Revisited

It was one of the first mass shootings at a US school: On April 20, 1999, two students burst into Columbine High School in Colorado armed with automatic weapons, pistols and rifles. For the next half-hour they shot their way through the school, killing 12 students and one teacher, before turning their guns on themselves as police closed in. The Columbine shooting, covered by news channels across the United States, shocked the nation.

The Japanese archipelago of Okinawa was the scene of one of the bloodiest battles of World War II. Over 82 days in early 1945, an estimated 200,000 soldiers and civilians died in a "typhoon of steel". The legacy of war survives to this day. The United States never left the islands, setting up 32 military bases there. They were used during the wars in Vietnam and Korea, as well as more recently in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Starting in the late 1960s, Italy experienced more than a decade of violence, known as the "Years of Lead". Armed groups on the far right and far left carried out bombings, kidnappings and assassinations. Almost 400 people were killed. In January, after 40 years in exile or on the run, the Italian far-left militant Cesare Battisti was arrested, later confessing to four murders from the 1970s. FRANCE 24's reporters went to meet the families demanding justice for the victims of this dark period.

In 1959, a crackdown by the Chinese army forced the young Dalai Lama to flee Tibet. For 15 days, on foot and on horseback, he crossed the Himalayas. It marked the end of the Tibetans’ armed rebellion against Beijing’s authority. The Indian government offered asylum to the Buddhist spiritual leader in Dharamsala, where thousands of other Tibetans were later to join him. So what remains of the Tibetan struggle today, six decades on? FRANCE 24 reports from Dharamsala.

In 2002, the Boston Globe revealed that thousands of acts of paedophilia had been committed by priests in the Boston region, plunging the American Catholic church into crisis. The Globe investigation revealed that the Church had known about the abuse, which went on for decades, and covered it up. Instead of punishing the priests involved, bishops simply moved them from one parish to another. Over two years, the investigative journalists at the Boston Globe published some 600 articles and a book.

A gateway to Europe, the Greek island of Lesbos saw tens of thousands of refugees arrive in 2015. Back then, the islanders rushed to help the new arrivals. But today, sympathy has given way to exasperation. Many migrants are stuck on the island, waiting for their asylum requests to be processed. Their living conditions are dire; some have lost everything in a fire. Our reporters went to Lesbos, where they witnessed the migrants' plight, but also the growing frustration of local residents.

Seventy years after millions of people fled the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, more than five million Palestinians are still registered by the UN as refugees. Many of them live in the 60 refugee camps spread around the region. Nahr al-Bared is one such camp in the north of Lebanon. More than ten years after the camp was virtually destroyed by the Lebanese army, our reporter looks at the progress made in rebuilding it.

In 1983, Ivorian President Félix Houphouët-Boigny moved the country’s capital city from Abidjan to Yamoussoukro, his birthplace. Huge building sites were set up to transform what was a small village into a modern city: an international airport was built, a polytechnic institute, a presidential palace and even the world's largest church. But most institutions were never transferred to Yamoussoukro and few people ever moved there. FRANCE 24 takes a closer look at Ivory Coast's abandoned capital.

Ten years ago, Spain was hit by a severe economic crisis. A million Spaniards moved abroad in search of a better life and the country’s traditional two-party system took a beating. Our correspondent takes a closer look at what has changed: Although economic indicators paint a rosier picture today, austerity has left its mark and job insecurity is on the rise.

The "Winter on Fire" of 2013-2014 saw Ukrainians oust a kleptocratic leader in violent protests, in the name of closer ties with the EU and adherence to its values of good governance. What did they achieve? Our reporter Gulliver Cragg, who covered the protests at the time, went to meet some of those whose lives were profoundly affected by Ukraine's Maidan Revolution.