The Commonwealth Foundation has announced the five regional winners of the Commonwealth Short Story Prize on Wednesday.

The regional winners are Joshua Lubwama from Uganda (Africa), Faria Basher from Bangladesh (Asia), Chanel Sutherland from Canada/Saint Vincent and the Grenadines (Canada and Europe), Subraj Singh from Guyana (Caribbean), and Kathleen Ridgwell from Australia (Pacific). The overall winner will be announced on June 25.

Basher is the first Bangladeshi-origin writer to win the regional Prize. She holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Edinburgh and a master’s degree from New York University.

Taking the reader from a surf shack in Australia to a village in Guyana on the eve of independence, the stories tackle powerful themes head-on. The stories present the clash between generations as a boy’s illiterate mother fears and resents the unconventional newcomer; the lost memories of enslaved Africans for whom storytelling is their final act of defiance; the legacy of colonialism reflected in a demon that threatens to prey on a young baby; the pressures on young women in their twenties to get married and rear children – or face dire consequences; and how two young people form an unlikely friendship in the face of racism and family pressure.

Chair of the Judges, Vilsoni Hereniko, said,...