paulo state, boasts Duarte Nogueira. “We have everything beginning with the letter ‘C’,” says the mayor of Ribeirão Preto, a city four hours inland from the state capital, before reeling off the Portuguese names of produce cultivated in