What's as addictive as alcohol or tobacco, targets the young and underprivileged and makes millions for sports franchises? As we set our gaze beyond the ball at the pitch-side billboards at Euro 2021, ads for beer and home appliances seem a dying breed. Instead, online sports betting rules. It's been more than a decade since most European nations loosened rules on online gambling. What are the consequences?

A ceasefire on whose terms? The leadership in Ethiopia's rebel region of Tigray has set terms for a truce in reply to what government forces billed as a unilateral cessation of hostilities and what aid groups worry may in fact be a siege, with aid blocked and internet cut off for the restive region. Some 1.7 million displaced people now face a food crisis, with up to 400,000 people potentially facing famine.

It is a celebration of Marxist-Leninism in what could soon be the world's top capitalist power. Communism is alive and well and living in China, where the party partied this Thursday to mark its centenary birthday. Much of those 100 years were indeed a struggle and a bloody one. But for three decades now, the planet's most populous nation has gone from strength to strength.

Will he go quietly? Jacob Zuma has five days to leave his KwaZulu-Natal ranch and start serving a 15-month jail sentence for contempt of court. South Africa's 79-year-old former president had refused to appear before the corruption inquiry that's been looking into the alleged siphoning of public funds on his watch. Why does Zuma seemingly prefer jail to answering questions about what South Africans call state capture?

Will history repeat itself when the US leaves Afghanistan? The Taliban continue to advance ahead of a drawdown that could be finalised in a matter of weeks. The insurgency has even reached the gates of Kunduz, far from its traditional base in the south. As we illustrate in an excerpt from our exclusive report, the Taliban already control vast swathes of the countryside. Is their return to power inevitable? Does it signal an end to women's rights and civil liberties as was the case in pre-9/11 Afghanistan?

Should Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen worry? Polls still predict a rematch next year of the 2017 presidential runoff, but a record abstention rate in Sunday's second round of French regional elections shows how volatile outcomes can be when citizens vote with their feet. Indifference or disillusion? How would a low turnout upset the form in 2022?

What's up with Bitcoin? It's down, dropping to its lowest level since January after China announced a crackdown on cryptocurrency mining. Is it, as stated, about going green and cooling it in the nation that's home to an estimated two-thirds of the energy-sucking giant computer servers that create virtual currencies? Or is it about reining in a cottage industry that is out of not only Beijing's control, but that of central banks and regulators the world over?

Human rights activists are saying thank you to UEFA. By siding with Budapest and barring Munich city hall from displaying rainbow-coloured lights for the Germany-Hungary match, European football's governing body has unwittingly drawn attention to Hungary's new anti-gay legislation that de facto criminalises references to homosexuality. We ask about the backlash and the support of Viktor Orban's government for UEFA's position that sports shouldn't mix with politics and religion.

Bold step or betrayal? Spain's Socialist prime minister went to Barcelona on Monday to announce the conditional pardon of nine prominent Catalan separatists, jailed for organizing a banned 2017 independence referendum. With two years left in his mandate, Pedro Sanchez says he sees an opportunity, with the promise of dialogue to follow. He's ready to brave public opinion: a recent survey has more than six in ten Spaniards against clemency.

His supporters had been waiting ten years for this day. Laurent Gbagbo basked in a hero's welcome for his grand return to Abidjan. It took a brief rekindling of Ivory Coast's civil war to force out the former president when he refused to concede the 2010 election to current leader Alassane Ouattara. After the case against Gbagbo fell apart at the International Criminal Court, we ask about the terms and conditions of the return of a larger-than-life political figure.