World News

Art can enlighten, soothe, challenge and provoke. Sometimes it can transform a community.

Case in point: a 5.5-square-mile island called Naoshima in Japan's Seto Inland Sea.

Once upon a time, the biggest employer on Naoshima was a Mitsubishi metals processing plant. Actually, it's still the biggest employer, just not nearly as big as it once was.

#NPRreads is a weekly feature on Twitter and in The Two-Way. The premise is simple: Correspondents, editors and producers from our newsroom share the pieces that have kept them reading, using the #NPRreads hashtag. Each weekend, we highlight some of the best stories.

An animal rights activist is being tried in Canada on charges of criminal mischief because she gave water to pigs bound for the slaughterhouse.

Anita Krajnc faces a maximum of six months in jail or a $5,000 fine if convicted, and she has pleaded not guilty, according to the CBC. The pigs were on their way to Fearman's Pork Inc. in Ontario last summer.

In Zimbabwe's capital city, police fired tear gas and water cannons to disperse a demonstration that the country's top court had ruled could proceed.

Opposition leaders termed Friday's march in Harare a "mega-demonstration." It marked "the first time that Zimbabwe's fractured opposition joined in a single action to confront President Robert Mugabe's government since 2007," as The Associated Press reports.

Not 1,000. Not 50. Not even 10.

Zero.

"There have so far been no laboratory confirmed cases of Zika virus in spectators, athletes or anyone associated with the Olympics," the World Health Organization said Thursday on its website.

France's highest administrative court struck a blow against controversial 'burkini bans' Friday, upending one town's decision to prohibit the full-body swimsuit on its beaches.

The Council of State suspended the ban in Villeneuve-Loubet, just west of Nice, saying it "seriously, and clearly illegally, breached the fundamental freedoms to come and go, the freedom of beliefs and individual freedom."

The Riviera town was one of roughly 30 municipalities to forbid beachgoers from donning the swimsuit often worn by Muslim women, reporter Jake Cigainero tells our Newscast unit.

The saga of the swimmer and the robbery-that-wasn't continues: Ryan Lochte has been charged with filing a false police report.

Brazilian police say Lochte and the International Olympics Committee's ethics commission will both be informed of the charges, NPR's Lulu Garcia-Navarro reports.

The charge carries a penalty of up to 18 months in prison and Lochte could be tried in absentia, Lulu says. She notes that the U.S. has an extradition treaty with Brazil but that it's unlikely Lochte would be sent there if convicted.

In Japan, you sometimes hear the term "village on the edge." What it means is "village on the edge of extinction."

Japan's population is declining. And the signs of that are easiest to see in rural areas, like the mountainous interior of the southern island of Shikoku. For example, the village of Nagoro used to have around 300 residents. Now it has 30.

They've known each other for only a few months, but this love story between an Australian ultramarathoner and a Chinese stray dog has seen extraordinary highs and lows.

Trust the Italians to meet disaster with food.

While nobody is making light of Wednesday's earthquake that struck Amatrice, a small town in the Appenine mountains about 70 miles as the crow flies from Rome, several independent efforts have sprung up to use the town's signature dish — spaghetti all' amatriciana — to help relief efforts.

Hiromi Yamamiro is doing something that's relatively rare in Japan. At age 67, he's still working in the corporate world, where traditionally, the mandatory retirement age has been 60.

But Yamamiro keeps going, because he loves his job — which he's been doing for 18 years — selling environmentally friendly products at Tokyo-based Sato Holdings.

"We're developing new products every single day," he says. "Plus the purpose is to create an environmentally friendly world. And it's just so much fun!"

More than a day after a powerful earthquake struck central Italy, rescue teams are desperately searching for survivors in the rubble of once-charming mountain towns.

At least 241 people died in the disaster, according to civil protection officials, The Associated Press reports. Many of the devastated communities are difficult to reach, and the exact number of missing persons isn't known.

Marxist rebels and the Colombian government met in Havana on Wednesday night to sign a historic peace accord, marking the end to a guerrilla war that has seethed for more than half a century.

The brutal conflict has killed more than 220,000 people and displaced millions.

It's the summer of 1998 and I'm at the mall with my mom and my sister Anna, who has just turned 5. I'm 7. Anna and I are cranky from being too hot, then too cold, then too bored. We keep touching things we are not supposed to touch, and by the time Mom drags us to the register, the cashier seems a little on edge.

"They're mixed, aren't they?" she says. "I can tell by the hair."

Mom doesn't smile, and Mom always smiles. "I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about," she says.

Later, in the kitchen, there is a conversation.