Secular France may have designs on Notre Dame

FRANCE: The debate over ways to dismantle the religious character of Notre Dame Cathedral is well underway. Apple CEO Tim Cook became the latest corporate head to pledge funds for reconstruction, as France’s billionaires already have pledged $670 million toward restoration.

TURKEY: Opposition candidate Ekrem İmamoğlu gave his first address as mayor of Istanbul Wednesday, hours after the election board announced he was the winner nearly two weeks after municipal elections. His victory ends the 25-year rule of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the country’s largest city, where Erdogan began his rise as mayor in 1994.

YEMEN: U.S. President Donald Trump vetoed a measure that passed both houses of Congress to force an end to U.S. involvement in Saudi Arabia’s campaign against rebels in Yemen. The resolution marked the first time War Powers Act legislation passed Congress with bipartisan support and reached a president’s desk, but the White House said it could weaken presidential authority to wage war.

SUDAN: Protesters are demanding that power be handed to civilians following the military’s ouster last week of President Omar al-Bashir, who himself took power in a military coup in 1989. Al-Bashir, indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court, is reportedly in solitary confinement at a Khartoum prison, but Uganda has hinted it may grant him asylum.

NIGERIA: Five years after the Boko Haram kidnapping of 230 schoolgirls from Chibok created an international protest, half of them—112—have yet to be freed.

DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO: About 150 people are missing after a boat sunk on Lake Kivu.

SYRIA: Even when the enemy is ISIS, if your enemy is hungry you feed him, reports aid organizer Dave Eubank from the front lines of the last battle in Baghuz.

GLOBAL: The nations of Africa dominate a map highlighting countries never visited by a U.S. president.

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