麻豆社

Stories from the US, China, Lithuania and Georgia.

It is a drug epidemic which has cost around half a million lives, yet the people behind it were not dodgy individuals pushing pills and powders on the street. It was major pharmaceutical companies which sold opioids as painkillers, despite being aware these could be highly addictive. OxyContin was the drug implicated in many cases, and now the company which made it has been told that it will not be prosecuted. Indeed, its owners will remain one of the wealthiest families in America. Daniel Thomas has followed the story of OxyContin, and met some of those who fell victim to it.

The Chinese government has recently made rules about what songs can be sung in karaoke bars, and warned film makers not to produce work which is 鈥渧ulgar.鈥� Now, the authorities there have said that 鈥渟issy boys鈥� should not appear on television. They want programmes to promote what they consider to be a more masculine image, and certainly not men in make-up. These are just the latest developments in a more general trend, which critics say shows that the Communist Party is seeking to control ever more areas of life in China. But why now, and what does it mean? Stephen McDonell in Beijing has been unravelling the various factors at work.

There was a time when Lithuania played host to nuclear-armed missiles which could have destroyed any number of cities around the world. Back then, Lithuania was part of the Soviet Union, and with a location which gave it great strategic importance, close to Western Europe, and facing Scandinavia across the sea. But in 1991, Lithuania became fully independent, and suddenly found itself a rather small nation, with only about three and a half million people. Yet Lithuania has been decidedly feisty lately, refusing to back down in a row with China, and standing up for dissidents in neighbouring Belarus. On a recent visit to a small Lithuanian village, Sadakat Kadri, found relics of the country鈥檚 past, with important lessons for the present.

September is not normally a month to focus on Christmas, but for some in Georgia, it is precisely the time of year when the festive season is on their minds. That鈥檚 because this is the harvest season for Georgian pine-seeds, and every year, people climb the country鈥檚 giant fir trees, to get hold of them. The seeds are then exported to Europe, and planted to grow Christmas trees for people鈥檚 homes. It is a huge business, but also a dangerous one, as Amelia Stewart found when she spent a day in the forest with one pine-hunting expert.

(Image: Bottles of OxyContin. Credit: Reuters/George Frey)