What does a child bride bring to a marriage — a dowry, social status, domestic labor, business connections? What is her value to two families, the one she leaves and the one she joins? And what is the cost to the girl?

ON THIS DAY IN AMERICAN HISTORY On July 29, 1958, Congress creates the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA. The move came in response to the Soviet Union’s launch of the first-ever satellite, Sputnik . The launch of the satellite was a huge embarrassment to the United States, which prided itself on its technological prowess. While the Soviets maintained the edge in the space race for years, including putting the first man in space, NASA slowly but surely caught up and surpassed them, winning the ultimate race to put men on the Moon in 1969. Since the race to the Moon, NASA has launched numerous space probes to explore Solar System, landed spacecraft on Mars and cooperated on missions with the USSR and later, Russia. There have been setbacks, including the fire on Apollo 1 as well as the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger during launch and the disintegration of space shuttle Columbiaduring re-entry.

VIDEO: China’s government uses advanced technology to monitor and censor daily life of people in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous region, according to Jewher Ilham, daughter of prominent jailed Uighur scholar and economist, Ilham Tohti. Her observation comes amid reports that the U.S. government is considering sanctions against Chinese video surveillance firm Hikvision for its role in China’s treatment of its Uighur minority in the internment camps

The Justice Department announced Thursday that it will resume federal executions in the United States after a 16-year pause. While the death penalty remains popular among most Americans, the level of support for capital punishment has fallen well below levels seen when the last federal execution took place in 2003.

A proposal to put tourist hotels on a Philippine islet in the South China Sea could boost Manila’s broader maritime sovereignty claim as it tries to hold off its more powerful rival, China, experts say.

A Chinese government official on Monday called on the people of Hong Kong to oppose violence and accused some Western politicians of stirring unrest. The comments followed a tense night in Hong Kong, where protesters surged onto city streets and defied riot police who pelted them for hours with tear gas and rubber bullets.