Niko Vorobyov

"If it bleeds, it leads." Skim through the headlines of today’s papers and you’ll struggle to find much that’s positive. Coverage of the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis on Saturday might make you think the United States is on the brink of widespread civil disorder, but the truth is that America is set to have its safest year since 1900. Last week, a report by the Council on Criminal Justice examining 40 cities across the US found that homicides in the fell by an astounding 21 percent in 2025. The Trump administration, of course, was quick to take credit. "Deporting criminal illegal alien murderers reduces murders," tweeted Immigration and Customs Enforcement, next to a chart from the study.

‘If it bleeds, it leads,’ Skim through the headlines of today’s American papers and you’ll struggle to find much that’s positive. Coverage of the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis on Saturday might make you think the United States is on the brink of widespread civil disorder, but the truth is that the country is set to have its safest year since 1900. Last week, a report by the Council on Criminal Justice (CCJ) examining 40 cities across the US found that homicides in the fell by an astounding 21 per cent in 2025. The Trump government, of course, was quick to take credit. ‘Deporting criminal illegal alien murderers reduces murders,’ tweeted US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice), next to a chart from the study.

Why exactly Donald Trump ordered that another head-of-state should be kidnapped is up for debate. The official reason for the seizure of Venezuelan president Nicolás Madurowas is drug trafficking: Maduro is the alleged mastermind of the Cartel of the Suns, a drug-dealing branch of the Venezuelan government, and a narco-terrorist. But the US Justice Department has now tacitly conceded that the Cartel of the Suns doesn’t actually exist. Moreover, Trump’s claim of fighting drugs looks peculiar after his pardoning of two narco heavyweights: Ross Ulbricht, the founder of the Silk Road online drugs bazaar; and Juan Orlando Hernández, the ex-president of Honduras who once bragged about up shoving cocaine right up the gringos' noses.

They call them the roses of Sarajevo: scars ripping through the concrete and painted red, marking where an artillery round claimed a life during the longest siege of modern history – a full three-and-a-half years, longer than even the siege of Leningrad.  From May 1992 until December 1995, an average of 329 shells struck the Bosnian capital each day, while snipers took aim at passers-by from vantage points on the mountains surrounding the city. More than 11,000 lives were lost in the siege, including 1,600 children, a memorial to whom now stands in a park. A closer look reveals some of the lost etched into the memorial are simply listed as NN – babies killed before they even had names. Sarajevo might have been under siege, but it was not the worst place to be.

The trap draws open. The long, slender bodies of the greyhounds bolt out in pursuit of the taunting, mechanical hare as a thunderous cheer erupts from the roaring crowd. But over the years, that roar has gotten quieter. Dog racing, once a form of public entertainment more popular than the cinema, is on its last legs. Dog racing, once a form of public entertainment more popular than the cinema, is on its last legs 'At one time in the UK it was the second-most popular sport behind football,' said Greg Cruttwell, director of a documentary film on the sport, Going to the Dogs. 'It has a unique place in British sporting history and culture. In its time, when there were tracks all around the country, it played a very important part in community life.

In 2022, Thailand became the first nation in Asia to lift its ban on cannabis (or 'kancha' in Thai) after decades of prohibition. A massive industry mushroomed practically overnight: you couldn’t turn a street corner in Bangkok without seeing a shopfront with 'DOCTOR WEED' in big, green, neon letters. But now, Bangkok’s hazy days might be over. Last week, health minister Somsak Thepsutin signed a decree outlawing any sales without a doctor’s prescription. Since the vast majority of their customers are not epileptic or recovering chemotherapy patients, this means that most pot shops may well go out of business.

I saw my first murder scene in Manila. On the evening of the 22 January 2018, a pair of assassins on motorbikes rode up to the scrap metal dealer Manny ‘Buddy’ Wagan and blasted him twice in the head. I didn’t witness the killing itself but arrived with my fixer just in time to see a passerby lighting a candle in honour of the deceased, the flickering flame reflected in the pool of blood, brain and skull spread across the pavement.  Manny's death was one of up to 30,000 such slayings over the course of President Rodrigo Duterte's six-year rule of the Philippines between 2016 and 2022. Duterte had declared a war against drugs by pledging to eliminate every last pusher and addict.

Being a drug addict has never been sunshine and roses, especially not on the cold, rainy streets of Glasgow. At least now there may be a glimmer of hope. From today, a 'Safer Drug Consumption Facility' called 'The Thistle' will open in the city that has been labelled Europe's drugs death capital. Drug addicts 'under the supervision of trained health and social care professionals' will be able to shoot up with clean, sterilised syringes. At no point will Old Bill make an unwelcome appearance, dangling a pair of handcuffs. The caveats are that you must be over 18, sharing your drugs is not allowed, and the usual rules about indoor smoking apply. Has Scotland gone mad? The truth is that the facility in Glasgow’s East End may save lives.

On Friday morning, Azwan bin Bohari was marched to the gallows. The 47-year-old Singaporean, himself an addict, was convicted of trafficking 26.5 grams of heroin in 2019. Despite pleas for the Singaporean authorities to halt it, and the fact Azwan was waiting on the outcome of a legal appeal, the execution controversially went ahead. Azwan's appeal that half of what he was caught with was for his own personal consumption – which would have placed him below the threshold for execution – was dismissed by the court. Singapore prides itself on being clean, safe and orderly, telling the world this is because when they say 'zero tolerance', they mean it.

17 October 2019 will forever be etched in the memory of Culiacán, the capital of Sinaloa in northwest Mexico, as Black Thursday. That afternoon, two convoys of soldiers knocked on the door of a safehouse hiding Ovidio Guzmán López, son of drug baron ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán and scion of the Sinaloa Cartel, to execute an arrest warrant. ‘The boss has fallen! The boss has fallen!’ crackled the walkie-talkies. Within minutes, heavy gunfire erupted as mobsters arrived with machine gun turrets mounted on the back of their pick-up trucks. They took over the neighbouring streets and then the rest of the city, seizing roads and bridges and setting buses alight to act as burning barricades.