Battles are raging in Tripoli between forces aligned with the UN-backed government and a renegade general named Khalifa Haftar. Haftar and his militias had controlled eastern parts of the country, including the city of Benghazi, but in recent weeks he has marched his troops westward, toward the capitol Tripoli, in an effort to oust the Libya’s internationally recognized government.

Several hundred people have been killed in this fighting. Thousands have been displaced, and the situation is now very much on the precipice of descending into a full blown civil war.

On the line with me to discuss what is happening in Libya and why we need to be paying attention to this escalating crisis is Mary Fitzgerald, a former journalist and researcher who has been studying Libya since 2011. In this conversation she breaks down the complex dynamics of this conflict in ways that I found very understandable.

No one knows which side the US is backing

We kick off discussing a rather unusual turn of events. On April 19th, I and every other reporter who subscribes to the White House email list, received a note in our inbox that was a White House summary of a phone call between Donald Trump and Khalifa Haftar. In the call, the President offered his support behind the renegade general. This statement seemed to reverse US policy on Libya, which is to support the UN-backed government. Subsequent reporting by Bloomberg news has confirmed that US National Security advisor John Bolton gave a “green light” for Haftar to launch his assault on Tripoli. This seemingly undermined the State Department’s position, which was to oppose the military offensive by Haftar.

If you have 20 minutes and want to understand this unfolding conflict in Libya, have a listen.

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In mid-march, Cyclone Idai struck southern Africa, ravaging parts of Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe. Of these countries, Mozambique was hardest hit. The storm struck the port city Beira and surrounding areas, creating a massive inland flood plane. At the time, the World Meteorological Organization called it one of the worst weather related disasters to ever strike the southern hemisphere.

One month on, I wanted to get a sense of the how the recovery efforts were progressing, so I called up Dorothy Sang of Oxfam, who is on the line with me today from the city of Beira in Mozambique.

Dorothy Sang is Oxfam’s humanitarian advocacy manager and in this conversation she describes the scale of the damage wrought by Cyclone Idai and how international relief agencies like Oxfam are responding to this crisis.

One thing that struck me about this conversation is how over one month since this crisis, relief agencies are still finding communities that have been totally cut off from access.  Aid has not reached many stranded communities, and relief agencies are relying on expensive air drops to deliver aid.

If you have twenty minutes and want to learn how the relief and recovery efforts are progressing in the wake of one of the worst natural disasters in history, have a listen.

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Support relief efforts, via Oxfam,via the UN’s Central Emergency Response Fund, or your favorite charity,

The White House confirmed that Egyptian President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi is to meet President Trump at the White House on April 9. The invitation to the White House was offered amid a deepening crackdown on human rights and a further erosion of the rule of law in Egypt, nearly six years after al-Sisi ousted President Mohammad Morsi.

The White House visit comes as Egypt is facing yet another inflection point that could further ensconce al Sisi in power. At issue are a series of constitutional amendments that would effectively make al Sisi president for life and create what analyst Amy Hawthorne calls a “personalist dictatorship.”

Amy Hawthorne is the deputy director for research at the Project on Middle East Democracy and co-author of a recent Foreign Policy piece on the current tumult in Egyptian politics.. After years of crackdowns on political opposition, she explains why Egyptian politics is poised to enter a potentially more dangerous phase.

We kick off with an extended conversation about the circumstances that brought al Sisi to power, including the events of Egypt’s Arab spring and its aftermath.  We then discuss the implications of recent moves by al Sisi to further consolidate power.

We recorded this conversation a few days before it was announced that al Sisi was to visit Washington, DC on April 9th. If you are listening to this episode contemporaneously, Amy Hawthorne does a good job of setting the scene for that visit.  If you have 20 minutes and want to learn how al-Sisi has subverted democracy and undermined human rights in Egypt over the last six years, have a listen.

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