Nathalie Stucky

Dozens of American children are abducted to Japan every year—not by strangers, but by parents after messy divorces. As Nathalie-Kyoko Stucky and Jake Adelstein report, divorce laws protective of Japanese nationals encourage such illegal abductions.

Japan has a child-kidnapping problem. It’s not strangers snatching the kids on the playground or at the bus-stop; the problem is that when a Japanese national divorces a foreigner overseas, he or she can abduct their children, bring them back to Japan and the law ensures that the parent left behind has no rights to see the children or take them back home. The U.S. State Department reports that there have been over a hundred such kidnappings since 1994—according to a source, the number is closer to 400.

Brett Gundlock/Reuters, via Landov

A new video reportedly shows the top Torontonian smoking crack. But from slurs and AIDS controversies to a forgotten marijuana bust, this is only his latest bit of trouble.

Toronto Mayor Rob Ford was reportedly filmed smoking crack, but this hardly would be his first controversy. From getting thrown out of a hockey game to getting thrown out of office, Caitlin Dickson looks at Rob Ford’s greatest hits.News that Toronto Mayor Rob Ford may have been caught on film hitting a crackpipe  almost immediately conjured up old memories of America’s favorite crack-smoking politician, Marion Barry, and prompted the predictable comparisons between the Canadian conservative and the former mayor of Washington, D.

Joseph Eid/AFP/Getty

Obama isn’t jumping in, and neither is anyone else. Combine that with a string of military victories, and Assad is looking stronger than he has in months. Mike Giglio on the dictator’s next act.

Despite President Obama’s assertion on Thursday that he reserves “the options of taking additional steps, both diplomatic and military,” foreign intervention in Syria seems a distant prospect, and that, along with a string of military successes, has fueled the perception that president Bashar al-Assad now has the upper hand in his country’s bloody civil war. As Republican Sen. John McCain bluntly put it this week: "Right now, Bashar al-Assad is winning.

NBC NewsWire via Getty; AFP/Getty; Ben Curtis/AP

Why the CIA bears the main responsibility for the intelligence failures that led to the atrocity in Libya last year. By Christopher Dickey

On September 12 last year, President Obama made a vow in the White House Rose Garden. The previous night attacks on a U.S. diplomatic outpost and a nearby CIA base in Benghazi, Libya, killed four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens. “No acts of terror will ever shake the resolve of this great nation,” Obama declared. “We will not waver in our commitment to see that justice is done for this terrible act. And make no mistake, justice will be done.

Allegations reflecting the country’s deep levels of corruption surfaced in a dramatic session of the Afghan Parliament. Mujib Mashal reports from Kabul.

The impeachment of Afghan Finance Minister Omar Zakhilwal, on charges of accusing M.P.s of smuggling, began like any other. Zakhilwal patiently listened to members of Parliament ask their questions—about budget cuts, nepotism in his ministry, and tax evasion by large companies. But the one and a half hours of response time allotted to the minister ended in utter embarrassment for at least six M.P.s, dramatically highlighting a cycle of alleged parliamentary corruption that many believe has taken President Hamid Karzai’s government hostage.

Broadcast in Seoul on May 2 showing Bae. (Ahn Young-joon/AP)

At a “special prison.”

An American citizen who has been sentenced to 15 years of hard labor in North Korea began his sentence Tuesday at a “special prison,” state media reported. Making matters even more bleak: two South Korean experts told the Associated Press that they didn’t even know what a “special prison” was. Kenneth Bae, a South Korean by birth who has become a naturalized U.S. citizen, has been accused by Pyongyang of trying to create an anti-government base in the North, although outside analysts have speculated that Bae could be used as a bargaining chip in diplomatic negotiations with Washington. A North Korean academic told the Associated Press that Bae had been told that he couldn’t appeal his sentence, and he should instead urge Washington to push for amnesty. There has been no indication that Washington will send any high-profile envoys to negotiate for Bae.

Read it at Associated Press

Nigerian Pres. Jonathan on national television on Tuesday. (Pius Utomi Ekpei/AFP/Getty)

Sends Army into three states against Boko Haram.

Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan on Tuesday ordered the Army to intervene in three states after a series of violent attacks by Boko Haram—despite his government’s recent promises that it was seeking a peace agreement with the militant Islamic group. Jonathan said troops would be “immediately” deployed to the three states, located in the northeastern portion of Nigeria, after he declared a “state of emergency” Tuesday. Jonathan called the recent attacks by Boko Haram akin to a “declaration of war.” The move is somewhat of a contradiction of the Nigerian government’s recent declarations that many Boko Haram fighters have been surrendering.

Read it at Al Jazeera English

Near Eiffel Tower on Paris on Tuesday. (Fred Dufour/AFP/Getty)

While Germany slowly picks up steam.

Maybe the French should have stopped protesting gay marriage and instead gone to work or bought some stuff. France slipped back into a recession as the entire euro-zone economy shrank more than expected in the first quarter of 2013, according to European Union data released Wednesday. France’s economy shrunk by 0.2 percent, its first decline in four years, and officials worried that France will continue to fall further behind throughout the year if it can only keep up the current pace. Germany, the largest economy in Europe, posted modest growth after suffering a sharp decline in the last quarter of 2012, with the EU Statistical Office commending Germany for “slowly picking up steam.” But things were especially bleak for Italy, the third-largest economy in Europe: its economy shrunk by 0.5 percent, putting the economy in recession for its seventh straight quarter.

Read it at Reuters

Syrian troops celebrate in Haydariyah on Monday. (Joseph Eid/AFP/Getty)

Will condemn Assad. Russia expected to veto.

The United Nations Security Council will vote Wednesday to condemn Syrian President Bashar al-Assad—and to accept his opposition as a possible political transition if Assad’s regime topples. The resolution is expected to face some push back by Russia, which has remained a close ally of Assad’s. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Tuesday that “progress is being made” in the negotiations to have peace talks in June, and he warned Assad that more weight will be given to the opposition if Assad fails to participate. But the opposition could have suffered a blow in its standing in the world after a video went viral of a man who appeared to be a rebel fighter mutilating a corpse and then eating the victim’s heart.

Read it at Reuters

Khalil Hamra/AP

Suspicion between rebel groups in Syria raises the specter of further violence if Assad falls—and makes the idea of intervention fraught and complex. Mike Giglio reports.

Riad al-Ahmad, an Army lieutenant when Syria’s revolution began, defected to the rebels’ side early in the conflict. In Latakia, the coastal stronghold of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Ahmad made a name for himself as a bold and reliable commander. As his stature grew, he attracted funds from foreign donors, a coveted resource in the rebels’ desperate war effort, which he used to arm his fighters. In late January, Ahmad was resting in the Turkish city of Antakya, 12 miles from the Syrian border, when he received a call from a man who said he had money to donate.