海角大神

The cradle of the Arab Spring, Tunisia gets surprisingly little attention. As elections near, our reporter returns for a multimonth visit and finds a young democracy that may have lessons to offer established ones.

Tuesday鈥檚 special election in a GOP-leaning district may prove a bellwether for 2020. But amid the intense politicking, our reporter found small signs of openness to talking across party lines.

We sent a writer to assess flood damage on a fragile stretch of U.S. shoreline, and he found something promising in the debris: Gratitude for help received had led to heartfelt reciprocity.

Many factors affect refugee admissions. In the U.S., tensions are growing over balancing humanitarian outreach with an increasingly closed-borders political climate.

Why should inspiration be limited to one gender? Grassroots efforts are aimed at making the stories of all athletes, regardless of sex, known to the public. The first step: engaging fans.

After nearly a year of negotiations with the Taliban, President Donald Trump abruptly ended the talks on Saturday with a string of Twitter messages. The reason: The Taliban killed 12 people last week, including an American soldier. With so little regard for life or the equality of Afghans, the terrorist group could hardly be expected to make good on a deal that would have required a cease-fire leading to withdrawal of United States forces.

The news brought a sigh of relief to many Afghans who worry Mr. Trump might be putting a U.S. pullout ahead of preserving the country鈥檚 progress in basic rights and democratic freedoms. Even more than relief, the breakdown in talks renews a focus on exactly what the Taliban most oppose: elections.

On Sept. 28, Afghans of all ethnicities and religions will cast ballots for president, the seventh election since the 2001 ouster of the Taliban. For all the flaws of voting in an insecure environment and infighting among Afghan leaders, the ballot box still confers a moral legitimacy far above that claimed by the militants, who rely on guns to impose unelected religious authority.

鈥淣ow the important question for the people and government of Afghanistan, and the international community, is what will happen to the elections,鈥� says a spokesman for President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani.

Despite being one of the world鈥檚 poorest countries and one with frequent terror attacks, Afghanistan still manages to pull off an election. In last year鈥檚 parliament elections, around 4 million out of 8.8 million registered voters showed up. Yet in rural areas controlled by the Taliban, voting doesn鈥檛 even happen. The country keeps learning how to improve the process. Many former warlords now compete for votes on the campaign trail rather than with bullets on mountain trails. And for the current election, as many as 18 candidates were in the running at one point.

Elections help Afghans realize they are inherently equal in civic life despite their differences. Women especially appreciate the new social norm. They occupy 27% of government jobs while 39% of school students are girls, a sharp contrast to life under the Taliban in the 1990s.

The country remains highly dependent on the U.S.-led international donor community. And its neighbors meddle in ways that hinder democracy. Yet the best answer to these challenges lies in Afghans steadily, if fitfully, gaining trust in their institutions by exercising a right to vote.

Negotiations with the Taliban will fare better the longer that group keeps seeing Afghans brave threats and line up for hours to cast ballots. Voting in Afghanistan is a sign of triumph over fear.