Back in 2015 the world's leaders committed to a sweeping set of targets to lift the world's poorest citizens into a decent life by 2030. Four years later, it's clear that the world is nowhere near on track to meet these 17 so-called "Sustainable Development Goals." And millions of children still face a lifetime of inequality because of such factors as where they are born, their gender and their race.

"My hometown, where I once lived, is a mountain village with blossoming flowers."

The lyrics to this folk song, which is sung in both Koreas, evoke nostalgia for a time and a place to which one can never return.

On a recent day, it is playing at a makeshift shrine in downtown Seoul. There's an altar with flowers, alongside photos of 42-year-old North Korean defector Han Seong-ok and her 6-year-old son, Kim Dong-jin.

Veteran journalist Cokie Roberts, who joined an upstart NPR in 1978 and left an indelible imprint on the growing network with her coverage of Washington politics before later going to ABC News, has died. She was 75.

Roberts died Tuesday because of complications from breast cancer, according to a family statement.

For Carlos Marroquín, the chickens are all that's left.

For the last several years, Marroquín has struggled to feed his wife and five children with the proceeds from their ten-acre corn farm. They live in a mud-brick house with a sloped terra-cotta roof, nestled among pines, acacias and prickly pear cactus in Guatemala's mountainous northern Quiché region, part of the country's Dry Corridor that has been gripped by a multiyear drought.

Updated at 10:45 a.m. ET

An explosion at a campaign rally for Afghan President Ashraf Ghani killed at least 26 people and wounded more than 30 others on Tuesday. Ghani reportedly was not harmed in the bombing, for which the Taliban later claimed responsibility.

The Taliban also said it was behind a second attack in which a suicide bomber detonated a device in Kabul, in an area near the U.S. Embassy and other official buildings. At least 22 people died and dozens were injured in the blast around 1 p.m. local time, the Afghan Interior Ministry says.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Likud party are facing voters for the second time in just five months in an unprecedented contest that has the potential to end Netanyahu's decade-long grip on power.

Months of political limbo followed the previous election in April that saw Likud and the centrist Blue and White party each win 35 seats in the 120-seat Knesset, Israel's parliament.

Austin is about to become the first city in the U.S. to fund groups that help women who seek abortions pay for related logistical costs, such as a babysitter, a hotel room or transportation.

The move is an effort to push back against a new Texas law that went into effect Sept. 1. The state law bans local governments from giving money to groups that provide abortions — even if that money doesn't pay for the actual procedure.

On the face of it, NASA's newest probe sounds incredible. Known as Dragonfly, it is a dual-rotor quadcopter (technically an octocopter, even more technically an X8 octocopter); it's roughly the size of a compact car; it's completely autonomous; it's nuclear powered; and it will hover above the surface of Saturn's moon Titan.

Over the past couple of years, Strasburg Township's zoning office in Pennsylvania found itself fielding more and more requests from Amish to house horses on residential lots.

Most Amish in Lancaster County today work outside the farm, so they have been moving into homes on smaller lots — but they still need horses for transportation.

In response, Strasburg Township's board of supervisors voted to allow the horses — with some restrictions.

Remember those old "wanted" posters on TV Westerns? They offered rewards for handing over a person to law enforcement. In more recent times, rewards are less about bounty hunting and more about persuading people to provide information that can help solve a crime. It's an attempt to use money to overcome fear and apathy, and sometimes that can be difficult.