NEW YORK, Jun 16 (IPS) - Floods, earthquakes, and droughts are striking the wallets of the world harder than any other time in history. According to the Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction, the cost of disasters is only growing, with annual expenditures exceeding $2.3 trillion; accounting for over 2% of global GDP, and if represented as a nation, it would have the seventh largest GDP.

BRATISLAVA, Jun 16 (IPS) - “We didn’t want revenge. We want justice—justice for Daphne and for the her stories.”

MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay, Jun 16 (IPS) - At a White House meeting, presidents Nayib Bukele and Donald Trump exchanged praises and joked about mass incarceration while discussing an unprecedented agreement: the USA would pay El Salvador US$6 million a year to house deportees – of any nationality, potentially including US citizens – in its Centre for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT), a notorious mega-prison. This agreement marked the evolution of Bukele’s authoritarian model from a domestic experiment to an exportable commodity for strongmen worldwide.

NEW YORK, Jun 16 (IPS) - Geopolitical tensions – from deepening rivalries between major powers to regional conflicts – have placed acute pressure on the international development agenda. Development assistance from major funders has been on the decline. The world is becoming more unpredictable.

In the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Rwandan-backed rebels, Congolese troops, and allied militias have all committed human rights abuses, some possibly amounting to war crimes, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said in Geneva on Monday.

From the high Himalayas down to sea level, climate change is no longer a distant threat for children in Nepal and the Maldives – it is a daily struggle: landslides tear through mountain villages washing away homes and farms, while rising seas surge over island shorelines, threatening to swallow entire communities.

The UN Secretary-General is set to launch a global campaign to boost support for disarmament and mine action.

The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) announced on Monday that it is cutting global staffing costs by around 30 per cent, following a comprehensive review of its activities, spending, staffing and structure, prompted by major funding shortfalls.

Since conflict erupted in Sudan, more than a million people have fled to neighbouring South Sudan, seeking refuge from escalating violence that has displaced 12.4 million people and plunged over half the Sudanese population into food insecurity.

Eighty years after the United Nations was established to end war, uphold fundamental human rights and promote justice and international law, those founding principles are increasingly under threat, the UN’s human rights chief warned on Monday.