Mike Essien knows the power of literature, especially during the formative years — how it broadens a person’s worldview, fosters learning and drives curiosity.

Growing up in Nigeria as a child, Essien said he was lucky to live in a home filled with books. His parents were both educators, and there was no shortage of stories in his home — something not all the other kids in his neighborhood could relate to.

For 32 years, Essien has been involved with Books for Africa, a St. Paul-based nonprofit that “promotes literacy for underprivileged children in Africa.” Essien, of Woodbury, serves as the country director for Nigeria, meaning he leads the book-donation drives for his home country. In 2025, Essien led projects that sent more than 150,000 books to young people in Nigeria, he said.

“Mike is very important for Books for Africa,” said Tom Warth, founder of Books for Africa. “I think he’s dedicated his life to helping the underprivileged in Nigeria.”

Warth said that since 1998, when Books for Africa began, the nonprofit has shipped close to 65 million books throughout Africa, and more than 5 million of those books have gone directly to Nigeria.

Container captain

Mike Essien, left, greets Naggita Mayimuna of Uganda, Emmanuel Ntivuguruzwa of Rwanda and Mirriam Owino of Uganda, as participants in the Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders volunteer at the Books For Africa warehouse in St. Paul, Thursday July 14, 2022. (Scott Takushi / Pioneer Press)

Essien, an attorney and assistant STEM professor at the University of Wisconsin-Stout, first heard of Books for Africa in 1994. At that time, he’d joined a local chapter of Nigerian engineers in Minnesota who were helping with a book drive through Books for Africa, he said.

“From that day onward, I have been a volunteer in as many capacities as Book for Africa would even allow anybody,” Essien said.

Essien, 67, said he’s served on the board, facilitated drives and collected, sorted and delivered books by hand. Any way that he’s able to help, he has, he said. He even gets students at UW-Stout to get involved.

As a container captain, Essien helps load multiple shipping containers annually that each hold more than 20,000 books, which then are sorted at a warehouse in Atlanta and eventually make their way to Africa.

“We understand the value of books, and making sure that we put as many books in the hands of young people (as possible) is a dream come true personally for me,” Essien said. “It’s an opportunity for me to give a little back.”

Growing up in Nigeria

The passion is personal for Essien.

He said growing up in Akwa Ibom, Nigeria, his parents had a library of books, and none, no matter their subject or age range, was off limits to him and his siblings. Essien said having access to books and reading the day’s newspaper after his father finished it were some of his best introductions to a quality education.

He said he remembers reading a collection of William Shakespeare and being the only one in his class who had. He’s eager to make such books more widely available to youth throughout Africa.

“If I can do anything to make that a little less onerous for somebody, oh, you’ll catch me doing that anytime,” Essien said.

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A 2023 study of 1,422 South African participants by the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund found that 40% of the households surveyed had no books at home.

The Books for Africa website states that 40% of school-age children in Africa do not attend school and 46 million African children have never been in a classroom. “Most African children who attend school have never owned a book of their own,” the organization says. “In many classrooms, 10-20 students share one textbook.”

Essien said the need is there, but it’s one that he hopes will not always be. It’s a dream he said he knows won’t come true in his lifetime.

“A world where children don’t have books is not one I want to imagine,” Essien said. “I know we’re dealing with it in the grand scheme, so the little that Books for Africa does in that space is one we must do because the alternative is awful.”

Changing lives with literature

Essien said he travels to Nigeria from Minnesota at least once a year, and that’s not as much as he’d like to.

There, he connects with Top Faith University, one of Books for Africa’s donation partners. Thousands of books have become available in the school’s library, and not just to students but to entire communities, he said.

“Invariably, I will travel to Nigeria and at a school or someplace there will be a child or a student with a book that came through Books for Africa,” Essien said. “There’s nothing better in the world than that.”

He said he loves seeing young people reading and will often strike up conversations with them about what they’re reading, knowing that Books for Africa made it possible.

“One of the biggest rewards is that I am a beneficiary of the work we do here,” Essien said. “Some of these books, even though they may not literally go to my family, they go to my broader family.”

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The mission of Books for Africa is simple, Essien said: “We aim to end the book famine in Africa.”

A child reading means their world has become a little wider, Essien said. It allows them to see that life is full of possibilities and it gives them the confidence to learn and try new things.

A good example of this in action is the story of William Kamkwamba in “The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind,” Essien said. It’s a biography about how reading a book about windmills inspired Kamkwamba, a boy from Malawi, to build windmills in his own community.

“Who knows what a child would do when they have access to education, to books, and what comes from life for them is unimaginable,” Essien said. “The sky is the limit.”

Books for Africa donations

Book donations are welcome; children’s books are a particular need at this time.

The Books for Africa website lists donations the organization does not accept.

More information on volunteering or donating is available at booksforafrica.org.

A defiant Iran unleashed deadly retaliatory strikes Sunday against Israel and the countries of the Persian Gulf, home to several U.S. military bases, in a conflict that has drawn in much of the Middle East and that critics say has no clear endgame.

Three U.S. troops were killed in action, the Pentagon said Sunday, the first Americans to die in President Donald Trump’s war with Iran. U.S. Central Command did not say where the troops were killed. At least nine people were killed in Israel, and amid fears of a wider conflagration, at least four people were killed in attacks across the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman, according to official reports tallied by The New York Times.

Iran’s top national security official, Ali Larijani, announced that an interim committee would run the country until a successor to the ayatollah was chosen. He also said that the death of the ayatollah would not deter Iran, which he said would hit Israeli and U.S. targets “with a force they have never experienced before.” The supreme leader was killed in his home office in the U.S.-Israeli attack on Saturday, Tasnim, the Iranian news agency, reported.

As the United States and Israel pressed on with their high-risk military campaign, the Israeli military said Sunday that its air force was again bombarding “the heart of Tehran.” Videos verified by The New York Times showed two huge plumes of gray and white smoke rising over Tehran, Iran’s capital, as airstrikes resumed.

After the United States and Israel launched strikes against Iran on Saturday, HRANA, an Iranian rights group based in Washington, said that at least 133 civilians had been killed and 200 others wounded. Iranian state media reported that dozens of children had been killed at a girls’ elementary school near a naval base. The U.S. and Israeli militaries did not comment.

Across the region, many were still trying to understand the extent of the fallout from the stunning events since early Saturday, which began with a surprise U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran and led to Trump’s announcement that the ayatollah was dead.

While some ordinary Iranians celebrated the end of Khamenei’s authoritarian rule, his death also created deep uncertainty about Iran’s future. Israeli and U.S. officials are hoping the attacks on Iran’s leadership, military and missile program will degrade the country’s ability to fight back, but a more vulnerable Iran could also be more unpredictable.

Here’s what else to know:

— American casualties: U.S. Central Command did not say where the three U.S. troops were killed, but it said that several other troops “sustained minor shrapnel injuries and concussions and are in the process of being returned to duty.” Two military officials said that an Army base housing U.S. troops in Kuwait was one of the many U.S. bases in the region that had been hit in retaliatory Iranian strikes.

— Strikes in Israel: Iranian missile barrages repeatedly targeted Israel on Sunday, forcing much of the country into fortified shelters. The Israeli ambulance service said nine people were killed and nearly 30 others wounded in Beit Shemesh, a city about 18 miles west of Jerusalem, making it the worst casualty event in Israel since the conflict started.

— Attacks in the Persian Gulf: Iran’s assaults on Gulf countries were shaking the region’s image as a safe haven. In Dubai, the largest Emirati city and the business and tourism capital of the Middle East, five-star hotels caught fire, explosions shattered the windows of apartment towers, and social media influencers shared videos of fiery projectiles streaking past the city’s iconic skyscrapers.

— Iranian succession: The strikes killed several other senior Iranian figures in addition to the supreme leader, Iranian state media said. The power to choose a new supreme leader rests with the Assembly of Experts, a conservative body of clerics. In the meantime, Iran’s president, the head of the judiciary and a jurist of the clerical Guardian Council will be in charge.

— Shipping impacts: The fighting has shut down shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, the conduit for one-fifth of the world’s oil supply, according to shipping companies and Tasnim, Iran’s semiofficial state media. Major airports, including Dubai International in the UAE, and a wide corridor of airspace were also closed.

— Oil prices: The eight oil-producing countries in the group known as OPEC+ said Sunday that they would increase oil production by 206,000 barrels a day in April, which could help mitigate the impact on oil prices of disrupted shipments in the Middle East.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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By THOMAS ADAMSON

PARIS (AP) — He is known as the French Banksy — or simply JR. Now the artist popular across France for large-scale projects, from photographs to graffiti and street art, wants Parisians to do something unusual on the city’s arguably most famous bridge: stop.

In June, he plans to transform the bustling Pont Neuf that dates back to the 17th century into a walk-through “cave” — a temporary, monumental public artwork that will cover the stone arches with a rocky illusion and invite visitors to cross the River Seine through a tunnel, complete with sound and digitally augmented reality.

He says it’s possibly the “largest immersive installation ever made” and — one that will be accessible around the clock and offer a “totally different approach” to the bridge.

“We’re about to leave something pretty incredible in the middle of Paris,” JR told The Associated Press at his studio in eastern Paris, wearing his trademark hat and shades.

His project, the Pont Neuf Cavern is to run June 6-28, spanning 120 meters (yards) in length and over 17 meters in height.

French artist JR shows his project Pont Neuf Cavern during an interview with The Associated Press in his studio, in Paris, France, Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)

A tribute — and a gamble

The installation is a nod to a Paris legend: the late artistic duo Christo and Jeanne-Claude who in 1985 wrapped Pont Neuf — and its streetlamps — in a pale golden fabric. The project, which took years of negotiations with the authorities, helped define the genre of monumental public art in modern cities across the world.

To JR, the homage is both aesthetic and personal.

“I had the chance to meet Christo along the years,” he said. “We had big respect for each other’s work.”

French artist JR shows his project Pont Neuf Cavern during an interview with The Associated Press in his studio, in Paris, France, Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)

While walking recently on the street with an AP crew, an older woman stopped JR — now, a household name in his country — to share her memories of the Christo and Jeanne-Claude wrapping. She told him she was excited to see the bridge transformed again.

Still, JR — a pseudonym stemming from first name, Jean-René — acknowledges the weight of following in the iconic pair’s footsteps.

“It’s pretty hard to go after them,” he said, “but I’m doing it in a very different style, in my own way.”

His idea is about “bringing back mineral and nature” to the heart of Paris.

From the outside, his installation will make Pont Neuf look “as if it has been overtaken by a prehistoric outcrop,” a structure visible along the banks of the Seine — a rocky mass that is “literally going to break the landscape,” he said.

A photomontage shows the project by French artist JR called Pont Neuf Cavern in his studio, in Paris, France, Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)

Two experiences: the city, then the cave

JR said there will be two main ways for people to experience his installation. From the outside, those heading to Pont Neuf will see the giant installation hundreds of meters away.

And from the inside, once visitors enter the “cave” on Pont Neuf, they will be able to walk through a long tunnel-like structure, having a feeling of “total immersion,” he said.

The cave will allow no daylight in and once inside, visitors “will lose track of time,” JR said.

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A key collaborator on the project is Thomas Bangalter, a former member of French rock band Daft Punk who is creating the sound to accompany the installation — “something you’ll only hear from the inside,” JR said.

Snap’s AR studio in Paris is developing the augmented reality technology. Visitors will be able to use their smartphones to “experience and see things that you can’t see with your eyes,” JR said.

He is intentionally mysterious about what that is — keeping it a surprise until closer to the opening.

JR’s team conducted extensive engineering studies, including tests in a hangar at Paris’ Orly airport, to understand how the structure behaves, especially in an emergency when the electricity that fuels the cave’s air supply cuts off. Tests show the structure stays the same. There is also the security question — the bridge is a busy zone, especially during Paris’ tourist-packed early summer.

JR said visitor numbers will be limited at any given time, and that his team is consulting with authorities on that. During the three weeks of the exhibition, the installation will be continuously monitored.

A photomontage shows the project by French artist JR called Pont Neuf Cavern in his studio, in Paris, France, Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)

A cave, and a metaphor

JR is best known for his large-scale art — enormous portraits pasted on buildings, border walls and rooftops. Because of his origins in graffiti and street art he has inevitably drawn comparison with Banksy, the elusive U.K.-based artist famous for his huge murals and activism.

JR’s installation will not have any massive faces, but the theme is still human, he says: gathering, connection, and what people project onto a shared space.

He says his installation is also an allusion to Plato’s allegory of the cave in which chained men interpret shadows on the cave wall as reality, ignorant of the real world outside — and compares that to the fake reality created by the visual world of our social media platforms.

“What are our caves today is our phone,” JR said, “because we … believe that … our algorithm on social media … is the reality.”

During the installation, which will coincide with June’s Paris Fashion Week and World Music Day, the bridge will close to traffic.

By Michael Ordoña, Los Angeles Times

LOS ANGELES — Some of this year’s Oscar-nominated documentary shorts hit so hard, viewers may be grateful to come across one that simply follows donkeys visiting an observatory in the desert — even if it bumps up against the very boundaries of the genre.

‘All the Empty Rooms’

Director Joshua Seftel hadn’t spoken with his former colleague, longtime CBS News correspondent Steve Hartman, in 25 years. Then Hartman, famed for stories of human kindness and compassion, reached out: He and photojournalist Lou Bopp had been documenting bedrooms left behind by children killed in American school shootings.

“I said to him, ‘This could be a great film,’” says Seftel, though Hartman asked not to be in it. “I said, ‘You are the “Good News Guy” and people trust you. If the Good News Guy is telling you he’s got some bad news, people are going to listen.’ ”

The rooms provide silent testament to those who once lived there. One is festooned in SpongeBob memorabilia; another contains the rack on which a girl would arrange her outfits for the week.

“You meet these families and hear the stories and there’s a heaviness” in the rooms, says Seftel. He says he could see them weigh on Bopp and Hartman. A filmmaker friend, on seeing the film, told Seftel, “Steve Hartman is a haunted man.”

A scene from “Armed Only With a Camera: The Life and Death of Brent Renaud.” (HBO/Warner Bros. Discovery/TNS)

‘Armed Only With a Camera: The Life and Death of Brent Renaud’

Brent Renaud and his brother, Craig, made documentaries in Haiti, Egypt, Iraq and other hot spots, and won awards for their portrait of a troubled Chicago school. Then, while covering the war in Ukraine, Brent was killed by Russian soldiers.

“For Brent, it was always a focus on people caught in the middle of conflicts,” says Craig Renaud. “Going back to the front lines over and over again, we often had to be on the ground for months at a time in these war zones.”

Included in the clips of Brent Renaud’s work: a weeping Iraqi woman clutching the bloody jeans of her slain son; Renaud interviewing a Honduran boy embarking on the hazardous trek to the U.S. on his own; and a Somali man telling Renaud, “The way you hold the camera, you’re doing it from your heart.”

It also includes casual mention of his diagnosis as neurodivergent.

“He’s calm as a monk in a firefight,” Craig Renaud says, “but a cocktail party in Brooklyn is absolutely terrifying.”

‘Children No More: Were and Are Gone’

In Tel Aviv, a group of Israeli protesters stands silently, holding posters emblazoned with the faces of Palestinian children who have been killed in Gaza by the Israeli military.

“They didn’t choose to be part of this war,” says Israeli filmmaker Hilla Medalia. “They were killed not because they brought it on themselves, but because someone decided they needed to die.”

Medalia’s film follows activists whose silent vigils draw both support and condemnation. So far, despite sometimes having to abandon their protests when situations become potentially threatening, they remain undaunted.

“Their focus is to stop the war and this war crime and other things that are happening in our name, and to force the general public to confront those images and to look at the kids and to feel for them,” Medalia says. “It’s amazing to me how humanity and compassion become an act of resistance.”

A scene from “The Devil Is Busy.” (HBO/Warner Bros. Discovery/TNS)

‘The Devil Is Busy’

At a women’s health clinic in Atlanta, a typical day includes religious protesters on megaphones (“All men,” points out co-director Geeta Gandbhir) and women seeking help only to discover their pregnancies are just past the six-week mark, making terminating them illegal in Georgia.

“We decided to focus on the providers,” says Gandbhir. “They’re putting themselves at risk to provide care. What you see are the hurdles they face.”

Co-director Christalyn Hampton says the burdens on these independent clinics have drastically increased as about 50 Planned Parenthood sites closed last year. She points out the spectrum of healthcare provided and the complexity of situations for both patients, many of whom must travel considerable distances, and providers.

“When the technician is giving the young lady a sonogram, the [patient] goes through several emotions: She’s happy, she’s crying, she’s nervous. That speaks to the vulnerability these women feel when they have to make certain decisions. That emotional moment [reminds us] of that human aspect.”

‘Perfectly a Strangeness’

A trio of donkeys traverses a desert to an observatory. Captured with creative camera angles and accompanied by an imaginative score, Alison McAlpine’s film pushes the boundaries of what documentaries are.

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While shooting her previous feature in Chile, McAlpine noticed donkeys hanging out around an observatory. “We hired three gentle donkeys [for the film]. It was a combination of trying to direct the donkeys up from the valley to the observatory, and sometimes we just followed the donkeys.”

McAlpine acknowledges that her film has been difficult to categorize. “Sometimes it’s at IDFA, which is an international documentary festival. Sometimes it’s just competing with fiction, where it’s been lucky to win awards sometimes. But what is a documentary? As soon as you put on a lens and a frame, it’s a personal document, not something objective.

“I’ve been moved because people have been touched; they seem to be transported elsewhere, which is what one wants as a filmmaker.”

©2026 Los Angeles Times. Visit at latimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.