Cuts force World Food Programme to end support for half a million Palestinians in Gaza

By: Emma Graham-Harrison in Jerusalem and Seham Tantesh in Gaza

19 October 2026 at 05:54

Two-thirds of population face crisis levels of food insecurity and 200,000 people are in danger of famine

This winter is likely to deepen hunger for Palestinians in Gaza, after sweeping aid cuts forced the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) to end support for more than half a million people each month, the agency’s director for Palestine said.

More than a year after a Trump-brokered ceasefire came into force, promised reconstruction has not begun, there are few jobs and the vast majority in Gaza still rely on aid to eat.

Cop17 at a glance: everything you need to know about the UN’s nature summit

The Guardian

By: Patrick Greenfield

19 October 2026 at 00:00

This month’s biodiversity summit in Yerevan, Armenia, aims to push governments to meet the 23 targets agreed at Cop15 in 2022

This month, nearly every country on Earth will return to the question of how to stem the rapid destruction of the natural world. Humans are driving it, but so far we have not found a way to stop it.

In late 2022, governments reached an ambitious once-in-a-decade deal to better protect nature amid scientific warnings that the planet is going through the largest loss of life since the extinction of the dinosaurs. Now, they are assessing their progress on the targets for the first time.

Food and fuel run low as besieged Yemeni city braces for Houthi breakthrough

The Guardian

By: A Guardian reporter in Yemen and William Christou

15 October 2026 at 06:18

Speed of advance has left people rushing to buy food as basic supplies to city are cut off by fighting

Ali Abdulsamed spent all day waiting and walking. Like many people in the besieged Yemeni city of Taiz, he was searching for some food for his family of six. But each time he reached the end of the queue at the grocers, he was greeted with empty shelves. He would go on foot to the next shop, unable to afford the price of petrol, which more than doubled last week.

After visiting more than a dozen stores, Abdulsamed managed to find a 25kg bag of wheat flour – sold at more than twice its usual price. It would have to do, he was lucky to find anything at all.

How Europe’s most wanted cocaine trafficker turned Sierra Leone into the world’s first true narco state

The Guardian

By: Mark Townsend

14 October 2026 at 02:00

Drawing on dozens of interviews with intelligence and police officers across two continents, a Guardian investigation reveals the murderous cost of our insatiable appetite for cocaine

As abductions go, few have been more brazen. Alan Jalloh was with two friends outside Goodies supermarket, frantic as usual with late afternoon shoppers. Rush hour in downtown Freetown, Sierra Leone’s capital, was under way with familiar gusto.

A black Toyota Rav4 forced its way through the Peninsula highway traffic. Witnesses describe burly white men leaping out, yanking on balaclavas. Jalloh, 40, seemed to freeze. As did his two friends, one a famous Freetown footballer. All three were dragged into the waiting SUV. None of them have been seen since.

IPCC is under pressure to delay publication of key global climate report

The Guardian

By: Fiona Harvey Environment editor

13 October 2026 at 01:00

AR7 report was scheduled for 2028 in time for Cop33 summit but some petro-states and major developing countries want to postpone it

Scientists are coming under pressure from some petro-states and major developing countries to delay publication of a key global report on the climate, despite pleas from vulnerable countries worried that postponement could spell disaster for them.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the UN-convened body of the world’s leading climate scientists, is meeting this week in Addis Ababa to discuss its seventh assessment report, a comprehensive survey of all that is known about the climate crisis.

UN condemns Coco Gauff abuse and warns: ‘Black female athletes are being targeted’

The Guardian

By: Associated Press

10 October 2026 at 08:22

Human rights office denounces online targeting
‘Appalling vitriol and abuse’ of American

The United Nations’ human rights office has condemned the racist abuse of Coco Gauff and called for solidarity to help push back against racism and sexism.

The office, led by high commissioner Volker Türk, issued a social media post on Saturday saying the racist messages sent online targeting the American tennis player were “appalling and illustrate that Black female athletes are specifically targeted for vitriol and racial abuse”.

Twelve killed and hundreds injured in Houthi attack at Riyadh airport

The Guardian

By: Patrick Wintour Diplomatic editor and agencies

10 October 2026 at 19:37

Donald Trump evaluating whether US should join Saudi strikes against the Iran-backed Yemeni rebels

Yemen’s Houthis have launched a missile attack on Riyadh’s international airport in Saudi Arabia, killing at least 12 people and leaving hundreds wounded, the Saudi Civil Aviation Authority has said.

Operations at King Khalid international airport in Riyadh were suspended as ambulances rushed to the airport. More than 300 people were reported injured in the deadliest attack in any Gulf Arab country since the start of the Iran war.

U.N. Warns Against Technology Used to Read Citizens’ Minds

NYT: Science

By: Jonathan Moens

9 October 2026 at 05:32

A report by the secretary general warned that new technologies could be used to access and criminalize people’s innermost thoughts.

While neurotechnologies have become powerful clinical tools for patients with brain injuries, the United Nations on Thursday warned that future technologies could be abused by governments.

America’s A.I. Leaders Warn U.N. of Possible Peril Absent a Global Response

NYT: Technology

By: Dustin Volz and Farnaz Fassihi

23 September 2026 at 19:54

Sam Altman of OpenAI and Dario Amodei of Anthropic told the Security Council that international cooperation was needed to ensure that A.I. remains under human control.

Sam Altman, the head of OpenAI, told the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday that A.I.’s development had made its “upside more tangible, but also the stakes and risks more immediate.”

Global Warming Will Breach the 1.5 Degree Celsius Limit. Now What?

NYT: Science

By: Chico Harlan

14 September 2026 at 05:02

As global temperature increase shoots past 1.5 degrees Celsius, the vulnerable countries that fought for that Paris Agreement target face a brutal new reality.

Wildfires burning in southwestern France this summer.

August Ties for Hottest Month on Record

NYT: Science

By: Raymond Zhong

9 September 2026 at 22:00

Sweltering summer temperatures put last month on par with July 2023 for global warmth, scientists said. More records could be broken in the months ahead.

A vendor cooled off with a frozen water bottle in a market in Seoul on Aug. 6.

U.N. Says World Will Miss Its 1.5-Degree Climate Target

NYT: Science

By: Chico Harlan

3 September 2026 at 08:47

Carbon removal combined with emissions reduction is the only remaining pathway to avert catastrophic levels of warming, a new report warns.

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