Rough Translation

This week on Rough Translation, we check in with NPR international correspondents in China, Germany and Greece about the ways that culture shapes—and is reshaped by—responses to the COVID-19 pandemic.

A young Chinese exchange student in Taiwan with no history of activism posts a video criticizing China's president Xi Jinping on Twitter, then asks for asylum. His request for protection fuels a larger discussion about Taiwan's role as a haven for Chinese dissidents, and also raises questions about who he is as an individual and his motivations. Who is he, and can he be trusted?

This week, we present the latest episode of NPR's Throughline, a look at the life and complicated legacy of the assassinated Iranian military leader, Qassem Soleimani.

Please, take our ! At a Ukrainian comedy competition founded by President Volodymyr Zelensky, can humor unite a divided country?

In the country on the other side of the impeachment hearings... A comedian runs for president of Ukraine and wins in a landslide, with a parliamentary majority to pass any law he wants. So now what? Our host, Gregory Warner, reports from Kyiv.