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Heavy metal music is controversial in some conservative societies but quite popular in the world’s largest Muslim-majority country. As VOA’s Dave Grunebaum reports, heavy metal has a home in Indonesia.

Limited medical resources in Africa force some patients to travel abroad for specialized surgeries. Now, a new special surgery institute has opened in Ghana to try and help. Senanu Tord reports from Accra, Ghana.

British citizen Peter Fouche has been volunteering with Ukraine’s Armed Forces since March 2022. Before Russia’s invasion, he was working as a carpenter in London, but after the start of the war he made the decision to travel to Ukraine to help. In January 2024, he officially enlisted in the country’s Armed Forces. Anna Kosstutschenko met with the man and learned about what motivated him.” Camera and edit: Pavel Suhodolskiy

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ISLAMABAD — Pakistan said Tuesday that recent militant attacks in the country, including a deadly suicide car bombing on Chinese engineers, were planned from “terrorist sanctuaries” in Afghanistan. Major-General Ahmed Sharif, spokesperson for Pakistan’s military, leveled the allegations during a live broadcast news conference. He said Afghanistan’s Taliban government has failed to prevent the use of Afghan soil for cross-border terrorism despite repeated protests and sharing of “solid evidence” with them through diplomatic channels. In late March, a suicide bomber rammed his explosives-laden car into a convoy of Chinese engineers and workers in northwestern Pakistan, killing five of them and their local driver. The slain Chinese nationals were working on a major dam project. “This attack was planned in Afghanistan, and terrorists and their facilitators were also being controlled from there,” said Sharif. “The car used in it was readied in Afghanistan, and the suicide bomber was also an Afghan national.” The spokesperson also said Pakistani security forces captured and killed several Afghan nationals who were carrying out recent terrorist attacks, adding that members of the Afghan-based, anti-Pakistan Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, along with other fugitive insurgents, orchestrated the cross-border terror attacks. Explaining that the Afghanistan-based terror group is aiming to undermine peace and stability in Pakistan, Sharif said, “The main reason for the new wave of terrorism in Pakistan is the facilitation and supply of modern weapons to the TTP” by elements in the Taliban government. There was no immediate reaction from Taliban representatives, but Kabul has rejected such allegations in the past, maintaining it still bars anyone from attacking Pakistan or any country. Surging TTP and other insurgent attacks have strained Islamabad’s ties with Kabul. TTP, designated as a global terrorist organization by the United States and the United Nations, is a close ally of Afghanistan’s fundamentalist Taliban rulers. The group is known to have provided recruits and shelter to Taliban leaders in Pakistani border areas when the Taliban was staging insurgent attacks against the U.S.-led NATO troops in Afghanistan for almost two decades. The Taliban seized power in 2021 as all foreign forces withdrew from the country. Pakistani officials and the latest United Nations assessments have documented the presence of thousands of TTP fighters on Afghan soil since the Taliban takeover. Sharif said Tuesday that growing incidents of terrorism in Pakistan prompted the government to evict undocumented Afghans and send them back to their native country. He noted that more than 563,000 Afghans living illegally in Pakistan had gone home since October, when Islamabad began its crackdown on undocumented migrants. The crackdown is not targeting an estimated 1.3 million registered Afghan refugees in the country and the more than 800,000 others carrying government-approved Afghan citizenship cards.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

BEIRUT — The United States has repatriated 11 of its citizens from sprawling camps in northeastern Syria that house tens of thousands of family members of suspected Islamic State militants, the U.S. State Department said Tuesday. The repatriation was the largest Washington has carried out from the camps to date, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement. Five of the 11 citizens brought back were children, and one non-U.S. citizen child — the 9-year-old sibling of one of the other children — was also brought with them. As part of the same operation, the U.S. facilitated the repatriation of 11 other camp residents, eight of them children, to Canada, the Netherlands and Finland, the statement said. Although the pace of repatriations has picked up — neighboring Iraq recently returned hundreds of its citizens — many countries remain reluctant to bring back citizens from the al Hol and al Roj camps, which now hold about 30,000 people from more than 60 countries, most of them children. The camps are run by local authorities affiliated with the U.S.-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces. The SDF and its allies, including U.S.-led coalition forces, defeated the Islamic State group in Syria in 2019, ending its self-proclaimed Islamic "caliphate" that had ruled over a large swath of territory straddling Iraq and Syria. Human rights groups have regularly reported on what they describe as inhumane living conditions and abuses in the camps and in detention centers where suspected Islamic State members are housed. "The only durable solution to the humanitarian and security crisis" in the facilities "is for countries to repatriate, rehabilitate, reintegrate, and where appropriate, ensure accountability for wrongdoing," Blinken said in the statement.

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Amsterdam — German police on Tuesday broke up a protest by several hundred pro-Palestinian activists who had occupied a courtyard at Berlin's Free University earlier in the day, the latest such action by authorities as protests that have roiled campuses in the United States spread across Europe. The protesters had put up about 20 tents and formed a human chain around the tents. Most had covered their faces with medical masks and had draped kufiyah scarves around their heads, shouting slogans such as "Viva, viva Palestina." Earlier on Tuesday, Dutch police arrested about 125 activists as they broke up a similar pro-Palestinian demonstration camp at the University of Amsterdam. In Berlin, police called on the students via loudspeakers to leave the campus. Police could also be seen carrying some students away and some scuffles erupted between police officers and protesters. Police used pepper spray against some of the protesters. The school's administrators said in a statement that the protesters had rejected any kind of dialogue and they had therefore called in police to clear the campus. "This form of protest is not geared towards dialogue. An occupation is not acceptable on the FU Berlin campus," university president Guenter Ziegler said. FU is the abbreviation for Free University. "We are available for academic dialog — but not in this way." The administrators said some protesters attempted to enter rooms and lecture halls at Free University in order to occupy them. The protest organizers, which say they are made up of students from various Berlin universities and other individuals, had called on other students and professors to take part in the action, the university statement said. In recent days, students have held protests or set up encampments in Finland, Denmark, Italy, Spain, France and Britain, following earlier protests at U.S. campuses. Amsterdam police said on the social media platform X that their action was "necessary to restore order" after protests turned violent. There were no immediate reports of injuries. Video from the scene aired by national broadcaster NOS shows police using a mechanical digger to push down barricades and officers with batons and shields moving in, beating some of the protesters and pulling down tents. Protesters had formed barricades from wooden pallets and bicycles, NOS reported. The demonstrators occupied a small island at the university son Monday, calling for a break in academic ties with Israel over the war in Gaza. After clearing the Amsterdam protest by early afternoon Tuesday, police closed off the area by metal fences. Students sat along the banks of a nearby canal. The school said in a statement that police ended the demonstration at its Roeterseiland campus overnight Tuesday "due to public order and safety concerns." "The war between Israel and Hamas is having a major impact on individual students and staff," it said. "We share the anger and bewilderment over the war, and we understand that there are protests over it. We stress that within the university, dialogue about it is the only answer." In Finland, dozens of protesters from the Students for Palestine solidarity group set up an encampment outside the main building at the University of Helsinki, saying they would stay there until the university, which is Finland's largest academic institution, cuts academic ties with Israeli universities. In Denmark, students set up a pro-Palestinian encampment at the University of Copenhagen, erecting about 45 tents outside the campus of the Faculty of Social Sciences. The university said students can protest but called on them to respect the rules on campus grounds. "Seek dialogue, not conflict and make room for perspectives other than your own," the administrators said on X. The administration "cannot and must not express an opinion on behalf of university employees and students about political matters, including about the ongoing conflict" in Israel and the Palestinian territories, the statement said. On their Facebook page, members of the activist group Students Against the Occupation said their attempts to talk to the administration over the past two years about withdrawing the school's investments from companies with ties to activities in Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories have been in vain. "We can no longer be satisfied with cautious dialogue that does not lead to concrete action," the group said. In Italy, students at the University of Bologna, one of the world's oldest universities, set up a tent encampment over the weekend to demand an end to the war in Gaza as Israel prepared an offensive in Rafah, despite pleas from its Western allies against it. Groups of students organized similar protests in Rome and Naples, which were largely peaceful. More than a dozen tents were set up in a piazza named for a university student who fought against fascist rule during World War II. Some were decorated with Palestinian flags and a banner read "Student Intefadeh," or "Student Uprising." In Spain, dozens of students have spent over a week at a pro-Palestinian encampment on the University of Valencia campus. Similar camps were set up Monday at the University of Barcelona and at the University of the Basque Country. A group representing students at Madrid's public universities announced it would step up protests against the war in the coming days. In Paris, student groups called for gatherings in solidarity with Palestinians later Tuesday. On Friday, French police peacefully removed dozens of students from a building at the Paris Institute of Political Studies, known as Sciences Po, after they had gathered in support of Palestinians. On Tuesday, students at the prestigious institution, which counts French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal and President Emmanuel Macron among its alumni, were seen entering the campus unobstructed to take exams as police stood at the entrances. Protests took place last week at some other universities in France, including in Lille and Lyon. Macron's office said police had been requested to remove students from 23 sites on French campuses.

Methane leaking from fossil fuel production is among the top contributors to climate change. Now a leading environmental scientist is hoping to provide more accurate and consistent findings of methane emissions with the launch of a technologically advanced satellite. VOA’s Julie Taboh has more, in this week’s episode of LogOn. (Produced by: Adam Greenbaum)

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Jakarta, Indonesia — The sounds from guitars strumming and drums beating sears through the air. Crowds dance in circles while thumping their heads back and forth. Some 38,000 fans attended Hammersonic this past weekend, according to organizers of Southeast Asia’s largest annual heavy metal music festival. Featuring 55 bands, the event is held in Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim majority country. One of the groups performing, Lamb of God, was barred from performing in neighboring Malaysia in 2013 after Islamic leaders there said some of the band’s songs were blasphemous. Interestingly, the current president of Indonesia, Joko Widodo, talks openly about his passion for heavy metal and says he’s a fan of Lamb of God. “We’re a moderate Muslim country and that’s why we’re more open to foreign influence including heavy metal music than some more conservative countries” said Pri Ario Damar, dean of the performing arts faculty at the Jakarta Institute of Arts. Damar, 49, was a bass guitarist in a local heavy metal band back in the 1990s and currently plays with his students from time to time. “Heavy metal has been popular here for decades,” he says. “So there are several generations of listeners here who appreciate it as an outlet to comment on society, politics and the environment.” At 6 p.m. local time, during a break in the live performances at Hammersonic, many fans went to the designated prayer area. Some of them prayed wearing heavy metal t-shirts simultaneously showing their Muslim faith and favorite music. While bands from around the world took the stage, Dian Ranidita, a 40-year-old Indonesian mother of three, tapped her feet to the rhythms while her husband Yanuardi gently bobbed his head up and down. “The stereotype of heavy music is always dark, violent, aggressive and also like a devil, but actually heavy metal is not like that,” Dian said, adding that she’s been a heavy metal fan since high school because of the different themes in the music that she relates to. “For instance, romantic themes when you have a broken heart or feeling like fall in love with someone. And also if you’re feeling depressed, there are also depression themes, and when you’re feeling like you want to release your adrenaline,” she said. “Those are some of the many themes in heavy metal.” Sisi Selatan is a heavy metal band from the Indonesian city of Solo. The group performed songs about love and social activism while fans in front of the stage jumped up and down. Band members say Indonesia is a country that embraces foreign cultural influences. “We [Indonesians] absorb foreign cultures,” said guitarist Adi Wibowo. “Not only metal music, but also Korean, Japanese, Indian music and more. We embrace these types of music.” Denisa Dhaniswara is a 24-year-old heavy metal vocalist from Jakarta. Like many singers, she writes songs based on her own personal experiences in life. “A lot of my lyrics are filled with grief and greed. So, I really want people to feel unsettled when you listen to my music,” she said. “It’s a way of saying: I’ve been feeling like this, do you relate? If you relate that’s good. I mean I’m not alone here.” Dhaniswara says Indonesia’s heavy metal fanbase is growing as performers get better and better. “Indonesia has a lot of newer heavy metal bands and that makes me very happy because we’re always emerging,” she said. “Always finding out new stuff. Everybody’s so creative.”

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

A Muslim-dominated neighborhood in the Indian capital that held a massive months-long protest of a new citizenship law four years ago has transformed into one of the city’s food hubs. Residents link its new identity to the protests when people from different communities bonded over food. From New Delhi, Anjana Pasricha has a report. Camera: Darshan Singh